Students in Dr. Marisa Chappell’s History 363 “Women in U.S. History” class spent the final three weeks of Fall Quarter 2025 in OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center exploring women’s impact on our university.

By Eliza Thompson

It was at the sixth annual meeting of the Home Economics Association in 1913 when Sarah Louise Arnold gave her President’s Address. “Tonight I shall speak particularly to the younger members of our Association—to you who are entering upon your life work,” she began. “You are discovering and weighing the results of your earlier efforts. You, we trust, will succeed where we have failed, will build upon our foundations, will reach the Promised Land which we have dimly seen, afar off.”^[1]

And what does she go on to say to these younger members? What does she predict, like an inspired prophet, for the future of home economics? “The time will come and come soon,” she said, near the end of her speech, “when we shall be absolutely sure that the sanity and safety of our state institutions depends upon the sanity and safety of our homes. Then the state will say to all of its girls, ‘Your life does not belong to yourself as an individual; it belongs to all of us, all together. We need you at your best; we need you to be wise and strong and good, for the sake of all of us. You have a great contribution to make to the general welfare and the common good.’”^[2]

One hundred and twelve years later, while sorting through the Ava Milam Clark papers at Oregon State University’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center, I stood, staring at a typed copy of this speech, stunned by these words. Your life does not belong to you. It belongs to us all.

When I first dove into research about the early years of home economics at OSU, I expected a very cookie-cutter curriculum, a one-size-fits-all approach. I suppose, deep down, I was expecting classes on how to greet your husband back from work with a martini. How to bend down to vacuum under furniture without messing up your hairdo. How to hold your baby in one hand and apply your lipstick with the other. And, to be clear, the home economics department was homogenous in many ways. For one, the student body was racially uniform, almost entirely white (the first known African American graduate of OSU, Carrie Halsell, didn’t graduate until 1926).^[3] Still, I was humbled by just how much thought and discussion was put into acknowledging all the different variables that would go into the study of home economics.

Home Economics as a field is closely linked to the land grant system in American higher education. Oregon State University is a land grant college. As explained by William Robbins in The People’ School: A History of Oregon State University, “[g]rants of land to support education date to the colonial period, and the practice transferred seamlessly after the American Revolution to the new United States …. For state support for higher education, however, the Morrill Act offered a different approach, providing grants of land to promote the education of the individual classes.”^[4] According to a Middlebury college blog post analyzing a project binder of 1918 graduate, Bessie C. Jennings: “[a]lthough principles of domesticity were being taught as early as the mid 19th century, the term ‘home economics’ was not applied to this area of study until the early 20th century.”^[5] This was because the universities established as a result of the Morrill Act were open to women as well as men and were thus “mandated to foster research and instruction in practical areas of endeavor . . . associated with home economics.”^[6] Because home economics was so new, how it was characterized in the late 1800s and early 1900s was extremely significant.

In her Presidents’ Address, Arnold discussed how important it is to know and understand the people to whom you teach home economics and how you need a comprehensive view of the individual to do so. Arnold speaks of meeting a little girl who was often left to her own devices. “I thought as I looked in the child’s face, ‘How little I know of experiences like hers! How much I should have to learn before I could teach her as I ought?”^[7]

Nuance could also be seen in how much was covered by home education. We see this in the work of Ava Milam Clark (1884 -1976), Dean of Home Economics at OSU from 1917-1950. She traveled abroad where she studied various cultures in order to know how best to teach home economics,^[8] and with more unconventional works, such as her Boy Scouts cookbook for camping.^[9]

The question now is: just how nuanced did these programs get? How far did this embrace of variety go? In many ways, early home economics, at least at OSU, took diversity and individuality seriously, but there is one crucial aspect where the room for nuance was more limited: Attitude.

As Sarah Louise Arnold explained in her paper, “Concerning Institutional Management,” a home-economics student would have been, at this time, asked to carry out many tasks.^[10] At a certain point, then, what became important was less the ability to carry out these tasks and more about the willingness to do so and the way in which to go about it.^[11]

It has been evident from the beginning that the institutional worker most in demand is the woman of maturity and experience, who has developed in other fields the qualities which are essential to success in institutional administration. … The demands upon the department go to show a wide variety of opportunities in institutional administration, which no single course of instruction could adequately meet. One might definitely prepare students to administer college dormitories; the same student, however, will be confronted by requests to become a dietitian, in the sense of adviser concerning diets;—or she will be asked to buy, cook, and serve diets and teach classes of nurses at the same time;—or she may be urged to take complete charge of a lunchroom, a tea room, the stewardship of a hospital, or the administration of a children’s home;— she may be asked to mother and manage a Welcome House; she may be called upon to administer the house of residence of the Y. W. C. A., or the small community which is the modern form of the orphan asylum . . . . Letters of inquiry invariably place personality first, experience second, and training third. These three essentials, all right, give us the ideal woman, who shall administer the ideal institution.^[12]

This shows us that the trailblazers of home economics were very deliberate about this demand for a certain personality type in their students.

Not only was personality seen as the most important trait in a student of the home economics department, but the fostering of this specific type of woman was, in many ways, the central goal of these programs. In an article about her life, Milam was quoted saying: “While I do not in any way minimize the importance of teaching, food and nutrition, clothing and home management, I do believe a home economist’s greatest service comes in the influencing of attitudes and values. These must supersede all else!”^[13]

Arnold says something similar in her 1910 “Certain Phases of Instruction in Institutional Management”:

It is evident that there is an urgent demand for women of native ability, mature experience, social aptitude, good judgement, promptness in meeting emergencies, and sound business sense, to direct institutional housekeeping . . . . It is clear that many of these qualities must be contributed by the individual. They cannot be secured by a fixed course of study in school or college. On the other hand, they may be developed by wise tuition. And, further, opportunities may be provided for such observation, such practice under expert guidance, such interpretation of accumulated experience, as will/fortify the worker and prevent her from making the mistakes of the novice. This, I take it, has been the purpose of the various courses in institutional management which have been hitherto provided.^[14]

This obsession with women’s behavior wasn’t limited to the home economics department. According to The Experience of Women’s Higher Education at Oregon Agricultural College 1870-1916 by Katrina Anne Knewtson, in 1910, training at OSU was introduced for women students that “‘included a series of personal interviews with the dean and lectures for the physical, moral, and spiritual development of young women at the university.’ In one example given in the catalog, a lecture focused on the cardinal points of good manners at the table, in school, on telephones, the correct carriage, and the proper position in sitting and standing.”^[15]

This need for social uniformity was undoubtedly influenced by the First World War. In a 1918 Report of the Home Economics Department of Education, it is said that

[t]he department of Home Economics Education has not been unmindful of its duty towards winning the war. . . . At the State Teachers meetings, Home Economics Association meetings, and others, and through literature distributed to the Home Economics teachers throughout the state, the department has cooperated with other departments to establish the right ideals and attitudes among the teachers who in turn should work the same spirit among their pupils and in their communities.^[16]

According to historian Patricia Albjerg Graham, for many land-grant colleges, creating “character” in students was a particular focus during WWI. These colleges “stressed teaching on the part of the faculty, not research, and envisioned the molding of students’ characters rather than merely transmitting knowledge for knowledge’s sake as a principal and legitimate activity of the college.”^[17]

I ask you, now, to think back to Arnold’s words, the idea that women’s lives do not belong to themselvesbut that, instead, women must sacrifice for the collective good. Always having a positive attitude is an example of such a sacrifice. It’s easy to see how this sacrifice would be expected during a world war: to stay chipper and happy for the boys overseas. The truth is, however, that this expectation for a continuous pleasantness that expands to both appearance and attitude is something that women today still face—to never complain, to be sweet and placid and—I’ll say it—maternal in all aspects of life no matter the stress they are under. It is interesting but not surprising, then, that this would be the invariable requirement of home economic students at Oregon State University in the early 1900s.

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^[1] Sarah Louise Arnold, “President’s Address,” 1913, Ava Milam Clark Papers, box 4, folder 2, Special Collections and Archives Research Center, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon (hereafter SCARC).

^[2] Arnold, “Address,” 10-11.

^[3] “Historic Moments of Black Excellence at Oregon State University,”mSpecial Collections & Archives Research Center website, https://scarc.library.oregonstate.edu/omeka/exhibits/show/historic-moments-of-black-exce/carrie-halsell—osu-s-first-b (accessed December 10, 2025).

^[4] William Robbins, The People’s School : A History of Oregon State University (Oregon State University Press, 2017), 14.

^[5] “Household Management Project,” Home Economics and Household Management: The American Middle-Class Home, January 26, 2016, https://sites.middlebury.edu/homeec/history-of-home-economics/.

^[6] Middlebury student body, Household Management.

^[7] Arnold, “Address,” 6.

^[8] Milam, Ava, Untitled, 1922, Correspondence 1920-1922, box 1, folder 2, Ava Milam Clark Paper, Special Collections and Archives Research Center, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon.

^[9] Milam, Ava B., and Ruth McNary Smith. “Camp cookery.” Corvallis, OR: College Bulletin Extended series, 1913.

^[10] Arnold, Sarah Louise “Concerning Institutional Management,” 1912, “A Model for Branch Association of Home Economics” Sarah Louise Arnold, 1910-1943, box 4, folder 2,  Ava Milam Clark Papers, SCARC.

^[11] Arnold, “Concerning,” 1-5.

^[12] Arnold, “Concerning,” 1-5.

^[13] Hoyt, Isabell Murray, “DEAN AVA B. MILAM of Corvallis, Oregon,” 1947, MSS- Ava Milam Clark, box 4, folder 7, “Reports, Speeches, and Articles on Home Economics at OSU, 1917, 1969,” SCARC.

^[14] Arnold, Sarah Louise “Certain Phases of Instruction in Institutional Management,” 1910,  “A Model for Branch Association of Home Economics” Sarah Louise Arnold, 1910-1943, box 4, folder 2,  Ava Milam Clark Papers, Special Collections and Archives Research Center, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon.

^[15] Katrina Anne Knewtson. “The Experience of Women’s Higher Education at Oregon Agricultural College 1870-1916,” 1995, Scholars Archive.

^[16] Hatty R. D., “Report of the Home Economics Department of Education,” 1918, Correspondence 1903-1919, box 1, folder 1,  Ava Milam Clark Papers, SCARC.

^[17] Patricia Albjerg Graham. “Expansion and Exclusion: A History of Women in American Higher Education.” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 3, no. 4 (July 1978): 762.

Students in Dr. Marisa Chappell’s History 363 “Women in U.S. History” class spent the final three weeks of Fall Quarter 2025 in OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center exploring women’s impact on our university.

