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Research Proposal:
The Frontier of Women in Uniform

Jessica Hall

HIST 2600
Professor Higham
September 29, 2015

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This paper will be about how World War II revolutionized societys gender roles for
American women for future generations. It will look further into how the Air Force affected the
shift for women. When looking at the specific period from 1939 to 1945 the changes provided
women the same work opportunity as men. American women started to work jobs because all the
men needed to fight and go overseas. Organizations such as Womens Airforce Service Pilots
(WASP) or Womens Army Corps (WAC) became major players in allowing women to do jobs
that society consider to have masculine qualities. The modifications took place on the home front
because of the need for soldiers. The importance this War has on history remains to be that
gender roles shifted in the American society to accept that women could work just as equally as
men could.
Women stepped into the role of men for the very first time during World War II. Similar
to Frederick Turners thesis, which focuses on the bigger picture of westward expansion, this
situation demonstrates the development of women and how American culture transformed. The
war created opportunities for women to join the military because of the economic demand for
soldiers and workers. In the book by Laurie Scrivener, U.S. Military Women in World War II:
The Spar, WAC, Waves, WASP, and Women Marines in U.S. Government Publications, she
identifies that the opportunities drove women forward into embracing the masculinity and the
growth of American society. Even though the gender roles had remained relatively the same for
decades, the once widely known expectation of women had gradually become nonexistent. The
War allowed for advancements in the American society that would revolutionize gender roles and
establish womens capability to work the same jobs as men.
When looking at how World War IIs effects on gender roles it presents a change and how
it has launched women forward. The recent books read for this topic have provided some

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indication that many individuals feel this War had key factors for women. For example, the
biography, Women pilots of World War II, written by Jean Cole consists of interviews from
women who became pilots during the War. It talks about the Women Air Force Service Pilots
(WASP) programs that gave opportunities to women and how their contribution had a big effect
on the womens movement. Women had never before had freedom to choose what they wanted to
do. Originally, becoming a housewife seemed to be the only option for women because of their
limitations. Many historical literatures provide insight to this specific period such as biographies,
memoirs, and articles. In these historical literatures, the conclusion always turns out to be that
World War II played a big role into womens movement and it helped changed societys views.
Scholars have done a good job at looking at the bigger picture and have done a job at coming to
conclusions like the War affecting womens movement or the American society making room for
women in the workplace. There does not seem to be anything that scholars overlooked at this
time.
This paper will follow similar effects of the War but will look more into gender roles and
how the War provided womens roles to change. This changes the historiography by looking
deeper into how changes the specifically altered gender roles. Changes like American women
becoming more empowered to provide or Looking at the War from this angle and how it
provided change would give a new approach to this topic. Acknowledging that World War II
assisted the womens movement will lay the foundation for how it implemented the innovation of
gender roles. Pre-World War II women had no place in the Air Force, which led to a tremendous
alteration when they became a part of it during Wartime. In addition, women did mechanical
work on planes to fix and repair planes in order to get them where they needed to be.
Recognizing that society did not view this to be acceptable for women before the War, this paper

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will also look at how this opened doors for American women to work jobs that may require
women to get their hands dirty. Looking at this particular angle shows that the requirements to
become pilots, like being able to fix parts of the plane or the engineering behind flying a plane
shows that women had to learn this skill. Therefore, becoming educated for women who wanted
to be pilots had American women excel further than basic grade school. This paper will look
further into how all these different aspects played a huge role in the womens movement.
Time management, finding good primary sources, and writing in Chicago format; will be
some of the potential issues experienced when writing this paper. My time management will
definitely be because it takes me forever just to write one sentence and even longer now that I
have to exclude passive voice. The frustration of trying to write will take me longer than it
should but I will need to prepare for that. Another worry of mine will be finding primary sources
just because I need a specific group of women that it may become difficult. I hope that it happens
to be easier because that would lift a lot of weight off my shoulders. Lastly, writing in the correct
Chicago format has been my biggest worry. This worries me because I have never written in this
format before and I get worried that I will mess up. I really want more practice with the format
but I really do not know how to go about doing that. I have looked at many different examples
online but I think that has got me more confused than before.
The questions I have are- Do you think I am missing something that could make my
paper stronger. Maybe a book and/or article you have read. Are we going to have a workshop on
footnotes and Chicago?

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Annotated Bibliography
Carl, Ann. 1999. A WASP among Eagles: a woman military test pilot in World War II.
Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press.
Carl writes a memoir of her time as a test pilot during World War II where she worked with other
women pilots. In her memoir, she discusses about the certain aircrafts they would work on and
repair. This is an extremely helpful to have because it gives personal insight from someone that
actually lived through this change.
Cole, Jean Hascall. 1992. Women pilots of World War II. Salt Lake City: University of Utah
Press.
This is relevant to the research because it provides interviews from women pilots who were
students that graduated from the Army Air Forces training school. It discusses the certain types
of aircrafts and their experiences they had during that period. It is interesting to see how their
contribution effected gender roles.
Rickman, Sarah Byrn. 2008. Nancy Love and the WASP ferry pilots of World War II. Denton,
Tex: University of North Texas Press. http://site.ebrary.com/id/10331579.
This is relevant to the research because it is a biography of a woman who was a part of the
WASP program. It gives firsthand knowledge that will be helpful when trying to analyze how
this effects women in the end.
Scrivener, Laurie. 1999. "U.s. military women in world war II: The spar, wac, waves, wasp, and
women marines in u.s. government publications". Journal of Government Information. 26
(4): 361-383.
Scrivener writes about women during World War II and how the women transitioned into the
military. In addition, she discusses the creation of jobs and what women did during this period.
She also has annotated bibliography that gives readers the resources that she used to write with.

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This is very beneficial because if readers want to look deeper into a certain topic she discussed
the can just look at her sources
Turner, Frederick Jackson. "The Significance of the Frontier in American History." Choice
Reviews Online 32.07 (1893): 199-217. American Historical Association. Web. 10 Sept.
2015.
Turner was the first person to introduce his beliefs on the westward expansion and the
significance in how it developed American culture. His work is to help make deeper connections
with not just the original frontier but the modern ones as well. This will help future historians by
having this resource and able to get different perspectives.

Wish List
I want to find primary sources from the library that could benefit my paper in the end. The
biographies and memoirs from womens experiences in the WASP program have really help me
find my direction for my paper. In addition, I want to find secondhand sources that gives
information on percentages and numbers of women that became a part of the military in the
decades that followed the war.