Double Victory: How African American Women Broke Race and Gender Barriers to Help Win World War II
1 In 2002 Thomasina Walker Johnson Norford died quietly in her sleep at the age of 94 The New York Amsterdam News described her as the epitome of elegant refinement culture and deter mination Her parents who were long dead would have been pleased and proud to know that their daughter had retained her elegance and refinement in her old age But they most likely would have been surprised considering the direction their daughter’s career had taken When Thomasina was growing up her parents had tried to convince her that nice little girls are not interested in politics and labor unions they teach Thomasina tried to obey her par ents she became a teacher But when she ran into problems because she was black she left the teaching profession Thoma sina turned to politics and labor unions becoming an influen tial lobbyist in Washington DC where a woman in the halls of Congress was an unusual sight and where a black woman in a prominent professional position was almost unheard of in the 1940s Professional opportunities for women of Thomasina’s gen eration were limited But for women who were not white the introduction
2 INTRODUCTION options were more restrictive Yet Thomasina managed to over come the double barriers of gender discrimination and race dis crimination She was one of a generation of women who did so Thomasina was a young adult in the early 1940s a time that was a turning point in American history The world was at war America entered World War II in 1941 As more and more men were needed to fight at the fronts women were reluctantly accepted in now-vacant positions that had been previously closed to them They entered the workforce in unprecedented num bers and became official members of the military for the first time in history Female news reporters followed stories to the battlefields across war-torn lands Female entertainers sang and danced across continents performing for the fighting armies in Europe Asia and Africa Women served in hospitals around the world caring for the wounded and comforting dying soldiers Although it was expected that after the war women would return to the lives they had led previously there was no turn ing back for many especially for black women These women were part of what became known as the greatest generation Thomasina was born in 1908 when the first Ford automo biles were selling for about 800 But in 1908 it was illegal for women to drive cars in some cities It was the year before the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People NAACP was formed Eighty-nine black citizens were lynched in the United States that year The women of the greatest generation were teenagers in the 1920s and 30s In 1920 the 19th Amendment was passed allow ing women to vote for the first time however black men and women were kept from voting through intimidation in most southern states In 1925 the state of Georgia introduced a bill that made it illegal for a black person to marry a white person In 1935 the NAACP petitioned the University of Maryland to
INTRODUCTION 3 explain its policy of admitting only whites to the university In 1939 famed singer Marian Anderson was denied permission by the Daughters of the American Revolution DAR to sing at their hall Constitution Hall in Washington DC because she was black When America entered the war in 1941 no one could have anticipated the changes that would shape the future for women But postwar America held hope for many black women The opportunities that they took advantage of during the war years in the 1940s set the stage for the 1950s 60s and 70s decades that saw the emergence of the civil rights movement and the women’s movement In the 1950s the women of Thomasina Walker Johnson Norford’s generation wondered what it would mean for their children when the US Supreme Court ruled that racial segrega tion in public schools was unconstitutional They heard about a black woman named Rosa Parks who challenged life as it was in the South by refusing to give up her seat on a city bus in Mont gomery Alabama Many Americans participated in marches that resulted in equal rights for women and minorities in the 1960s In 1963 a man named Martin Luther King Jr spoke about having a dream for future generations The Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawing discrimination in the workplace on the basis of sex or race was passed by Congress As the 1970s and 80s dawned Thomasina and the women of her generation began to enter their elder years The US Supreme Court again took actions that were intended to bring equality to the nation’s education system when it ruled that busing of students could be used as a tool to force integration of public schools in America Black and white women entered political life as never before Many were encouraged when Sandra Day
4 INTRODUCTION O’Connor became the first woman to serve on the US Supreme Court And some wondered if victory over racism had really been achieved when race riots broke out in Los Angeles after a jury acquitted four white police officers of beating a black man By the end of the 20th century fewer and fewer women of Thomasina Walker Johnson Norford’s generation remained Throughout their lives many of their stories of triumph over the challenges they faced as women were overlooked Many of their accounts of victory over racism were ignored It’s up to the children grandchildren and great-grandchildren to recover the stories of the women who have gone and to pay attention to the stories of the women who survive It is their responsibility to ensure these victorious women are not forgotten It will be a double victory