By Finnian Sweeney

The Co-Signers Engineering Students’ Wives’ Club existed at OSU from 1958 to 1977. The members of the club created scrapbooks to document their activities and achievements. This post focuses on the first years of the Co-Signers club, encompassing the period between 1958 and 1963 covered in the club’s first scrapbook. The flyers, newspaper clippings, images, and other objects contained offer a window into the purposes of the organization. Over the course of its existence, the club sought to promote friendships among the wives of engineering students at Oregon State University. The formula pictured above appears at the top of the Co-Signers recruitment flyer for the 1958-59 school year, which is one of the first items encountered in the scrapbook.[1] It is telling in that it is an equation to produce engineering wives. This reveals another purpose of the club: to create ideal engineering wives.

The materials in this scrapbook record a variety of activities the club engaged in, such as teas, social events, and holiday parties. The Co-Signers also engaged in charity work and held a variety of fundraising events for the club itself and for a scholarship they awarded to a married engineering student.

Some of the most interesting materials, however, concern the types of speakers that attended club meetings. Meetings featured talks by an interior decorator and a nursery school representative, as might be expected from a period where middle-class women were mainly expected to be housewives. More surprisingly, Co-Signers meetings regularly featured interviewers from major employers in the engineering field, including representatives from Lockheed Martin, NASA, and even a recruiter for the CIA. College of Engineering Dean George W. Gleeson was also a regular speaker. Dean Gleeson spoke annually at the club’s first meeting of each school year and seems to have been very supportive of the club. In fact, the 1958-59 recruitment flyer suggests that the creation of the club may have been partly inspired by an informal talk from the dean on members’ “role as a future engineer’s wife,” which seems to have been the topic of his annual talks, as well.[2] Gleeson’s wife Barbara also served as one of the club’s two advisors in its early years, alongside Louise Coopey, wife of another engineering faculty member.[3] All this suggests that Dean Gleeson felt it was important to prepare not only his students, but also their wives, for the engineering field, and that this view was shared by major employers in the industry.

The Co-Signers Club is indicative of larger patterns in the way married middle-class women at the time were expected and encouraged to support their working husbands. It is clear from the activities the Co-Signers engaged in, the way they worded their materials, and of course the name of their club that they saw their support and participation as important to the success of their husbands’ careers. This idea was encouraged and promoted by Dean Gleeson and by industry representatives. The club fits into a pattern identified by the scholar Hanna Papanek in 1973 of what she called “two-person single careers” in the American middle class.

These careers employed only the husband, but made implicit or explicit demands for supporting labor of various kinds from wives. Job interviewers like the ones that regularly addressed the Co-Signers would consider whether applicants’ wives would be “suitable” for the demands of their husbands’ positions. Papanek considered these two-person careers to be a “social control mechanism that serves to derail the occupational aspirations” of women and encourages them to seek “vicarious achievement” through the careers of their husbands. Papanek said that “the wife’s involvement with her husband’s career frequently begins before the career itself, during the stage when he is undergoing the advanced training so typical of these middle-class careers,” and that “the barely latent function of many colleges” was to prepare women to support a two-person career, giving additional context to Dean Gleeson’s support for the Co-Signers Club.[4]

Indeed, many wives in this period abandoned or did not pursue independent careers in favor of becoming housewives and providing direct and indirect support to their husbands’ careers. Researchers have shown that some of these women reported later in life that they would in hindsight have preferred to pursue careers of their own. It is important to note, however, that many of these same women also made their support roles central to their identities and derived satisfaction from supporting their husbands. Like the Co-Signers, many of them also engaged in social or service activities that at first glance appeared unrelated to their husbands’ careers, even to the women themselves, but that nonetheless were part of the work they did to support their husbands and families.[5]

In another article from 1979, Papanek defined the category of “family status production,” arguing that much of the work women did in various societies went unrecognized but produced value for their family units in the form of enhanced social status, often aiding their husbands’ careers. This status production work includes not only career support, but also social activities that enhanced their families standing in their community.[6]The social, fundraising, and charitable work of the Co-Signers can perhaps be viewed through this lens and may have helped to raise the profile of their husbands within the OSU engineering community, especially as the routine local newspaper coverage of the club’s activities referred to members mostly by their husband’s names, as was typical for the time.

Betty Friedan famously complained in her landmark 1963 book The Feminine Mystique that women were defined solely by their relationships to men.[7] In 1964, Friedan wrote that many women had through independent careers unlocked a “fourth dimension” beyond the three dimensions of the traditional female identity as a wife, a mother, and a homemaker. They had begun to see themselves as full people and members of society through independent careers. Even though many women had thought they were happy, there was still a yearning for independent achievement in many of them, and there were real psychological consequences to defining themselves solely in relation to their husbands, for example as “engineering wives.”[8]

The Co-Signers Club provides an excellent real-world example of the way the pattern of two-person single careers played out at Oregon state and show us the ways in which women sought to add meaning to their lives when society defined success for women as being a devoted wife and mother. Women were encouraged to define themselves in relation to their husbands’ careers, and the co-signers sought to find fulfillment in being the wives of engineers. This work focuses on the early years of the club, but it would be interesting to examine some of the later material from the 1970s to see how the rise of second-wave feminism, the entry of more women into the engineering field, and the decline in the number of married engineering students from the 1958 population of 380 (about half of engineering students at the time) changed the nature of the club in its later years.[9]            

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[1] Co-Signers Engineering Students’ Wives’ Club 1958-59 School Year Flyer.

[2] Co-Signers Engineering Students’ Wives’ Club 1958-59 School Year Flyer.

[3] Co-Signers Engineering Students’ Wives’ Club, Valentine to Engineers Wives, 1962m Series 4, Box 2, Folder 2.1, MSS Co-signers Collection, SCARC.

[4] Hanna Papanek, “Men, Women, and Work: Reflections on the Two-Person Career,” American Journal of Sociology 78, no. 4 (1973): 852–72.

[5] Eliza K. Pavalko and Glen H. Elder, “Women behind the Men: Variations in Wives’ Support of Husbands’ Careers,” Gender and Society 7, no. 4 (1993): 548–67.

[6] Papanek, Hanna. “Family Status Production: The ‘Work’ and ‘Non-Work’ of Women.” Signs 4, no. 4 (1979): 775–81.

[7] Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique (W.W. Norton & Company, 1963).

[8] Betty Friedan, “Woman: The Fourth Dimension,” Ladies’ Home Journal (June 1964), 48-55.

[9] Co-Signers Engineering Students’ Wives’ Club 1958-59 School Year Flyer.

Students in Dr. Marisa Chappell’s History 363 “Women in U.S. History” class spent the final three weeks of Fall Quarter 2025 in OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center exploring women’s impact on our university.

By Connor Grattan

A 1967 edition of the Portland-based Catholic newspaper, The Catholic Sentinel, touted the work being done by the Newman Center at Oregon State University, founded just two years earlier. The author viewed Center’s work, or apostolate, as both a great start for and possibly the beginning of a major conversion effort on campus. Moreover, the article praises, above all else, the Newman Center’s ability to connect with and integrate into the daily life of students; the author expressed hope that these efforts would h promote the values of the Catholic Church and convert non-Catholic students to the faith.[1]

The founding of the Newman Center at Oregon State University, one arm of a national Catholic apostolate organization, came at a time of immense change within the Catholic Church ushered in by the Second Vatican Council of the early to mid 1960s, in which Pope John XXIII declared that the Church should focus more on apostolicism and spreading the message of Catholicism through means other than specific calls to holiness from clergy. As the Newman Center worked to appeal to a new generation of students, its message nevertheless remained shaped by the Church’s longstanding patriarchal ideologies and practices. At a time when the Catholic Church grappled with evolving ideas about sexuality, marriage, and gender roles, the apostolic efforts by the Newman Center remained shaped by traditional and ideologically conservative gender ideals.

The Catholic Sentinel article suggested the hope that the Newman Center would create a new and growing commitment to the Church among OSU students. It discussed Center’s physical footprint on campus by noting the buildings it occupied; touted the priests, nuns, and student leaders who did the Center’s work; and highlighted the Center’s many recent campus events. It reassured readers that the Newman Center was using its budget wisely, particularly on efforts to recruit students to Catholicism. Finally, the article expressed optimism that the Center could launch theology or religion classes to further Catholicize the student body.

One barrier to that goal might be the Newman Center’s gender politics. The Center represented a conservative branch of the Catholic church and structured many of its apostolicisms around strict and discriminatory ideas of gender normativity and the idealization of heterosexual marriage. On example of the Newman apostolate was the rental housing the Center provided for students which gave preference to married couples.[2] In May 1968, the Center imposed a restriction on “girls” renting its properties; alongside the decision was this statement: “Because of problems in the past with girl renters it was again stated that no girls will be rented apartments and/or rooms in the Newman Rentals.”[3] This outright denial to rent to women was surprising to me; I had assumed that the advancements in civil rights in the 1960s would have ended this kind of discrimination. At the same time, the Center sponsored discussions addressing the liberalization of attitudes such as “Is pre-marital sex O.K.?,” “Is legalized abortion right?”, and “Is God dead?”[4] While we don’t know how these discussions turned out, the Newman Center’s commitment to traditional values likely led to conclusions that challenged the growing sexual liberalization in American society.

The 1960s was a time of change for Catholicism, marked by Pope John XXIII’s call for the Church to conform to the ideas of “aggiornamento,” or the bringing-up-to-date of the apostolate.[5] This meant an expansion into more areas outside of parishes and clergy. Many Catholics remained committed to conservative ideologies around sexuality and gender. In 1972, my mother was born into a devout Catholic family, and her childhood and adolescence were rooted in Catholic communities and their common faith. My mom told me about the underlying family pressures that she felt when she was going to college, especially the expectation that she find a husband. Her mother, as well as other women in her life, had met their husbands at college, and in some ways that created a pattern to follow. On top of that, there was a general understanding, as my mom put it, that women of the time knew that their husbands’ studies and career came before their own.[6] Even in the 1970s, these pressures were still around despite broader changes in American society.

This context may explain the Newman Center’s policies and projects. Women who wanted to focus on their own career and who showed no interest in finding a husband had no place in the Newman rentals. The historian Philip Gleason notes that the Catholic Church in the United States feared the changing national culture, which was becoming increasingly secular and liberalized.[7] The recurring discussion of using classes to convert non-Catholic students makes much more sense in an era where the future of the Catholic church was uncertain. The Center acted not as an outpost of stability for OSU students who are attempting to answer the pressing questions of that era; instead, it offered guidance to those who had already subscribed to the Church’s ideas of what was morally just and unjust. Single women not being allowed in the rentals would not appeal to liberal students, nor would the glorification of traditional gender roles appeal to LGBTQIA+ students or others who oppose these ideologies.

