Life on the Home Front: Stories of Those Who Worked, Waited, and Worried During World War II
"This account by historian Julie McDonald Zander is centered primarily on the activities of those employed by the Boeing Aircraft Company wing factory in Chehalis, Washington, building the wings for B-17s. The wings were shipped to the company's Seattle plant where they were put together with other parts and became the workhorse bombers of World War II.
"It's more than a story of ladies getting up and going to work every day, though. It tells of the other struggles in their lives and how they balanced those things with the need to support the war effort. Some had the pain of losing loved ones during the fighting, and others even saw local friends who happened to be of Japanese ancestry shuttled off to internment camps.
"McDonald's accounts, based on hours of interviews with survivors and illustrated with precious photos from their albums, may bring a tear to one's eye, but it will probably be a tear of pride in what the distaff side of the Greatest Generation was able to accomplish."
John Martin, former newspaper editor