The World War II homefront was a special time and place for American women. With some 16 million men off to fight in Europe, North Africa and the Pacific, the war effort at home depended on women, who rolled up their sleeves and went to work in factories in unprecedented numbers — a mighty army of Rosie the Riveters. For the first time, the societal strictures that tethered women to unpaid work at home were loosening — and yet it was understood that when the men returned, the women would go back to being second-class citizens.
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