Perhaps this explains the Newman Center’s many proposals to use classes to connect to the student body and perhaps gain new converts. There are many discussions of this tactic in leadership meeting minutes, an idea first introduced in a 1965 “Ten Year Projection” for the Center, when leaders expressed a belief that lessons in the Catholic faith were needed regardless of whether or not they would be offered through curriculum.[8] In another case, someone suggested using students in an architecture class to design a potential building for the Center while acting as ambassadors of sorts, furthering fellow students’ knowledge of the Center and Catholicism. They viewed this as a way to garner more support on campus.[9] In a way, it seems that the Center’s leaders hoped to create a quasi-Jesuit-style college for OSU students. One of the Center’s main goals in the second half of the 1960s was to create a “Catholic church on campus,” yet another way to spread Catholicism throughout the student body.[10]

My research into the Newman Center at Oregon State University in the 1960s surprised me. The staunch support of marriage, sexual conservatism, and heteronormativity aligned with the ideals of the Catholic Church but seem out of step with the era’s liberalizing culture. In the midst of mass movements for civil rights and women’s rights, the Newman Center denied housing to women; it is difficult to know if this conservatism helped or hindered its efforts to convert more students to the Catholic faith. If I could further this project, I would try to interview students who attended OSU in the late 1960s and ask them how they viewed the Newman Center. Some pieces of history are lost because they are not recorded, and this includes students’ perception of the Newman Center’s early years.

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[1]  “Newman Apostolate Grows at Corvallis,” Catholic Sentinel, October 13, 1967, Box 1, Memorabilia Collection, Special Collections and Archives Research Center, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon.

[2] Newman Center Minutes of Meetings, December 1968, Box 1, Newman Foundation of Oregon State Records, SCARC.

[3] Newman Center Minutes of Meetings, May 17, 1968, Box 1, Newman Foundation of Oregon State Records, SCARC.

[4] Talk to Be Given…,” 1968, Box 3, Newman Foundation of Oregon State Records, SCARC.

[5] S.J. Achutegrui, “The Second Vatican Council,” Philippine Studies 10, no. 4 (December 1962), 523.

[6] Annie Grattan interview with author, December 4, 2025.

[7] Philip Gleason, “Catholicism and Cultural Change in the 60s,” Review of Politics 34, no. 4 (January 1972): 91-107.

[8] “Ten Year Project” Box 3, Newman Foundation of Oregon State Records, SCARC.

[9] Mrs. Sitton to Newman Foundation, 1965, Box 3, Newman Foundation of Oregon State Records, SCARC.

[10] “Talk to be Given to People Called Together for the Purpose of Starting Some Type of Booster Organization for the O.S.U. Newman Center,” 1968, Box 3, Newman Foundation of Oregon State Records, SCARC.

Students in Dr. Marisa Chappell’s History 363 “Women in U.S. History” class spent the final three weeks of Fall Quarter 2025 in OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center exploring women’s impact on our university.

By Dylan Brady

In OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center, I was surprised to find a 1939 guide published by the Etiquette Board of Associated Women Students of Oregon State College called “Save Your Blushes,” which details the do’s and don’ts for incoming women students. One one page, for example, the guide instructs women students in how to act in the dining halls, from seating arrangements to conversation topics.[1] The guidebook tells women students what they should wear and how they should act on dates. In a section called “Fruit for the Beach Combers,” it offers advice – for example, “there are very few emergencies that justify breaking a date” – and referring to potential dates as “fruits” or “livestock.”[2]

The guide includes tips on mundane matters that I was surprised a college organization would even care about, such as how women are supposed to walk with men. A section called “Round Bout” advises, “if a girl and boy are walking together, the girl should always be on the man’s right.”[3] Many of the pieces of advice offered in the guide seem, to the modern eye, like an odd effort to dictate the daily actions of women students.

Associated Women Students (AWS) was a national organization with chapters at universities across the country. Each chapter shared a set of goals: to “regulate all matters pertaining to the welfare of women students, to further the spirit of unity and service, to increase a sense of individual responsibility, and to create and maintain high standards and ideals for the women students of the university.”[4] AWS served as a campus umbrella organization for all women’s groups, societies, and clubs, sponsoring events such as nickel hops, carnivals, and women’s weekends.[5] The constitution of OSC’s AWS noted that every woman on campus was allowed to become a member and participate creating cooperation among women across campus and the AWS.[6]

AWS worked closely with OSC’s administration to promote what its members viewed as the safety and well-being of women students and the campus community. A 1959 AWS pamphlet declared, “In the college community, closing hours and other regulations are made and observed in the best interests of the health and welfare of the women students and to meet expressed wishes of parents for social supervision.”[7] Here, the AWS promotes a common approach at the time in which college and university leadership acted in loco parentis, or “in the place of the parent.” As a legal scholar described it, “in its fullest form the doctrine of in loco parentis permits colleges to devise, implement and administer student discipline and to foster the physical and moral welfare of students.”[8] It was a primary focus for many of these organizations to regulate the behavior of the female students on campus because these regulations are were what they believed were necessary to succeed not just in college, but their future life. These regulations were harmonious to the roles women were expected to play in the family and community in the mid-twentieth century.

Throughout the AWS’s existence, they produced many coed codes to serve as guides for women on campus, designed to shape their behavior. This coincides with their belief that, “In every phase of life the individual lives within certain regulations, which are necessary for the welfare and harmony of the group.”[9] They emphasized the college rule that women students secure permission from a parent or guardian, filed with the Dean of Women, before leaving campus.[10] They also promoted the rule that women were barred from entering men’s dormitories.[11] AWS and the administration worked to impose a broad range of rules on women student behavior.  

The fact that it was women students themselves, through AWS, that advocated and publicized these rules and regulations suggests an emphasis on peer pressure as one key enforcement mechanism. The historian Babette Faehmel argues that if women on college campuses did not follow the behavior rules set out for them, they would be socially ostracized.[12] AWS guides emphasize that students must follow certain social conduct to remain “in accordance with standards of decency.”[13] Even as these guides sought to restrict women’s freedom, they insisted that conformity was “a sure recipe of happiness at college.”[14] These guides promoted a vision of womanhood rooted in acceptable social behavior, preparing women students to become good hostesses, conversationalists, and wives.

Similar handbooks and guides circulated on college campuses in the 1920s and 1930s and continued to shape college life during and after World War II. Historian Donna J. Drucker, who researched similar women’s organizations at Purdue University in the 1939-1940 academic year, found that they “aimed to prepare young women to face whatever experiences lay ahead—whether that meant eating oysters or preparing for war—with grace.”[15] In the postwar period, as more women could afford higher education, American culture both praised women’s college attendance and promoted domesticity.[16] Even as more women attended college, the expectation was that they would devote their adult lives to managing children and a home and supporting their husbands’ careers. AWS leaders, then, tried to prepare college women for this future role. As Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz wrote about Scripps College’s expectations of its students (all women) in this period, “graduates might combine work (‘contribution’) with marriage and children (‘fullest and richest life’).”[17]

Of course, on college campuses nowadays there are still rules and regulations that many must follow, but nothing that compares to the ones female students had to follow before the 1960s. College organizations do have a job in some ways to help foster student growth, not just for career goals but also for living a. healthy and contributing life. However, there is a limit to how far these restrictions should go in order serve the best interests of the students. These handbooks and organizations, even with their best interests in mind, served to control women students’ behavior and mold them for a limited future after college – marriage and motherhood. Regulations imposed by administrators and the promotion and enforcement of these regulations by fellow students limited the freedom of women students to be who they wanted to be and to express themselves. This small look at college life in mid-twentieth-century cannot capture the complexities of women students’ perspectives and lives living within this system. But it suggests that in this period, colleges sought to mold women students to fit a very narrow role in society rather than to develop and pursue their own, individual goals and aspirations.

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[1] “Save Your Blushes, 1939,” Oregon Digital, 9, Accessed 2025-12-04. https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71cn310.

[2] “Save Your Blushes, 1939.”

[3] “Save Your Blushes, 1939.”

[4] Betsey Creekmore, “Associated Women Students – Volopedia,” Volopedia, September 24, 2018, https://volopedia.lib.utk.edu/entries/associated-women-students/.

[5] Historical Publications of Oregon State University, Oregon State University. “The Beaver 1948” Oregon Digital. Accessed 2025-11-22. https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/0g354f54.

[6] Associated Women Students, A.W.S. Handbook, 1930-31, Series 1, Box 1, Folder 2, Associated Women Students Handbooks, Special Collection and Archives Research Center, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon.

[7] OSU Special Collections & Archives Research Center, Oregon State University. “AWS and Administrative Regulations for Women, 1959” Oregon Digital. Accessed 2025-12-10, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71cn38x.

[8] Theodore C. Stamatakos, “The Doctrine of In Loco Parentis, Tort Liability and the Student-College Relationship,” Indiana Law Journal 65, no. 2 (1990): 474.

[9] OSU SCARC, “AWS and Administrative Regulations for Women, 1959,” Oregon Digital.

[10] Ibid.

[11] OSU SCARC, “AWS and Administrative Regulations for Women, 1959,” Oregon Digital.

[12] Babette Faehmel, College Women in the Nuclear Age: Cultural Literacy and Female Identity, 1940–1960 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2011), 31.

[13] Historical Publications of Oregon State University, “AWS and Administrative Regulations for Women, 1960,” Oregon Digital, accessed December 10, 2025, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71cn396.

[14] Historical Publications of Oregon State University, “Coed Code, 1946–1947,” Oregon Digital, accessed December 11, 2025, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71cn353.

[15] Donna J. Drucker, “‘In a Sense, It Is a Game’: Women’s Dormitory Life at Purdue University, 1939–1940,” Indiana Magazine of History 113, no. 1 (2017): 15, https://doi.org/10.5378/indimagahist.113.1.0001.

[16] Lynn D. Gordon, “The Gibson Girl Goes to College: Popular Culture and Women’s Higher Education in the Progressive Era, 1890–1920,” American Quarterly 39, no. 2 (1987): 211–30, https://doi.org/10.2307/2712910.

[17] Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz, “Designing for the Genders: Curricula and Architecture at Scripps College and the California Institute of Technology,” Pacific Historical Review 54, no. 4 (1985): 439–61, https://doi.org/10.2307/3639569.

Students in Dr. Marisa Chappell’s History 363 “Women in U.S. History” class spent the final three weeks of Fall Quarter 2025 in OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center exploring women’s impact on our university.

By Kylie Abbey-Zanni

In the Buena Maris Mockmore Papers held in OSU’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center I found a fourteen-page report from 1960 titled “Hanford – In Retrospect.” In the report, Maris wrote about her time as Director of Women’s Activities at the Hanford Nuclear site, a Manhattan Project complex located along the Columbia River in southern Washington, during World War II. As Hanford recruited and employed thousands of women workers, its managers recognized what Maris called “the need for someone who could care for the welfare of several thousand women workers.”[1]

They turned to Maris, who took a year-long leave from her position as Dean of Women at Oregon State College, from September 1943 to September 1924, to serve as Director of Women’s Activities at Hanford. The report shows how she professionalized women’s welfare work and labor during wartime. Using her position at Hanford, Maris worked to set women workers up for success not only during the war but also afterwards, challenging the widespread assumption that women were temporary workers who would return home once the wartime emergency ended.

