I have wondered about the Ration Books that came out around the WWll since I first read about them as a kid. Today I was rereading an old Agatha Christy book, Three Blind Mice, that I haven't read since I was 10 or 11. In it they mention ration books, and this brought back my early curiosity about this war time way of recording a system that allowed a person or possibly a family to get supplies. I never heard why or how this system came about, or how it functioned. I've always wonder what kind of things were regulated by the complex system. Did America have anything like ration books? Do any of you have memories of this time period either here or across the sea?
I remember the ration books that they had in Canada I even had some pasted down from my parents. The ones I had were for meat and sugar there was probably more. Mom said whey she had them with lots of stamps in them is because they could not afford to use them.
No, I missed the ration books, although I do remember gas rationing under President Carter. That wasn't any fun.
I was 3 when the war ended, but recall later hearing my Dad explain that he had a gasoline stamp allowing nearly unlimited gas, since his trade of Tool and Die Maker was War Critical. Frank
Yes, I too remember gas rationing @Ken Anderson, and I remember designated days of the week being assigned by the first letter of your last name. I also remember back in 1965, when I started driving regularly, Houston was having gas wars. They were almost giving gasoline away with prices hopping up and down. I was only paying 15 to 18 cents at the time. @Martin Alonzo with as much food as our two countries produced, why did Canada need to ration? I understand that our countries were sending food to the soldiers, but war or no war we would have been feeding them just the same. Did your family go to the regular store, or did they go to a government outlet? How long did Canada use it's rationing system?
@Frank Sanoica what part of the country were your family in during the war? I get why gasoline and other kinds of fuel were in short supply back then. Of course we were shipping that to the war effort too.
@Ina I. Wonder We lived in a suburb of Chicago, in the house where I was born. Too young to understand the rationing efforts, I've since learned that a myriad of everyday products was rationed: sugar, flour, shoes, etc. Frank
I remember my folks talking about the food rationing during the war; but they lived on the ranch up in Idaho and grew a lot of their own fruits and vegetables, plus milk and eggs from the cows and chickens. Probably a lot of other people who lived in the country also grew their own veggie garden, and even most people in town used to have gardens out in the back yards. I remember seeing vegetable gardens in people's back yards when I was growing up. We certainly did have ration books here, and one house where Bobby and I lived, someone had left a bunch of the food ration books. They actually looked a lot like those first old food stamp coupon books, if you remember those. Which is the reason we call it food stamps now, even thought they have an EBT card and do not use food coupons any more. Before they used those food stamp books, they had what was called "commodities", which was food that was doled out every month to needy families. My mother used to have rental houses, and most of her renters were low income and received the commodities, which consisted of about 5 lb bags of flour, corn meal, powdered skim milk, as well as cans of pork, and a lunchmeat that tasted like Spam, and a large loaf of cheese. The meat and cheese usually got used up; but people often didn't use all of the corn meal and powdered milk especially. That stuff was terrible compared to what we have nowadays as powdered milk. It was almost an actual powder, and didn't dissolve in water very well. You had to put it in a mixing bowl with lukewarm water, and then the hand eggbeater and beat it until it dissolved and any clumps were gone, and then refrigerate it overnight before it was at all drinkable. During the war, there was probably a shortage of food for several reasons. All of the younger men were fighting in the war and not working on the farm, so less food would have been grown. Women worked in the factories, and even the family gardens would have been harder for them to tend to, especially when they also had a family at home to take care of after work. Since fuel was rationed, trucks that shipped food would not have been able to do this as easily, either. And lastly, the farmers were encouraged to grow hemp crops instead of corn or wheat, because the military needed all of that hemp for the big ropes that were used on the Navy vessels.
I don't think rationing was a huge deal to my family during World War II, since we lived on a farm. My dad was away for several years in the army and I don't think my mother kept the farm up, as far as planting three hundred acres of fields, but I know she was quite capable of putting together a large garden. I don't picture her on a tractor, however. Plus, we had cows, chickens, and pigs, so I'm guessing that things like flour might have been a problem. Then again, there was only my oldest brother, who was born during the war, and mom had family all around her, most of whom also farmed, so it's quite likely that someone else farmed a portion of dad's land.
Thank you @Yvonne Smith , that does make sense. I don't know why my parents never spoke of rationing. I can understand why my father didn't speak of them, he was in the navy before the war, and he didn't leave until after the war was over. My mother was born in 1929, so I would have thought she would have had at least some memories of this period in our history. Nor do I remember any of my folks friends speaking of rationing. So rationing must have given us the first template for this countries food stamp program. Now I wonder how did the government decide what and how much to distribute to an individual or family. I would think that the needs of people in the country would be different to those that lived in cities. Did everyone get a ration book, or was it only for those that could not afford to pay the high prices that must have occurred with the lack of supplies? I don't know why this subject interests me so much, other than the fact that no one seemed to speak of it.
Here is one of the videos that was made back in 1942, encouraging people to share, and explaining (from the perspective of the government) why food rationing was so important. Since most people didn't even have a television back then, this was probably shown as a newsreel at movie theaters like other news was back then. One important difference between the food rationing books, and the food stamp program that was later developed, and which is pointed out very well in this video, is that people still had to BUY the food that they ate, but even when they paid for it, they were only allowed to buy as much as they had stamps to give when they shopped. If you look online and on youtube, @Ina I. Wonder , there is a lot of good information about the food rationing during the war. Your mother would still have been a teenager during the war years, so she probably was not that involved in the food purchasing as your grandparents were. My parents were born much earlier than that, and were children during the First World War, and almost in their 40's by the Second World War, so they remembered those things much better.
I remember rationing very well, my father ran a grocery store so I recall seeing the books and the coupons, and sometimes filled in pages as below, plus rationing didn't end in the UK until 1954 when all foods finally came off ration.. I can still picture the books in my mind..... here are a couple of pics
I don't remember rationing at all... I was born well after Rationing ceased , even though it continued in this country right up until the early 50's. My mother was only about 10 when the war ended.. and she'd been evacuated to a farm in the country so she didn't feel the effects of shortage of food like the city folks did, in fact she told me that she'd never eaten so well as when she was on that farm.....and my father who was about 20 when the war ended, never spoke about rationing at all.. and given that he was one of 16 kids who lived in the city, I often wonder how they all managed.. Of course I've seen ration books historically, and I've studied the war and the effects domestically in many books, so I know how people suffered , and also how miraculously people kept going creating weird and wonderful..and not so wonderful meals out of nothing..and of course clothing and furniture was also rationed and very severely too..
That was an informative clip @Yvonne Smith. I didn't know there were such films, but I can see how they help make sense to the farmers that were supplying this country's and our servicemens needs. I guess being born almost 17 years after the war, and in the TV generation, I like many people today don't really understand how much the everyday person was involved in the war efforts of that time. I now get that probably most people learned about that part of our history through public school, and since I only went to school for 2&1/2 years before college, was never aware of this part of the war. Thank you @Terry Page for the visuals. Do you remember if rations were set up for the individual or for a whole family. From what I can see of the amounts issued, I have a hard time seeing how a family could stretch food for a month. Today a pound of bacon or ham would only feed a family of four for one meal. I can now see why some countries might feel that America is full of pampered individuals that wouldn't be able to survive if we had to face such challenging circumstances today.