WAC Life.

For Memorial Day, here are some scans from my mother's "WAC Life/War Department Pamphlet," dated May 1945.

The cover:



Chapter 1 (Text: "So you're in the Army! You've had your fears and doubts, your cheers and kidding, your tears and farewells. Now, as the boys say, 'This is it!' You're somewhat of a different person already. You're not 'that sweet little Smith girl from Sycamore Street' nor 'that awfully capable Mrs. Smith' any more. Now you're Mary Smith, enlisted woman ..." )



Chapter 2 (Text: "Your job as a Wac, in its broadest definition, is to back up the fighting man. Your place is to render a service to him, not to fight at his side. He depends upon the service which you provide. The fact that your function is service rather than combat does not put you in any secondary or subordinate position. Your activities contribute directly to the winning of the war. Activities such as yours could not alone win the war; but alone they could lose it if they were left undone or were done badly.")



Here's some advice from Chapter 7:

As a people, we're earnest about this war. Our enemies have learned that we're deadly earnest. So are our Allies. We don't wail when things go badly, nor blow off steam at every victory. The fight goes on, come good news or bad.