EB Sledge and Peggy Terry

E.B. Sledge was a soldier in the Marines, and had fought at Guadalcanal. He described the courage and bravery that the young men possessed, despite the fact that "eighty percent of the division in the Guadalcanal campaign was less than twenty-one years of age."(197) He cited how he felt that there were two different wars. On the front lines "you don't come off until you are wounded or killed." (197) But despite this harsh reality of war, men had the courage to continue fighting and risking their lives. An example of this was how Sledge described how  he had " never heard of self-inflicted wounds out there." (197) To combat these hardships the soldier on the front line "develops this insensitivity because it is the only way he can cope." (199) He then goes on to tell horrific stories of war that had transformed mild-mannered men into quasi-savages.

Peggy Terry was a woman from rural Kentucky, who had worked in a shell factory creating rounds of ammunition. She describes how bad the conditions were for her and others as her mom was fired when her "mother took sick and died and Mamma asked for time off and they told her no." (191) She describes how little the plant workers knew of "human rights, union rights" (191) She describes how her world was " very small" (192) and that the factory job was the "first time [her] mother ever worked at anything except in the fields" (192). The Homefront after the war was jubilent, people were giving away free loaves of bread, and women got pregnant celebrating their husband's return. However she had also been turned against her faith. She tells of how 'the Bible says, Thou shalt not kill, it doesn't say, Except in a time of war." (195).

 The homefront was happy that the war had ended, but it was also upset for the tragedies that happened during the war. The war had a large impact on the lives of the the soldiers, and EB Sledge's stories of war were jarring to think about. War is a troubling experience, and the horror stories really make you question whether war, despite how noble, is worth people dying and going through these traumatic experiences over.

Jane Yoder and Peggy Terry

These stories told the hardships of the Depression. Both the mental effects exemplified by Jane Yoder's father who "took a great deal of pyschological abuse" (127), and also they were "struggling, just desperate to be warm." (127). Jane Yoder also talks about how the government WPA program, which provided a much needed stable job for the family. This allowed for the family to be able to get the necessities needed to survive. Peggy Terry talked about the depression as a whole, and the thousands of people out of work, and in the soup lines, people who lived in holes in the ground and the dust storms. A combination of all these factors must of been unbearable for them. Terry also talks about her struggle, and how everybody was accepting, because they were all in the same position. She says "But among the people that I knew, we all had an understanding that it wasn't our fault" (141). She also talks about how despite all these problems, she still had the ability to have white supremacy feelings. She said " As long as you can say I'm better than they are, then there's somebody below you can kick." (143) and because of the hard times, she must have sought this power and superiority that she lacked in her life, although this is not the correct way to accomplish that.

Overall, the Depression was an awful time period where many people suffered, and struggled to survive, both mentally and physically. Jane Yoder and Peggy Terry, explained their horrible experiences during the Depression and remembered how hard it was to do the things we take for granted today. We should try and appreciate how fortunate we are today, that we don't have to go through these traumatic experiences, and we can learn from our past mistakes, to try and prevent this from hapening again.