Maris came into her position as Director of Women’s Activities at Hanford due to the unprecedented number of women entering the workforce, including newly available jobs in the defense industry, during World War II. A production site for plutonium needed for American atomic bombs, Hanford was a massive enterprise. At its peak in 1944, Hanford employed more than 51,000 workers, including four thousand women. With. large numbers of men serving in the military, defense plants sought out women to serve in a variety of roles including equipment inspectors, construction and general staff positions.

Maris’ report offers much more than just administrative notes. Instead, it reads very like to the diary of a woman managing a workplace in a new environment. She describes the living conditions Hanford’s women employees endured, such as overcrowded dormitories, the desert climate, and feelings of isolation. Maris’s solution for these struggles was something she called “purposeful engagement,” making available opportunities for women workers to get involved in recreational activities that served the community. She brought in Red Cross volunteer programs and church services and activities, for example, to help “curb boredom.”[2] These efforts were touted in promotional coverage in various newspapers. An article titled “New Deans a Queen!,” for example, portrayed Maris as a very warm woman who was heavily committed and involved in women’s development. “To satisfy needs of such a large group of employees… church facilities had to be provided. This wasn’t the specific responsibility of the supervisor of women’s activities… However, the tent for Catholic services was no longer adequate – some of the parishioners sitting on benches well out beyond the open end of the tent in the sagebrush.”[3] Providing adequate facilities for church services was not in Maris’s job description, but she was committed to the welfare Hanford’s women and took up the issue anyway. In a newspaper tribute decades later, reporter Laurie Williams referred to Maris as “Hanford’s mom for a year” and highlighted how women at Hanford thrived under her supervision, many of them going on to have careers after the war.[4]

Another later treatment discussed Maris’s promotion of volunteer activities. In “The Hanford Site: an Anthology of Early Histories,” M.S. Gerber wrote that “Mrs. Maris also organized a library, started a Red Cross chapter that still functions in Richland today, and scheduled a special daily bus with a late return to and from Pasco so that women could break the monotony of camp life.”[5] In addition to these organized programs, Maris worked endlessly to ensure these women kept their morale up and their lives as normally as possible. Maris was well suited to this role. After earning her undergraduate degree in Home Economics and Child Development, she earned a Master’s in Science at OSC in 1939 and went on to teach and serve as Dean of Women at OSC from 1941 to 1948 (excepting her year at Hanford).

Maris’s approach echoed similar work by middle-class women reformers in the first half of the twentieth century. During the Progressive era, reformers feared that young, unmarried women’s entry into urbanized labor markets and access to commercialized leisure put them at moral risk. Reformers from groups such as the Young Women’s Christian Association and the Travelers Aid Society believed these women needed supervised, structured recreation, from chess clubs and church services and supervised outings and supervised boarding houses.[6] Maris was able to reproduce this at Hanford, carrying on traditional ways of bringing leisure to working women. These sources show how Maris not only monitored Hanford’s workplace and leisure culture but also heavily shaped and contributed to it.

Some histories of women’s labor in World War II emphasized its temporary nature. They argue that while the wartime emergency opened up new kinds of jobs to women, these opportunities were largely foreclosed when servicemen returned after the war.[7] Other scholarship paints a more complicated picture. Claudia Goldin argued that women’s labor during World War II sparked a long-term shift in societal norms and expectations.[8]Several contributors to Joanne Meyerowitz’s reassessment of postwar gender roles argued that women continued to advance, particularly in feminized professions such as nursing, teaching, and social work.[9]

Maris’s impact on Hanford’s women workers seems to have played a small role in this larger phenomenon. Laurie Williams’s article “Women Came to Hanford to Make a Difference” detailed how women continued to grow in their career fields following their time at Hanford and credits Maris for building their confidence and capacities.[10] Maris modeled women’s leadership, showing that women could manage and direct the workforce, not just join it. Her work at Hanford not only illustrates wartime necessity but also shows how war-time need opened paths towards long-term employment for women. She proved herself as a wartime professional who demonstrated that women managers were not temporary but rather individuals who could carry their skills outside of the war. Maris’ story and impact fits into the broader transformation of women in the United States at the time. WWII made women’s labor more visible and necessary while women like Maris worked to make it more sustainable. Her role in Hanford serves as a reminder that the war created both women workers and women leaders.

“Hanford – in Retrospect” captured the story of a woman who reshaped wartime labor at a singular site. By establishing a variety of programs, a sense of community, and professional pathways, Buena Maris helped to normalize women in long-term paid labor, not just during the war but after it, as well. Her story invites further questions and research about Oregon State College and the larger history of women, war, and labor. Did federal agencies recognize, or even use Maris’s model? What role did race, class, and religion play in shaping women’s lives and labor at Hanford? How did OSC benefit from Maris’s Hanford experience after she returned? Maris opened the door for women to continue growing in the professional workplace and her papers ensure we can look back on and evaluate her impact.

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[1] Buena Maris, “Hanford – In Retrospect,” December 8, 1960, series 3, box 2, folder “Manhattan Project: Hanford, 1960-1962,” Buena Maris Mockmore Papers (hereafter Mockmore Papers), Special Collections and Archives Research Center, Corvallis, Oregon.

[2] Maris, “Hanford – In Retrospect.”

[3] “New Deans a Queen! New Dean Promises OSC Friendliness,” undated newspaper clipping, series 2, box 1, folder “Newsclippings re: Speeches and Presentations Given by Mockmore [Iowa and Oregon] circa 1940-1965,” Mockmore Papers.

[4] Laurie Williams, “Hanford’s Mom for a Year, Buena Maris Made Desert a Home for Women Workers,” newspaper clipping, October 31, 1993, series 3, box 2, folder “Manhattan Project: Hanford 1945,” Mockmore Papers.

[5] M.S. Gerber, “The Hanford Site: An Anthology of Early Histories,” October 1993, series 3, box 2, folder “Manhattan Project 1998-2010,” Mockmore Papers.

[6] Joanne Meyerowitz, Women Adrift: Independent Wage Earners in Chicago, 1880-1930 (University of Chicago Press, 1988).

[7] Ruth Milkman, “Gender, Consciousness, and Social Change: Rethinking Women’s World War II Experience,” Labor History 28, no. 1 (1987): 3–18; Marjorie Miller, “Working Women and World War II,” Journal of American Studies 14, no. 2 (1980): 123–141.

[8] Claudia Goldin, “The Role of World War II in the Rise of Women’s Employment,” Quarterly Journal of Economics 106, no. 4 (1991): 1497-1542.

[9] Joanne Meyerowitz, Not June Cleaver: Women and Gender in Postwar America, 1945-1960 (Temple University Press, 1994).

[10] Laurie Williams, “Women Came to Hanford to Make a Difference,” newspaper clipping, October 31, 1993, series 3, box 2, folder “Manhattan Project: Hanford 1945,” Mockmore Papers.

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 Tanner Maynard.

The December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor by the Imperial Japanese Navy forced the American people to recognize that the war raging across the globe was coming to them, whether they wanted it or not. Men stood in recruitment lines, women signed up for the Red Cross, and assembly lines transitioned from producing cars to producing tanks. The attacks galvanized the nation’s fighting spirt and Americans were once again willing to enter the fray. However, the war overseas would not be won through spirit alone. It had been more than two decades since the United States’ foray into World War One and Americans were not accustomed to, nor prepared for, the rigors of war. Technicians needed training, communities needed organizing, and those on the home front needed more practical knowledge to support the war abroad. Land-grant universities like Oregon State College (OSC) answered the nation’s call to arms by addressing the country’s educational needs.

America faced a critical shortage of engineers, doctors, and scientists for wartime needs at the onset of the United States’ entry into World War Two. In recognition of this shortage, the OSC campus almost immediately began to transition from traditional campus life towards a wartime curriculum. A headline from the March 1942 issue of The Oregon Stater, the campus’s monthly magazine, reads: “Wartime Demands Anticipated…Defense Activities at Oregon State College Meet and Exceed Suggestions of Wartime Commission.”[1]  The article states that, earlier that month, under the direction of acting president Dr. F.A. Gilfillan, OSC had committed to accelerate academic schedules. College administrators planned summer classes for the upcoming term that would offer up to a maximum of 18 credits for the session and allow undergraduates in critical sectors, such as engineering and physics, to graduate earlier. OSC also contributed to the war effort by creating nutritional programs, pre-nursing courses, first aid, fire prevention training, and additional ROTC work.[2] While many of these courses were educational, the newly established physical program, for example, offered dancing classes, field games, and swimming courses, all under the supervision of OSC physical education staff.[3]

OSC was one of the first campuses in the nation to offer physical conditioning courses aimed at national defense for women.[4]  While these courses were not designed to prepare women for physical combat, they were intended to condition who would go on to work in canneries, field labor, or at aid stations through the course of the war, as the Oregon State Barometer explains.[5]

By 1943, the accelerated wartime curriculum began to accommodate incoming undergraduates who participated in the similar high school Victory Corps program. The program was designed to provide some basic military training to male and female high school students. Undergraduates would be eligible to transfer their Victory Corps experience over in the form of degree credits to further accelerate their graduation date and meet the expertise required of the war.[6] Summer classes and Victory Corps workshops could give freshmen a head start on their graduation date. The wartime curriculum prepared students for their future trials. However, OSC did not just offer curriculum for its own students.

The military quickly realized its direct need for technical expertise beyond the home front. In 1943, the Army and Navy collaborated to create the Army Specialized Training Program (ASTP) under the Ninth Service Command. The Service Command’s intent was to train officers in subjects such as advanced engineering and other sciences. Qualified civilians, such as campus faculty, would conduct this training on a contract basis. OSC was the first institution on the West Coast to secure one of these contracts.[7] Oregon newspapers quickly praised OSC for accepting 500 soldiers in the coming spring term of 1943.[8] The ASTP required the soldier students to adhere to rigorous military and professional standards. An ASTP manual sent to the OSC President details the contracted curriculum the campus would provide, as well as the advanced expectations of those who participate in the program.[9] The program would not survive the end of the war due to more pressing manpower requirements, such a need for riflemen in late 1943 and early 1944. However, OSC continued to support the program, with contracts extending as far as July 1945.[10] Wartime curricula and the ASTP, while significant presences on the campus, were not the only educational programs offered by OSC in support of the war.

President Roosevelt’s administration confronted a monumental task in mobilizing the American people and the economy for war. In his historical analysis Wartime America, historian Dr. John Jeffries describes the complexities of mobilization and how the executive branch created various organizations to assist in that endeavor. “America’s entry into the war in December 1941 galvanized mobilization agencies, the production of war goods, and the management of the economy, but largely along lines already established. In January 1942, FDR created the War Production Board (WPB)…Designed to exercise general responsibility over the economy in order to effect conversion to war production, restrict nonessential economic activity, and coordinate materials and production priorities.”[11] By themselves, these programs would mean relatively little if the public did not know how to help support them in their day-to-day lives. You may ask an individual to do their part to control inflation, but it will not amount to much if people don’t know what that is or how they can make an impact. Luckily, OSC was well-equipped for educational outreach.

