Interview by Katie Ortiz
Georgia Pfister was only thirteen when Pearl Harbor happened. She attended a boarding school in Chicago and at the age of sixteen she worked for an accountant during the war years. The war ended that summer, when she was only sixteen, and she celebrated V-J Day in Chicago. She could remember all the excitement with the banners flying, people singing, and all the people crowding in the classrooms. She recalled taking a German language class that was full of returning service men who already spoke fluent German after they returned home from there. The school even had classes in the largest auditorium to prevent overcrowding. Georgia had three cousins in the war, one was killed in Germany, another returned home from Germany safely, and the other cousin went to India and Burma. Georgia remembers writing to her cousin in Burma the most. Georgia believes he had helped build a road in Burma and at one time while off road in India he sent her a beautiful photo of the famous building, the Taj Mahal.
Georgia and her family were horrified to hear of the Pearl Harbor attack. While living on her farm in Wisconsin she remembers listening to the unbelievable words over their radio. Everyone was shocked and didn’t know what to think. The war did affect things for the worst, but not drastically. The rations were the hardest part. They mostly rode their bicycles because gasoline was rationed and they only drove when they had to. She never drove anywhere that she could get to on her bike. One of her most memorable moments was when her bike tire went flat, so she went to the neighbor’s house that had a tire pump. She remembers watching him pump the tire so full and pleading him to stop. It finally popped into a bunch of pieces. She had to wait so long before she was able to get a new one because the rubber in the tires was hard to come by. She also remembers her cousins returning home from the war while she was at school. He stopped by the campus to see her while he was still in his uniform. He hadn’t even been home long enough to buy civilian clothes. Another memory that stays with Georgia is driving in her cousin’s Model A car. They were driving downhill on the street when they saw one of their tires just drift past them and continue to roll down in front of their car. It was a frightening story. She remembers purchasing ration books for gasoline, sugar, and many other foods. They were books that set standards depending on family situations or jobs. She remembers wrapping presents without tape on Christmas, it was extremely difficult, and she recalls buying war bonds and war stamps that were taken out of her mother’s paycheck.
Georgia’s reaction to the dropping of the atom bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was she was shocked. She was only sixteen, and she supposes she was more into socializing and just thinking the war was over than anything else, mostly thinking about things that benefited herself. Like most teenagers, she was unaware of the danger and damage atomic bombs were capable of. She remembers being relieved that the war was finally over and she could finally wear regular stockings instead of the cotton ones she was forced to wear in times of rationing.