During winter term 2025 Dr. Kara Ritzheimer’s History 310 (Historian’s Craft) students researched and wrote blog posts about OSU during WWII. The sources they consulted are listed at the end of each post. Students wrote on a variety of topics and we hope you appreciate their contributions as much as the staff at SCARC does!
Blog post written by Logan Bledsoe
Many Oregon State College (OSC) alumni and students gave up their education and even their lives to serve in WWII. These young men and women faced all the horrific trials and tribulations that WWII had to offer, among the worst being the Japanese-perpetrated Bataan Death March. Captain Howard H. Amos, an OSC alumni, was one among thousands of men marched to the Japanese death camp, or their deaths.
Captain Amos received a degree in Chemical Engineering from Oregon State University in 1940 and subsequently joined the U.S. Army as a field artillery officer on July 1st, 1940. After the American loss at Bataan, Captain Amos and his brothers in arms were forcibly marched and tortured in the Bataan Death March. Six weeks after the death march concluded, Captain Amos succumbed to his maltreatment in Japanese captivity.[i]
The Oregon State Archives contain a record of Amos’s War Service Record, as OSC tried to keep a comprehensive record of students and faculty who served during WWII. This document was also shared with Amos’s parents. Attached to the document is a newspaper clipping containing his obituary. The newspaper clipping was an obituary and a tribute to his life and service. Captain Amos’s date of death is listed in his Oregon State University (OSU) War Service Record as June 27, 1942, notified by the War Department, Office of Adjutant General. His OSU War Service Record is a typed military format document and filled in by hand in pen by an unknown administrator at OSC. The newspaper clipping is reproduced from the original. Despite the age of his original War Service Record, it is in fairly good condition with slight bending of the sides of the paper, and yellowing. This document was archived by Luther S. Cressman as part of OSC’s Oregon State College History of World War II in the Special Collections & Archives Center (hereafter SCARC), for the purpose of commemorating OSC’s wartime history and contributions to the war effort on an individual community member basis.
The impact of WWII on the student population of The Oregon State College (OSC) proved to be dynamic and multifaceted in nature, beyond the deaths of singular students in war, and on to the more personal, social, and educational losses of the OSC community. Captain Amos’ story serves as a severe example of the temporary loss of an OSC community member, which given the lethality of WWII, often had the potential to be a permanent loss for the community.
A picture of the Cadet Corps. Published by the Agricultural College on December 9, 1921. This corps, like other pre-military programs, would become the bedrock for training in universities and indoctrination into the armed services with the onset of WWII.[ii]
The Bataan Death March, both directly or indirectly, affected OSU students, faculty and Alumni who served. The Battle of Bataan lasted from January to April 1942, and the subsequent American defeat prior to the Bataan Death March considerably dampened American morale, which was naively optimistic after Pearl Harbor. This is due to the American people’s enthusiasm to quickly strike a blow against the Empire of Japan which is reflected in the newspapers of OSC and the greater news establishments of the time. Even as Bataan and its surrounding areas were crumbling under the weight of the Japanese offensive, The Daily Barometer, OSC’s daily student newspaper, continued to publish updates on the second page, depicting the battle as a hard fought stalemate.[iii] These news stories from The Daily Barometer offer a stark contrast to the realities on the ground. Pending the devastating loss, the attitude of the time was briefly reflected on by The Daily Barometer, and then promptly summarized as a slight delay of victory rather than the foreboding specter of reality that would come to epitomize the war in the Pacific.[iv] Approximately 35 OSU students and faculty were summarily killed in the Battle of Bataan and its encompassing engagements, or taken as POWs. Indicative of the Japanese Empires attitude towards POWs, which was one of disdain and non-cooperativity towards any of its adversaries, many soldiers and military personnel taken prisoner were listed as MIA.[v] This included members of the Oregon State University community who joined the military at the onset of WWII.[vi]
There was a period of shock at this time, as Americans, and more specifically the OSU community, were deeply involved in supporting the war effort. There was eventually a piece in The Oregon Stater, published in June 1942, that listed approximately 35 OSC community members who were missing.[vii] For the OSC community, these losses must have been more personal, beyond a warring nation tasting its first real even-sided defeat, it would bring the reality of the war home far more personally than Pearl Harbor had. As OSC community members read the front pages of popular newspapers littered with anything but good news of the war, they also grappled with the personal loss of their peers, as reflected by The Evening Herald April 9, 1942, published in Klamath Falls, Oregon stating, “…We have known from the beginning that no other end was possible. We have been merely waiting.”[viii]
OSC students taking the Oath of Service to be sworn in as new cadets ca. 1942. Many students at many different universities would be doing the same thing in 1942.[ix]
While many OSC students went missing or perished early on in the war, some Oregon State College community members who were lucky enough to survive such brutal defeats ended up dying in Japanese captivity later on in the war. As the war progressed, it slowly robbed Oregon State College of the great generation of men who could have returned home after the war to continue their education. One of these survivors was First Lieutenant Harry Burton Black who died in Fukuoka Military Prison Camp on the Island of Honshu, Japan on February 11th, 1945. An all too familiar theme, the American Military listed First Lieutenant Black as MIA until his death was confirmed by the Japanese Government months after his death on September 9th, 1945.[x] Unfortunately, Lieutenant Black’s experience was not an isolated incident, men like him from every department at Oregon State College joined the service in their hundreds. Men like Captain Amos and Lieutenant Black are just a few of the OSC community members who would leave OSC to serve their country. Their absence alone would drastically affect the college.