Extension Services offered by land-grant universities and colleges like OSC had a long tradition of educational outreach long before, and long after, the entry to the war. Dr. Wayne Rasmussen, former chief historian for the United States Department of Agriculture, remarked in his historical account Taking the University to the People, “Extension has been a force for sustained, rational change that improves the quality of American life. It has taken the university to the people. Indeed, it is the university of the people.”[12] He adds, “the Extension Services played pivotal roles in the nation’s survival through three major emergencies – World War I, the Great Depression of the 1930s, and World War II.”[13]

While OSC’s wartime curriculum met the educational needs of the nation on campus, its Extension Service stood ready to address them off grounds. Extension Services outreach ranged from providing practical information to local communities in support of national programs, such as the effort to control inflation, to indirect support through comprehensive diet plans and fire prevention training.

Handbooks were particularly useful to this end. One such example is the Victory Begins at Home program booklet in which OSC’s Extension Services developed a guide to assist local leaders in supporting national goals.[14] The manual emphasized the need for community leaders to keep their neighborhood informed about wartime problems as well as activities that local communities could engage in, such as the collection of scrap iron and rubber or the establishment of Victory Gardens. Nutrition became a major focus of the war effort during 1942 and 1943. Establishing home food supplies and maintaining proper nutrition would allow families to be more resilient in the face of wartime shortages. In response, Extension Services distributed material to assist families in developing easy to follow diet plans.[15] Families received detailed instructions via guidebooks and workshops on how to keep and properly manage livestock, even in confined environments.[16] The potential threat of fire sabotage by enemy forces spurred the creation of the Emergency Farm Fire Protection program in support of the national Victory Garden initiative.[17] OSC’s Extension Services not only developed these types of programs, but ensured community access via the distribution of handbooks to local communities through meetings, workshops, or mailing lists.[18] OSC’s fire prevention and training programs were so successful that in 1942, the state organized the Keeping Oregon Green association. A 1942 thesis presented to the School of Forestry noted that the recent expansion of fire patrols in rural Oregon were directly attributable to the Oregon State College Extension Service.[19] These extra patrols would surely come in handy later that year when Japan attempted to drop incendiary bombs on the Oregon coast. However, not all programs were as tangible. In 1942, the President of the United States offered a plan to control inflation. Through workshops and booklets, Extension Services offered rural communities a comprehensive understanding of the causes of inflation, as well as tips for how individuals could assist their government in their attempts to control it.[20]

Educational institutions did not stand idly by while the rest of the nation went to war. Distributing a handbook or taking a course is not as flashy as raising a flag on a foreign island. However, that does not mean that the services offered by institutions were not valuable. Institutions like Oregon State College worked tirelessly to address the educational needs of a nation at war. Through wartime curriculum and the outreach of Extension Service, land-grant colleges directly supported the national efforts by ensuring America had the technical and practical knowledge to win the war.

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[1] “Wartime Demands Anticipated…Defense Activities at Oregon State College meet and Exceed Suggestions of Wartime Commission,” The Oregon Stater, March 1942, 2, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71bk75g

[2] “Wartime Demands Anticipated,” The Oregon Stater, March 1942, 3,16, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71bk75g

[3] “Physical program Open to All OSC Women,” Oregon State Barometer, March 24, 1942: 1, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/8k71p720p#metadata

[4] “OSC Health Program Among Nation’s First,” Oregon State Barometer, March 24, 1942: 1, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/8k71p720p#metadata

[5] Eva Seen, “Physical education Department Offers Conditioning Activities,” Oregon State Barometer, March 24,1942: 1, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/8k71p720p#metadata

[6] “Fourth Quarter Summer Session Plans at OSC Announced by Dean Smith,” The Oregon Stater, February-March, 1943, 5, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71bk89t?locale=en

[7] John Burtner, “Army Specialized training Program Set Up on Oregon State Campus,” The Oregon Stater,” (February-March, 1943), 3, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71bk89t?locale=en

[8] “Oregon State Is Ready to Proceed on War Basis,” The Springfield News, March 11, 1943: 3, Historic Oregon Newspapers, https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn97071003/1943-03-11/ed-1/seq-3/#words=college+Oregon+Oregon%27s+State+war

[9]“Army Specialized Training Program,” April 3, 1944, Oregon State University’s Special Collections and Archives Research Center (hereafter SCARC), President’s Office General Subject File, Army Specialized Training Program – Curricula, Contract manuals and curriculum material, 1943-1945,” Subgroup 6, Series 8, Sub-Series 41, Reel-Folder 34.79a, 215-238. Also available through, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/4m90dw941

[10] “Army Specialized Training Program” (April 1944), 7, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/4m90dw941

[11] John Jeffries. Wartime America: The World War II Home Front (Rowman & Littlefield,  2018), 17.

[12] Wayne Rasmussen, Taking the University to the People: Seventy-Five Years of Cooperative Extension (Iowa State University Press, 1989), 14.

[13] Rasmussen, Taking the University to the People, viii.

[14] Voluntary Community and Neighborhood Leadership in Oregon (Corvallis, Or. Federal Cooperative Extension Service, Oregon State College, 1942), 1-4, ScholarsArchive@OSU, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/41687k07k

[15] Mable Mack. Planning Your Family’s Food Supply (Corvallis, Or. Federal Cooperative Extension Service, Oregon State College, 1943), 1-5, ScholarsArchive@OSU, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/0g354k11p?locale=en

[16] James A. Harper and Clyde Walker, The Home Unit Poultry House. (Corvallis, Or. Federal Cooperative Extension Service, Oregon State College, 1943), 1-12, ScholarsArchive@OSU, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/5712mb02r

[17] A. S King, and R. H Sterling, Organizing for Farm Fire Protection in Oregon (Corvallis, Or. Federal Cooperative Extension Service, Oregon State College, 1942), 2. https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/jd473122h

[18] A. S King, and R. H Sterling, Organizing for Farm Fire Protection in Oregon (April 1942), 3, ScholarsArchive@OSU, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/jd473122h?locale=en

[19] Eugene McNulty, Keeping Oregon Green: Handbook for Field Men of the Keep Oregon Green Association (June 1942), 5, ScholarsArchive@OSU, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/undergraduate_thesis_or_projects/hq37vt27x?locale=en

[20] The Nation’s Program to Control Inflation (Corvallis, Or. Federal Cooperative Extension Service, Oregon State College,  July 1942), 3-8, ScholarsArchive@OSU, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/fx719r33t

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 Whitney Leonard.

During World War II, the increasing demand for farm labor in the United States of America, and the decreasing hands to do so, resulted in national and local initiatives to fulfill labor needs. The larger programs, such as the Bracero program, which contracted temporary workers from Mexico in agreement with the Mexican government, required more localized support, such as the Emergency Farm Labor Program (EFLP), founded by Oregon State College’s (OSC) Extension Services. In a January 1947 twenty-page circular report, OSC Extension Services described to Oregon citizens the role of the EFLP from 1943 to 1946 and its focus on migratory labor moving forward through 1947. OSC’s Extension program proved to be vital to the labor effort through its EFLP and its administration over the Bracero program in Oregon.

OSC cooperated with larger, national organizations to aid the farm labor efforts within Oregon. The Extension Services of OSC, created by the Smith-Lever Act of 1914 to bring specialized research and expertise to the everyday people of Oregon, were given “increased responsibility in 1943 in the recruitment, training and placement of farm labor,” by the U.S. Congress, which allocated 26 million among the states to do so.[i] The Extension Services took on this responsibility through an increased focus on their already established county farm labor subcommittees and the founding of the EFLP.[ii]  The 1947 circular report, mentioned above, informed Oregon citizens that the Extension Service of OSC supported the EFLP by providing resources such as statistics to estimate the number of workers needed, placing available workers, organizing training courses, providing instruction on efficient labor practices, and planning for building labor housing.[iii] This was a big task, however, for the main Corvallis EFLP office to take on by itself, which is where the county agents came into play.

The EFLP, based in Corvallis, was simply at the center of this operation, providing aid for county agents who worked diligently for the Extension Services throughout the state. A letter from J.R. Beck, the Corvallis supervisor for the EFLP, dated October 30, 1944, to the county agents, offered support from Corvallis specialists in filing the monthly farm labor reports for their county, which the county agents sent to the Corvallis office responsible for compiling a statewide report.[iv] The April 1944 report disclosed that the number of seasonal workers (2,310) that farmers ordered through the county agents was much higher than year-round workers (479).[v] This means that a county agent would have been tasked with placing workers based on changing needs throughout the year.  

The variety and changing nature of labor demands led to the Extension Services mobilizing many different types of workers. The EFLP, in the 1947 circular report, mainly highlighted the placement of 338,542 Oregon women and school children as laborers and even leaders in this operation.[vi]  However, when these workers were not enough, the EFLP also placed laborers from Mexico and Jamaica, interned Japanese Americans, and prisoners of war.[vii] While the role of these other workers seems vital, the report leaves these key workers in the margins only in brief comments or even hidden in the captions of photos.

The transcript of a May 30, 1944 Oregon Farm Labor Radio national broadcast on May featuring a discussion between EFLP supervisors William Teutsch and J.R. Beck and a member of the Benton County farm labor committee, Harold G. Rumbaugh, brings the diversity of these workers into clearer view. The three men commented on different types of laborers, such as children, women, discharged soldiers and even Mexican workers, and how the EFLP, along with the county committees, allocated these laborers based on differing needs.[viii] Rumbaugh explained, for example, that his, “community can use local labor better because we do not have enough concentration of jobs at any one time to handle a camp of Mexicans.”[ix] Rumbaugh’s comment demonstrates the thought that went into placements, and how every county committee considered the demands of its community.  Although this script provides another mention to Mexican workers, the speakers still leave the origin, purpose, and labor and living conditions of the Mexican migrant workers unclear.

The Mexican workers under the jurisdiction of the EFLP in Oregon were contracted through the 1942 Bracero agreement, which was one major effort by the United States government to create a sufficient labor force during World War II. The U.S. State Department, the Department of Labor, and the Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS) collectively established the August 1942 Public Law-45, and they did so in collaboration with Mexico. At the time, the U.S. War Manpower Commission, founded by Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1942 to address and estimate labor needs, predicted an overwhelming need for farm laborers.[x] The purpose of this Bracero agreement was to fulfill this great need, and, for INS purposes, to prevent farmers from contracting undocumented workers.[xi] Through the Bracero program, and “Operation Wetback,” where the INS deported undocumented migrants to then return them to the same farmers as Braceros, the INS provided a controlled labor force from Mexico.[xii] Although responsible for the Bracero program on an administrative level, these national agencies did not work alone.

