American college students in the 1930s and '40s faced a life of strange new contradictions and dualities. As the country finally began to recover from its worst economic downturn in history, attention shifted to far-off places. Many had the feeling disaster was looming just beyond the horizon. But the University, continuing to emphasize the importance of education, emerged relatively unscathed.
After the stock market crash of 1929, University President Alexander Ruthven proved his financial wizardry by sheltering the campus from negative effects of the Depression. According to "The Making of the University of Michigan" by Howard Peckham, Ruthven shielded students from "legislative bills and other ill-considered proposals that would have crippled the University."
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| FILE PHOTO This advertisement encouraging students to purchase war bonds appeared in a Jan. 21, 1942 edition of the Daily. |
Former Athletic Director Charles Baird donated a set of carillon bells in 1935. At the same time, The University of Michigan Club, together with members of the University Board of Regents and Ann Arbor residents, raised money to build a tower for the bells. According to Peckham, the 53 bells were hung in the new tower behind Hill Auditorium in the fall of 1936.
Although prohibition was in place in 1931, University students found ways to bend the law for the sake of a good time. In February of that year, Ann Arbor police raided five fraternities, where they discovered liquor.
They made 79 arrests and among the dissidents were several recognizable personalities on campus - the captain of the football team and two editors of The Michigan Daily. Officials were tipped off by local bootleggers who had been arrested a few days earlier and had given up the information in order to receive lesser penalties, Peckham wrote in his book.
The five fraternity houses closed and 184 students were evicted, but the charges against all 79 students were dropped.
As the decade continued, students who had been concerned only with campus elections and the latest fashions shifted their focus to something new - the escalating conflict in Europe.
Passive isolationists faced off with the few Americans urging the United States to intervene. In the spring of 1939, students held an anti-war protest, and Detroit United Auto Workers leader Leonard Woodcock demanded that the U.S. government separate itself from the war. "A student speaker demanded a cessation of bigger armaments and a vote on the question of declaring war," Peckham's wrote.
Betty Cooper, who graduated from the University in 1946, said the war created a feeling of instability on campus.
Cooper said that one morning she planned to have breakfast with another student she was dating, but before leaving for her date, Cooper got a call from the man. He told her he couldn't meet her because he had been ordered to board the next train out of Ann Arbor for military service.
"They marched them all down State Street to the train station," Cooper said. "In one morning, they moved them all out and sent them to the Battle of the Bulge."
And if the war hadn't hit home already with the bombing of Pearl Harbor or the deployment of U.S. troops, the Jan.10 edition of the Daily personalized the conflict for all University students.
U.S. Marine Corps First Lt. George Cannon was the first Ann Arbor resident to die in World War II. After being wounded when his Pacific Ocean battle station on Midway Island was hit, the University graduate refused to be evacuated until his men were taken to safety, the article said.
On Dec. 14 1941, in response to the nation's official entry into World War II, the Daily published a special edition called the "Defense Supplement." Its purpose was to inform students of ways they could get involved locally with the war effort and demonstrate how the community was coming together.
The articles urged everyone to get involved, even women, all of whom were not allowed to participate in combat. Women's Dean Alice Lloyd announced she was heading up an organization that would mobilize women behind the war effort. "The most important phase of the project at present is the registration of all University women for the common defense," the article stated.
But the idea of inviting women to participate in activities normally reserved for men was rare, Cooper said.
"Today we call them pants, in those days we called them slacks - you were not allowed to wear them on campus," she said.
Only when temperatures dropped extremely low were the rules amended, Cooper said, and only by an official edict by Dean Lloyd. According to Peckham's book, women generally showed up for their morning classes donning dresses, stockings and gloves.
Cooper said that although the population of male students decreased at the start of the war, the University's role in educating soldiers brought new students from across the nation.
Soon the University had the largest Japanese language school in the country and initiated other programs to prepare U.S. GIs for the culture and conditions of the places in which they would be fighting.
The end of the conflict overseas flooded the University with a new wave of students - older, mostly male and many of them married. Enrollment of 12,000 students in 1945 was considered high for the time, but in the fall of 1948, the University's total enrollment hit 21,360 students, Peckham wrote. The surge in student population can be attributed to the GI Bill, which granted many war veterans a free college education.
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| FILE PHOTO University alum George Cannon was the first Ann Arbor resident to die in World War II. |
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