The population of the College of Liberal Arts alone went down by almost one thousand students in 1941-1942 due to America’s silent preparation for the war.[xi] From the years of 1942-1943 to 1943-1944, the ratio of men to women students went from 5:3 to 1:3.[xii] Nationally, the ratio of male to female undergraduates approximately followed this trend, but there was a steady decline that started from 1942 onwards.[xiii] The records of the OSC Alumni Association indicate an official still-actively-growing list of 5,000 men in service, out of an approximate estimate of 8,500 men in total in their service in 1944.[xiv] This means that approximately 3500 men still had yet to be officially registered with the OSC Alumni Association records. Oregon State faculty and staff were no different in their commitment to serve their country, with 89 men and 8 women getting approved for leaves of absence for military service from 1940-1946.[xv] The Oregon State College Community lost many members temporarily in their service to the nation at war, and in grave cases, permanently.
ROTC Students of Third Detachment at “Retreat” next to Strand Hall. Although this picture was taken before World War II, it is a shining example of the military programs at OSC who had helped take on the challenge of preparing OSC for war.[xvi]
Just like at Oregon State College, the pull of young men and women from universities to take part in the fight of WWII was felt all throughout American universities. Higher education institutions were the most highly affected branch of education, more than any other branch in the American education system.[xvii] The U.S., at this time, grappled with the issue of young men in college, and how and when they would enter service to fill the growing ranks of the U.S. military as it gathered steam for the years ahead. Originally the U.S. government developed a rushed plan to give occupational deferments to college students so they could continue their education before entering military service. Unfortunately, this led to shortages in manpower across the military in varying fields, which would then be filled with young men who were still continuing their college education.[xviii] Students and universities knew that selective service was just over the horizon, regardless of their current enrollment status, and universities like the University of Virginia offered accelerated courses to try to quickly graduate their students before leaving for war.[xix] The accelerated courses served a double purpose, as this also freed up students’ time to participate in pre-military programs provided by the universities, or by ever expanding military programs already on campus[xx] During this time, campus life, as well as the individual students’ day-to-day activities changed almost in every aspect, as even the education they were receiving was slightly and afterthought, as their primary focus was now inevitable wartime service.
WWII affected everyone in the United States, and many college students would never return to higher education again because of the war and its consequences for them. For the universities of this time, one would be hard pressed to find another group of entities who were as severely affected by the onset of WWII, and whose community members would be directly affected as well. Not only did the sudden absence of thousands of men and women from the college drastically affect enrollment and campus life, but their sacrifices would leave holes in the OSC community for decades to come.
[i] Luther S. Cressman, Howard Amos Service Record, 1944, Oregon State University Special Collections & Archives Research Center (hereafter SCARC), Oregon State College History of World War II project records, Box 01 SC 33 03 02 11.
[ii] “History of the Military Department,” Oregon State Agricultural College Pamphlet, 7, stamped December 9, 1921, SCARC, Memorabilia Collection, Box 106, Folder 17.
[iii] “Japs Concentrate on Pany,” Oregon State Barometer, April 25, 1942, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/8k71p741f.
[iv] Historical Publications of Oregon State University, Oregon State University, Oregon State Barometer, April 10, 1942,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/8k71p7316.
[v] “Listed Among the Missing,” Oregon Stater, June 1942, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71bk924.
[vi] “Listed Among the Missing.”
[vii] “Listed Among the Missing.”
[viii] “Bataan Defenses Finally Fall,” The Evening Herald, April 9, 1942, Historic Oregon Newspapers, https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn99063812/1942-04-09/ed-1/seq-1/#words=Bataan.
[ix] “ASTP and Navy V-12 Program swearing in ceremony, circa 1942,”Oregon State College History of World War II Project Records, Military Photographs (P 002), Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/images/df71zj280.
[x] Oregon State College history of World War II project record, 1944, Box 01 SC 33 03 02 11, MSS OSCWW2.
[xi] “Ratio of Male to Female Students at OSC 1940-1944,” SCARC, Annual and biennial reports, Office of the President, Box 09 RG 013 – SG 12, Box 09 SC 43 02 04 20.
[xii] “Ratio of Male to Female Students at OSC 1940-1944,” SCARC, Annual and biennial reports, Office of the President, Box 09 RG 013 – SG 12, Box 09 SC 43 02 04 20.
[xiii] Claudia Goldin, Lawrence F. Katz, and Ilyana Kuziemko, “The Homecoming of American College Women: The Reversal of the College Gender Gap,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 20, no. 4 (2006): 133, https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257%2Fjep.20.4.133&fbclid=IwAR2YgNWGj5pMpZpEpG5a97ahef4Dwi8Wk7rUpLqqRGPMqwOGOnJYmGvcLys.
[xiv] “Military Records at Office Of Alumni Association,” SCARC, Oregon State College history of World War II project record, 1944, Box 01.
[xv] “Ratio of Male to Female Students at OSC 1940-1944.”
[xvi] “Oregon Agricultural College, Education for Enlisted Men,” December 15, 1918, SCARC, Memorabilia Collection, Box 106, folder 17.
[xvii] I. L. Kandel, The Impact of the War Upon American Education (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1948), 123.
[xviii] Kandel, The Impact of the War Upon American Education, 123.
[xix] Jennings L. Wagoner and Robert L. Baxter, Jr.,“Higher Education Goes to War: The University of Virginia’s Response to World War II,” The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 100, no. 3 (1992): 404, https://www.jstor.org/stable/4249294?casa_token=nGrQ7uf5ndAAAAAA%3AN128Mv94tKlGmPT8VvizaAUDL1JcZQfNJ5Q7h1VPhv-TPtHNvbWEDPXidF5g-nFj9uBpJlzzuJZTSX4oWMszTgkUm6wk5HCuszvBttLSLvA794j7NVY.
[xx] Wagoner, “Higher Education Goes to War,” 407.