  The EFLP found the Bracero workers, as they were very able to adapt, to be very fitting for their shifting labor needs based on the seasons. Beck comments, in the same radio script mentioned above, that “1944 production could not be harvested without the aid of Mexicans,” and the EFLP, “hope to have enough Mexican labor to put into the 20 or more districts where extra help must be had.”[xiii] While a shortage in labor made these workers important, their ability to pick up the slack when children returned to school in September and for working, “distant from centers of population,” as a 1944 newspaper comments, seemed to make them perfect for the job.[xiv] One example of adaptability was on August 6, 1945, when Beck announced that Mexican workers would be moved to agricultural adjacent jobs, such as working in processing plants during a downturn in agricultural labor needs.[xv] Even though the Bracero workers met specific needs, the EFLP had an understanding that the program would be short lived.

Despite the EFLP’s original thinking, the program continued for many more years. After the war it was clear, through EFLP news notes from August 16, 1945, that jobs for returning military workers would be prioritized, and the United States would begin to repatriate Mexican workers.[xvi] This did not mean, however, that the Bracero Program in Oregon was over. Instead, in late August 1945, the OSC Extension Services aided in, “camp construction and loaning tents, tent platforms, cots, mattresses and tables” to a migratory farm camp in Malin (Klamath County).[xvii] As the Bracero program continued to thrive, it is clear how important these workers were to the EFLP in handling the shifting conditions of the agricultural industry during and after World War II.

Despite the support the Braceros provided to the American agriculture industry, they received little respect in return. The Bracero workers, unlike undocumented laborers, “received housing (albeit meager), food, transportation, and a greater assurance that they would in fact be paid for their work.”[xviii] However, the working conditions were difficult and hazardous, causing injuries.[xix] Additionally, Braceros often lived in tents, had little to eat, and received subpar medical treatment, if any.[xx] These workers, placed in an unfamiliar, and sometimes hostile, situation, had to make the decision between the path of least resistance, or the more risky path of authorship in their own story.

 Braceros, decided to not be passive victims, but worked diligently to advocate for their rights. Braceros were able to protest more in the Northwest, where the workers were said to be, “constantly on strike.”[xxi] However, closer to the Mexican border, in the Southwest, where farmers more readily returned rebellious Braceros for new ones, there were limited strike efforts.[xxii] Furthermore, the Mexican government worked to protect Bracero workers. For example, Mexican officials ended the flow of Braceros to Texas and Idaho because of high rates of discrimination in those states.[xxiii] It is clear that the Bracero program was more than a neutral labor exchange. Due to the power differential, the United States actors took advantage of the Braceros. However, the Braceros also proved themselves to be active participants in their own history.

In sum, the expertise of Oregon State College, with support from both the U.S. government and county agents, created and ran a program which aided Oregon farmers in fulfilling labor requests fit to their circumstances. The interdependence of these actors within the Bracero Program and the EFLP, spanning all the way from the national level to the state level all the way down to the individual farmers and workers, shows the complexity of programs such as these. The intricacies of every actor’s interest, as well as their power to enforce their interests, shaped these farm labor programs. The Bracero Program and the EFLP continued after the war to support the national interest of the United States. The end of the EFLP, in 1947, however, did not even mark the end of the Bracero program, which operated until 1964. Even today we can see the ripple effects of these programs in the faces of agricultural workers, and the United States’ interdependence on undocumented Mexican labor.

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[i] Frank Llewellyn Ballard, The Oregon State University Federal Cooperative Extension Service:1911-1961 (Oregon State University Extension Services, 1960), 1, 22, Oregon State University (hereafter OSU), Scholars Archive, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/technical_reports/c821gq42j?locale=en; “Rieder Starts Labor Checkup,” The Oregon Statesman, May 27, 1943 4, Historic Oregon Newspapers (hereafter HON), University of Oregon (UO) https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn85042470/1943-05-27/ed-1/seq-4/#words=county+farm+labor+subcommittee

[ii] Ballard, The Oregon State University Federal Cooperative Extension Service, 22; “1943 Farm Labor Problems to be Studies Locally,” Roseburg News-Review, March 1, 1943: 3, HON, https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/2003260227/1943-03-01/ed-1/seq-3/#words=county+farm+labor+subcommittees

[iii] Oregon State College Extension Services, Fighters on the Farm Front: A Story of the 1943-46 Oregon Emergency Farm Labor Program (Oregon State Federal Cooperative Extension Services, 1947), 2,10,13-15, OSU, Scholars Archive, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/technical_reports/br86b846h.

[iv] J.R. Beck, Letter to “Certain County Agents,” Cooperative Extension Work in Agriculture and Home Economics, October 30, 1944, Special Collections and Archives Research Center at Oregon State University (hereafter SCARC), Extension Service Records (RG 111), Box 67, Farm Labor Emergency, April 1943 – June 1946.

[v] “State Farm Labor Report,” Oregon State University Extension Services, April 5, 1944, SCARC, Extension Service Records (RG 111), Box 67, Farm Labor Emergency, April 1943 – June 1946.

[vi] Oregon State College Extension Services, Fighters on the Farm Front, 4.

[vii] Oregon State College Extension Services, Fighters on the Farm Front, 7.

[viii] William L. Teutsch, J.R. Beck and Harold G. Rumbaugh, “Script for National Broadcast,” Oregon Farm Labor Radio, May 30, 1944, 1-4, SCARC, Extension Service Records (RG 111), Box 67, SG 2 Director’s Office: IX: Projects, Extension Specialists: Farm Labor Emergency Radio.

[ix] William L. Teutsch, J.R. Beck and Harold G. Rumbaugh, “Script for National Broadcast,” 3.

[x] Erasmo Gamboa, “Braceros in the Pacific Northwest,” Pacific Historical Review 56, no. 3 (1987): 379, https://doi.org/10.2307/3638664; Marjorie S. Zatz, “Using and Abusing Mexican Farmworkers: The Bracero Program and the INS,” review of Inside the State: The Bracero Program, Immigration, and the I.N.S. by Kitty Calavita and Mexican Labor and World War II: Braceros in the Pacific Northwest, 1942-1947 by Erasmo Gamboa. Law and Society Review 26, no. 4 (1993): 851, https://doi.org/10.2307/3053955.

[xi] Erasmo Gamboa, “Braceros in the Pacific Northwest,” 379; Marjorie S. Zatz, “Using and Abusing Mexican Farmworkers,” 851.

[xii] Zatz, “Using and Abusing Mexican Farmworkers,” 853.

[xiii] William L. Teutsch, J.R. Beck and Harold G. Rumbaugh, “Script for National Broadcast,” 3-4.

[xiv] “Oregon’s Fall Harvest Calls 50,000 Pickers,” The Springfield News, August 24, 1944, 3, HON, https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn97071003/1944-08-24/ed-1/seq-3/#words=centers+distant+from+population.

[xv] Fred M. Shideler, “Farm Labor News Notes,” Oregon State College Extension Services, August 6, 1945, SCARC, Extension Service Records (RG 111), Box 67, Farm Labor News Notes.

[xvi] Fred M. Shideler, “Farm Labor News Notes,” Oregon State College Extension Services, August 16, 1945, SCARC, Extension Service Records (RG 111), Box 67, Farm Labor News Notes.

[xvii] Fred M. Shideler, “Farm Labor News Notes,” Oregon State College Extension Services, August 27, 1945, SCARC, Extension Service Records (RG 111), Box 67, Farm Labor News Notes.

[xviii] Zatz, “Using and Abusing Mexican Farmworkers,” 852.

[xix] Gamboa, “Braceros in the Pacific Northwest,” 390.

[xx] Gamboa, “Braceros in the Pacific Northwest,” 381-384, 389-390.

[xxi] Gamboa, “Braceros in the Pacific Northwest,” 393-394; Zatz, “Using and Abusing Mexican Farmworkers,” 855.

[xxii] Gamboa, “Braceros in the Pacific Northwest,” 393-394; Zatz, “Using and Abusing Mexican Farmworkers,” 855.

[xxiii] Zatz, “Using and Abusing Mexican Farmworkers,” 856.

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 Sylas Allen.

In July 1862, the United States government granted thirty-thousand acres of federal land to the states for the purpose of building universities. These universities aimed to fulfill this mission by creating institutions that would instruction in the fields of science, classical studies, agriculture and mechanical arts. Oregon State University (formerly Oregon State College) got its start as a one of these land grant colleges in 1868. In his book The People’s School: a History of Oregon State University, historian William Robbins writes, “Oregon State University exemplifies the importance of federal initiatives in fostering agricultural experiment stations, extension programs, and oceanic and space related research.”¹

Today we see many different course offerings at Oregon State and many choices for majors and studies. However, expanding the curriculum took time and effort to get where it is now. One large push towards expanding and diversifying curriculum occurred during World War II. This unexpected change happened in part due to the soldiers Oregon State College (OSC) housed on campus during the war. Many college campuses were charged with hosting Army training operations. OSC’s Army Navy Specialized Training Program (A.S.T.P) created demand for an expanded liberal arts program. The A.S.T.P aimed to create technicians and specialists for the army, and sent these men to a variety of colleges and institutions for the purpose of receiving academic instruction deemed important towards serving their positions for the army.² The army needed soldiers that had fundamental understandings of the conflict and political science and history classes were considered important foundations along with language classes (primarily German). The demand for these courses helped to push OSC authorities into expanding and improving upon their liberal arts offerings.

Published in October 1940, the 1939-1940 Biennial Report book from The Oregon State Board of Higher Education contains information about colleges and universities in the area, including their budgets, departments, and changes within them. In the past, liberal arts and humanities courses at OSC were referred to as “Lower Divison” or “Service Courses” and these programs were smaller and received less funding than the sciences. According to the budget for the year of 1938-1939, OSC spent a total of $68,838.10 on Arts and Letters, Lower Division and Service Courses (English, Modern Languages, Public Speaking and Drama). Social Science, Lower Division and Service Courses (Economics, History, Philosophy, Psychology, and Sociology) received even less at a total of $36,990.58 for the year. This number is markedly lower compared what OSC gave to the School of Science (Dean of Science, Bacteriology, Botany, Chemistry, Entomology, Geology, Mathematics, Physics, Zoology and Science Survey). Their funding was a total of $202,640.52 throughout the year.³ This shows that the humanities was an underdeveloped program at the time.

Two Oregon State College Catalogs, one from 1940-1941 the other from 1943-1944, record enrollment numbers divided by major. Liberal Arts and Sciences in 1940-1941 had a total of 628 students enrolled in Lower Division courses.⁴ I hypothesized that enrollment numbers would be lower for 1943-1944 as enrollment rates dropped during the war. However, we can see that the number of students enrolled for Lower Division during this year was actually higher, at 713.⁵ This increase in students could be because of an uptick in students studying foreign language, history, or politics to aid the war effort. These classes provided foundational information to help understand and aid the conflict and build better informed citizens. Within administrative records there is record of a discussion about curriculum from March 10, 1942. During this meeting, Chancellor Frederick M. Hunter stated, “Characteristically all of the separate type have as a core curriculum basic science, and correlated and closely knit with this, broadening and liberalizing courses in language and social sciences. This, Oregon State College should have in considerably fuller provisions than it has at present.”⁶

More than three decades later, former OSC President August Strand observed in a 1975 interview that until 1953, OSC was still an agricultural college and was criticized during the war for not having a College of Liberal Arts.⁷ Unfortunately, he listed no further details about who specifically had criticized OSC or what was said. Another Biennial Report from 1941-1942 examined current liberal arts offerings and stated that OSC experiences, “the dominant interest in land-grant college education directed towards the applications of science.” The report then discusses ensuring that liberal arts education is up to standard.⁸

In November, 1941 Delmer Goode—a prominent figure within the OSC Publications department who advocated for changes regarding curriculum and higher standards—published a report titled “How ‘Complete’ is Oregon State College As a ‘Separate’ Land Grant Institution?.”⁹ In it he compared OSC to other universities and stated that the curriculum was “deficient in major opportunities in both liberal arts and professional fields.”¹⁰ In 1942, M Ellwood Smith, Dean of Lower Division, sent a letter to Goode drawing his attention to the new courses OSC had started offering that year. Smith noted a new course in Russian, and explained that new courses in English, American-European History, and other Lower Division courses provided foundational information to officers in training.¹¹ An Oregon State Barometer article published in April 1942 and titled “New Courses Added to Meet Educational Needs of Oregon” discussed plans to “liberalize the curricula of the entire institution to meet the needs of modern citizenship training.”¹² In January 1943, another Oregon State Barometer article talked about the A.S.T.P and their development of planned curriculum for their officers in training. It detailed coursework and training hours and shared that the army and a panel of specialists were working to create this curriculum and training plan.¹³

Despite the lack of specific classes, given what we know about the A.S.T.P and their goals for creating soldiers with foundational knowledge, at least some of this planned coursework would be Lower Division. A report from Winter Term 1944 shows that the curriculum would contain “Modern History and Contemporary World Affairs, 4 hours; Language Study, 13 hours; Police Science and Law Enforcement, 1 hour” along with several other items.¹⁴ These planned curriculum changes show us that OSC administration was listening to demands from faculty for new classes and were implementing new courses in order to meet these requests.

OSC was not the only institution going through curriculum changes during WWI; military training programs pushed other universities similarly to alter their curriculum. According to historian V.R. Cardozier, “almost 200 [small colleges] did attract college training programs sponsored by the military services.”¹⁵ Cardozier also shares that the war spurred greater interest in “social sciences, history, languages, politics, and international relations.”¹⁶ History and political science courses helped give students a better understanding of the current conflict through a more comprehensive grasp on the politics that caused it. Language courses provided valuable information to officers in training, especially with new German classes. Even without war influences on campuses, the period of 1920 to the 1950s was a time where many land-grant colleges wanted to start offering better liberal arts education. Educator Roger L. Geiger discusses this and the history of liberal arts education in his book The History of American Higher Education: Learning and Culture from the Founding to WWII. He shares that in the 1920s new standards were being created by education boards for teachers colleges. These new standards wanted to shape courses in the name of professionalism. Those in charge of higher education standards planned to remove any curriculum that was seen as not having functional value—primarily liberal arts courses. However educators and teachers disagreed with this course cutting approach. Geiger states, “By 1940 one-half of their [California state colleges’] enrollments were in liberal arts… However, other states failed to follow California’s lead until after the surge of postwar veterans under the GI Bill forced teachers’ colleges to expand enrollment and offerings.”¹⁷ This paints a picture of higher demand for a diverse education which included better developed liberal arts programs. These sources show us that OSC was not alone in experiencing pressure for diversified education.

Oregon State University has evolved much since its conception as an institution, and over time students have changed and so have their needs in regards to curriculum. We can very clearly track a shift within the WWII era encouraging colleges to offer more foundational liberal arts teaching. This shift happened not only within OSC but also within other colleges and universities across the country and it greatly improved course offerings. We can clearly see a correlation between A.S.T.P presence and the increase in class offerings within the liberal arts due to demands from military trainees and their leadership. This coursework provided students and soldiers in training with a more suitable framework for understanding the war and understanding the ways in which they could aid the war effort. Prior to this research, I would not have connected those two items but the story being told here begs to differ.

¹William Robbins, The People’s School: A History of Oregon State University (Oregon State University Press,2017), 1.

²John R. Craf, “Facts About the the A.S.T.P Reserve,” The Clearing House 18, no. 7 (1944), 402. https://www.jstor.org/stable/30187137?seq=1.

³Oregon State System of Higher Education, “Biennial Report 1939-1940,” Special Collections and Archives Research Center (hereafter SCARC), RG 013-SG12 Annual and Biennial Reports, Box 6, Folder 1.

⁴Oregon State University, “General Catalog, 1940-1941,” Oregon Digital, 492, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719v902

⁵Oregon State University, “General Catalog, 1943-1944,” Oregon Digital, 377, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719v93w

⁶Administrative Council Records, SCARC, Box-folder 2.4, 55, 1941-1955.

⁷August Strand and Mollie Strand, “August and Mollie Strand Oral History Interview,” 1975, SCARC, http://scarc.library.oregonstate.edu/omeka/items/show/35436.

⁸Oregon State University, “Biennial Report of Oregon State College, 1941-1942,” Oregon Digital, 34, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx71d395d.

⁹Delmer Goode worked within the Publications department at OSC and was later declared the first director of Publications. He worked on an academic journal titled Improving College and University Teaching. There are many mentions of letters and reports from him about how OSC could improve its curriculum or teachings to better serve its students and faculty.

¹⁰Delmer Goode, “How Complete is Oregon State College as a “Separate” Land Grant Institution?” 1941, SCARC, Institution Memorabilia Collection, 97.11.pdf.

¹¹Oregon State University President’s Office Records, Oregon State University, “President’s Office General Subject File, Audit Reports, Correspondence reports with State Board of Higher Education Curricula, 1940-1942,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/qv33rz03k.

¹²Oregon State Barometer, April 29, 1942, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/8k71p7448.

¹³Oregon State Barometer, January 26, 1943, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/871nj33f.

¹⁴Dean M Elwood, Winter Term Curriculum, 1944, SCARC, Historic Publications Collection, RG 013-5G12, Annual and Biennial Reports, Box 9, Folder 9.

¹⁵V.R. Cardozier, Colleges and Universities in World War II (Praeger, 1993), 109–19.

¹⁶Cardozier, Colleges and Universities in World War II, 109–19.

¹⁷ R.L Geiger, The history of American higher education : learning and culture from the founding to World War II (Princeton University Press, 2015), 436-438.

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 Nicholas Nowak.

As World War II began, and especially as the U.S. entered the war after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, virtually all institutions, from colleges and universities to film companies, adjusted their functioning to respond to the new environment and needs created by the war. These institutions had new restraints (lower enrollment and loss of faculty), opportunities (funding from the War Department), and goals (contributing to the war effort and preparing for the end of the war) that made change necessary. Colleges in particular had to adjust their functioning as the role of colleges and education in general grew.

Oregon State College (OSC, now Oregon State University), was no exception. One document, titled “Minutes of Meeting November 4, 1943,” offers insight into how the OSC administration responded to the war.[i] This document was likely typed by a secretary during the Administrative Councils November 4th, 1943 meeting for use by the meeting attendees. The OSC Administrative Council, consisting of the president and deans, attended this meeting to discuss current operations and potential changes at the college. The War Fund Canvas, a fundraising venture for the war set up by the community, was discussed, with the attendees claiming they exceeded the set quota by raising $5,394.57. The attendees also spent the majority of the time discussing the curriculum, particularly how they should change it for the upcoming year and after the end of the war.

This information offers some insight into how the administration changed in response to the war by taking practical steps towards contributing to the war effort and adjusting the curriculum. Overall, OSC, like most colleges in the U.S., faced increased restraints during the war due to limited resources, and responded by adjusting the curriculum and directly aiding and contributing to the U.S. war effort.

The war created a variety of new problems and issues that colleges throughout the U.S. had to respond to. After the U.S. entered the war in late 1941, many young men who would have previously gone to college entered the military, decreasing male enrollment throughout the country. This left a variety of jobs, particularly manufacturing jobs, open to be filled by women, who also would have previously gone to college, decreasing female enrollment throughout the U.S.[ii] Given enrollment was a significant source of funding for most colleges, college administrators had to find new ways of funding their colleges (which will be discussed later). Faculty at colleges also entered into military or war related services, even if it wasn’t the military itself. This resulted in some departments, such as the psychology department at OSC, losing a significant amount of faculty. The psychology department had four full-time staff before the war, which turned into one full-time staff member with two emergency appointments. This loss of faculty made it difficult for those departments to function.[iii] The OSC administrators were concerned about how this loss of faculty might impact the ability of the college to function, as seen in the 1944 Biennial Report for the Lower Division and Service Departments. During the war, OSC administrators even considered cutting certain programs, for example, the biology program.[iv] While it is unclear why administrators thought biology should be cut specifically, given their concerns about the loss of faculty and lower income due to lower enrollment, it is possible administrators thought cuts were necessary, and prioritized cutting programs that were not as important to the military (engineering and humanities programs were particularly important to the military). The OSC administrators’ concerns, overall, related to their ability to keep the college operational amid the scarcity of students, faculty, and funds created by the war effort.

OSC administrators responded to these concerns and restraints partially by adjusting and adapting their curriculum. As mentioned earlier, administrators had to seek out alternative sources of funding amid declining enrollment, and one major source of funding came from the War Department. Many colleges in the U.S. adapted their curriculum to better suit the needs of the War Department in order to attract more funding and support.[v] Initially, the military focused on engineering related education, because they needed officers who understood how to use certain technology, but as the war dragged on, the military also began prioritizing humanities education. The military had to send soldiers to a variety of different locations in Europe and Asia during WWII, so having soldiers and officers well versed in the language, culture, and geography of the areas they were serving in became important.[vi] OSC, while initially an engineering and science school, expanded into the humanities. OSC administrators became increasingly concerned with creating viable and useful humanities programs for the war effort.[vii] OSC also offered different, special registration and starting dates for students enrolled in the ASTP (a World War II program that trained officers and soldiers in technical skills necessary for the war effort, such as in engineering and languages).[viii] OSC did not offer special registration and starting dates before WWII,[ix] and stopped immediately after the war ended.[x] OSC also emphasized physically training students to better prepare them for the demands of the war.[xi] These changes administrators made to the curriculum demonstrate that OSC adapted to the restraints brought on by the war, particularly financial ones, by aiding the needs and goals of the War Department.

These changes, while likely being adopted partially because of financial restraints, may also have been adopted due to administrators’ desires for a U.S. victory in WWII, given OSC went out of their way to contribute to the war effort in much more direct ways. As mentioned earlier, OSC began a War Fund Canvas to help raise money for the war effort.[xii] On top of this, in 1943, administrators implemented a war bond buying program.[xiii] This program, set up by individual towns and cities, helped raise money for the war effort by buying bonds from the government, so that the government could fund the war, then pay back the buyers at a later date. The athletic department alone bought $15,000 worth of war bonds to kick off sales on the first day. The administration also created a program where students rolled bandages to contribute to the medical needs imposed by the war.[xiv] These efforts likely wouldn’t have been necessary to receive additional funding from the War Department, indicating that while some of the administration’s contributions to the war effort were likely an attempt to gain additional funding, it’s also likely that the administration was genuinely concerned about the U.S. winning the war.

The war forced the administrators of OSC, like the administrators at most U.S. colleges, to adapt to new demands and a new environment. OSC, like many colleges in the U.S., saw enrollment decline, and with it, funding. They also saw faculty leave for military related service, further contributing to the difficulties of keeping the college running during the war. Partially in response to these challenges, OSC adjusted its curriculum to better serve the needs of the War Department and prepare students for war. OSC administrators did, however, also contribute to the war effort beyond what was necessary to get increased funding, such as by engaging in fundraising efforts and implementing bandage rolling programs.

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[i] “Minutes of Meeting November 4, 1943,” Oregon State University Special Collections and Archives Research Center (hereafter SCARC), Administrative Council Records RG 032, Box 1, Administrative Council Minutes 1941-1942 to 1945-1946.

[ii] Taylor Jaworski, “‘You’re in the Army Now:’ The Impact of World War II on Women’s Education, Work, and Family,” The Journal of Economic History 74, no. 1 (2014): 174-176, doi:10.1017/S0022050714000060.

[iii] M. Ellwood Smith, “Biennial Report, Lower Division and Service Departments 1942-43 and 1943-44,” 1944, SCARC, Annual and Biennial Reports RG 013 – SG 12, Box 9, Folder 9.

[iv] F. A. Gilfillan, “Biennial Report, School of Science 1942-43 and 1943-44,” 1944, SCARC, Annual and Biennial Reports RG 013 – SG 12, Box 9, Folder 9.

[v] Charles Dorn, “Promoting the ‘Public Welfare’ in Wartime: Stanford University during World War II,” American Journal of Education 112, no. 1 (2005): 108, doi: 10.1086/444525.

[vi] William Robbins, The People’s School: A History of Oregon State University (Chicago: Oregon State University Press, 2017), 152-156.

[vii] M. Ellwood Smith, “Oregon State College, Lower Division,” 1944, SCARC, Annual and Biennial Reports, RG 013 – SG 12, Box 9, Folder 9.

[viii] “General Catalog, 1943-1944,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719v93w.

[ix] “General Catalog, 1938-1939,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719v86g.

[x] “General Catalog, 1947-1948,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719v84x.

[xi] “The Beaver 1943,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719t41x.

[xii] “Minutes of Meeting November 4, 1943.”

[xiii] “The Beaver 1943,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719t41x.

[xiv] “The Beaver 1943,” Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/fx719t41x.

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 Michael Metz.

When the United States entered World War II in December 1941, nationwide mobilization to contribute to the war effort began. The economy saw rapid changes to meet the needs of the US and its allies in the fight against the axis powers. In 1944, Ernest Wiegand, the director of Oregon State College’s (OSC) Food Industries Department, sent a report to Ralph Besse, the assistant director of the School of Agriculture. This report details the activities of the department’s research station, which included several food preservation methods such as: freezing, canning, and dehydrating. The college was using federal funding to carry out studies related to food preservation.^[i] This funding was critical to the college’s contributions to the war effort. During the Second World War, OSC aided the war effort by conducting research on food preservation and production, as well as educating the public on how to increase food production and how to preserve it more efficiently.

The report, released in 1944, provides insight into OSC’s role in food preservation studies. It was written by Ernest Wiegand for Ralph Besse. The report’s purpose was to inform Besse, and likely other department members, on the food preservation research that the department was conducting. This would have been important especially when considering that the school was using federal funding directed towards agricultural research. This includes the Purnell Funds, an agricultural-based federal grant. Wiegand wrote this report in 1944 and it describes types of food the department was freezing, canning, and dehydrating—mostly fruits and vegetables. This document serves as an introduction to OSC’s involvement in the effort to increase the country’s food stock during the war, as it provides readers with information on the type of work the college was doing and introduces important figures in the School of Agriculture.

Wiegand’s report is an example of OSC’s contribution to food preservation and production, but it does not entirely illustrate the school’s agricultural research during the war. Through the Federal Cooperative Extension Service at OSC, the school conducted intensive research on food science. The Extension Service, an OSC program focused on community education, was mobilized during the war and staff were ordered by the college to make the war effort their top priority.^[ii] Researching food preservation became a major focus of the extension service and Ernest Wiegand worked with the program to tackle a variety of issues regarding food preservation. A major issue that the country faced was maintaining the nutritious value of preserved food. In fact, according to the Journal of Environmental Studies and Science, when the United States entered the war, “two out of five US men could not serve because of disabilities related to malnutrition, especially rickets.”^[iii] This reality prompted the need for better nutrition in the country.

In 1944, Wiegand and other members of OSC extension service studied freezing as a method of preserving perishable food, in particular meat and poultry. Their study, titled “Food Preservation by Freezing,” reports that when freezing food, “a greater quantity of essential vitamins can be preserved; less labor and time are required for preparation; and the finished product more closely resembles fresh food in palatability and appearance.”^[iv] A common theme in OSC’s research into food preservation during the war was nutrient retention. Food that wouldn’t spoil and would also maintain much of its nutritious value was not just valuable for soldiers, but also for civilians faced with the challenge of rationing. Wiegand and his colleagues’ report provides the reader with information on how to improve the value of food with proper preservation. Their suggestions include selecting the proper ripeness of a fruit or vegetable, immediately freezing food after picking it, and how to properly blanch foods.^[v] A year later, Wiegand and other researchers investigated methods to improve dehydration of berries and cherries grown in Oregon. Their findings include viable procedures for effective dehydration, techniques for retaining higher vitamin content, and different uses for dehydrated fruits.^[vi] Despite the war coming to an end, the need for food preservation was not over, as many nations were facing food shortages. While these findings may not be revolutionary, they serve as a valuable educational resource that OSC would utilize in its outreach to communities across Oregon.

OSC’s effort to improve food preservation and production during the war extended out of the lab and into the community. With the nation facing food shortages, many ingredients were subjected to rationing. Products such as sugar were in high demand and in order to obtain them for canning, Oregonians were required to apply to receive an allotment of one pound per four quarts of canned fruit, plus an extra pound for each household member.^[vii] This restriction was necessary for the country to keep its armies fed, but it put a strain on Americans who depended on ingredients like sugar to properly preserve much of their food. Extension services played a variety of important roles in order to ensure that people across the state had the knowledge and resources they needed to make an impact in the war effort. The Medford Mail Tribune reported that OSC sent a survey to homemakers, on behalf of the War Production Board (WPB), in 1943 to assess their knowledge of food preservation and the need for preservation equipment in Jackson County.^[viii] Surveys such as this were useful in assessing the needs of Oregonians and were just one way the college provided community support during the war. Another task the college faced was increasing the state’s food production. OSC Extension Service reported that in 1943, for the third straight year, Oregon’s total crop acreage harvested and total livestock was at an all-time high. However, the state’s farmers had been tasked by the government with increasing that acreage to 151,000 acres in 1944.^[ix] This was a major challenge for Oregonians, as labor was already hard to come by since many of the state’s men were deployed overseas.

The task largely fell on Oregon’s youth. OSC Extension Service, as well as other extension services across the state, was directed by the state to mobilize Oregon’s 4-H clubs. 4-H clubs are youth clubs that provide children with leadership opportunities in their community. Across the country, 4-H clubs tasked their members with a variety of projects aimed at increasing food production. Their efforts earned the recognition of President Roosevelt who, in 1944, called them the “shock troops of food production.”^[x] OSC was essential in organizing Oregon’s 4-H clubs. Extension services were tasked by the state with organizing the state’s clubs, as well as increasing club membership from the 25,000 youth members serving in the club at the start of the war. State leaders had identified 80,000 children across the state as eligible to join.^[xi] However, this was not a program unique to Oregon. Across the country, 4-H clubs were mobilized with the help of local and federal governments, and were given the goal of increasing food output. In Utah, two teenagers and 4-H members, ages 13 and 15, received awards for producing and preserving the most food from their victory gardens. Their gardens turned a combined profit of $208.^[xii] From victory gardens to farm labor, the nation’s youth were essential in winning the war at home and in Oregon, OSC’s effort to rally teenagers to the cause was invaluable.

During World War II, Oregon State College played a critical role in improving food production methods and community outreach to increase knowledge of food preservation and to increase production. From breakthroughs in the lab, to community engagement, the college was a key player in Oregon’s contribution to the war effort. However, OSC was not alone in this endeavor. Educational institutions across the country were vital in keeping the nation afloat during the war and continued to aid the country well after its conclusion.

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^[i] Ernest Wiegand, “Report Station Activities – 1943-44,” Oregon State University Special Collections and Archives Research Center (hereafter SCARC), Annual and Biennial Reports: Farm Crops, Farm Management, Fish and Game Management RG 25 – SG 1, Box 1.

^[ii] Frank Ballard, “The Oregon State University Federal Cooperative Extension Service: 1911-1961,” 21, Scholar’s Archive at OSU, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/technical_reports/c821gq42j.

^[iii] Alesia Maltz, ““Plant a victory garden: our food is fighting’: Lessons of food resilience from World War,” Journal of Environmental Studies and Science 5 (2015): 392-403, https://doi.org/10.1007/s13412-015-0293-1.

^[iv] Ernest Wiegand, et al, “Food Preservation by Freezing,” Scholar’s Archive at OSU (1943): 2, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/0g354k10d.

^[v] Wiegand, et al, “Food Preservation by Freezing,” 16.

^[vi]  Ernest Wiegand, et al, “Development of a commercially feasible method of producing dehydrated berries and cherries,” Scholar’s Archive at OSU (1945): 42, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/technical_reports/bv73c8011.

^[vii] Glen Schaeffer, “Housewives Given Canning O.K.,” Oregon State Barometer, April 22, 1943, Oregon Digital, https://oregondigital.org/concern/documents/8k71nj813.

^[viii] Richard McMillan, “Jackson County Pantries, Lockers Bulge with Food,” Medford Mail Tribune, November 16, 1943, https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn97071090/1943-11-16/ed-1/seq-10/#words=food+preservation+preserved.

^[ix] William Schoenfeld, Oregon Food-For-Victory Objectives, Scholar’s Archive at OSU (1944): 3, https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/administrative_report_or_publications/h415pf30f.

^[x] Katherine Sundgren, “Feeding Victory: 4-H, Extension, and the World War II Food Effort,” Online Journal of Rural Research and Policy 14, no. 3 (2019): 7, https://doi.org/10.4148/1936-0487.1098.

^[xi] “Youths of Oregon to be Mobilized for Victory,” Beaverton Enterprise, January 1, 1943, https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn96088480/1943-01-01/ed-1/seq-1/#words=Extension+OSC+service+Service.

^[xii] Sundgren, “Feeding Victory,” 16.