Rationing during WWII, How sweet it wasn't. (original) (raw)

Growing up in World War II wasn't all bad. There were some good days, like the time my uncle, Pfc. Paul Jones, brought me a big box of Hershey bars from the commissary at Ellington Field, where he was stationed. While not rationed, Hershey bars were short in supply, a rare wartime treat.

For sure, the government rationed sugar, leading us to make certain adjustments in our cooking and eating habits. Uncle Paul and the Ellington commissary couldn't help us out in the sugar department.

With three bountiful fig trees in our yard, our family enjoyed preserved figs but the process of preserving fruit takes sugar, lots and lots of sugar. For the duration of the war, Mother had to substitute corn syrup for that major ingredient.

Meredith Bergeron Tyer, my friend since the first grade, has an unusual story about sugar rationing in her family.

�My mom and grandmother preserved figs, too,� Meredith said. �It's funny -- they always had sugar to cook figs. I couldn't understand why we had sugar for figs, and not candy, until about six months after the war was over, I watched Grandma go out to the mysterious 10 by 10 building out in her backyard. It was always locked and Grandma had the only key. It was on a 6-inch ring with all her other keys. They never left her body.

�So, as I watched her, I thought this is my chance to see what is so secretive about that building. I snuck up behind her and peeped over her shoulder. I could not believe what I saw -- there were bags and bags of sugar. They touched the top of the room. You could not even walk into the room, it was packed so full of sugar. They had been in there so long it would take a hammer to break the sugar up. That's when I realized that sweet little Gray Hair Granny was a hoarder. Then I remembered the day when Joanne, Barbara and I had been shopping for that one bag of sugar, we were at wrong store.�

Meredith was referring to the time that she and her cousins, Joanne Ellender Ernst and Barbara Boudloche Sheppard, went all over Baytown looking for a one pound bag of sugar.

�My Aunt Lily (Lillian Boudloche Ocker) said she would make us fudge but she was out of sugar. We soon realized there was not a grain to be found.�

Shoes were another rationed item that Meredith remembered.

�We were given two stamps a year for each family member and that meant we could only have two pairs of shoes a year. Mom would buy me Girl Scout shoes. Talk about ugly, but she was right. They lasted a year and if I didn't out grow them I wore them another year.�

Butter, anyone? Meredith and I both recalled our introduction to margarine during WWII when butter was rationed. Because the margarine was white, our mothers mixed it with a yellow-colored substance to make it look like butter. �I thought Mom had bought butter,� Meredith recalled. �She told me later that I had just eaten margarine on my toast.�

In our home, the "fake" butter caused somewhat of a crisis. My father, who ordinarily was not picky about food, strongly objected to margarine, and no matter how yellow my mother made it look, he complained it wasn't the real thing.

For kids, doing without butter wasn�t nearly as bad as the lack of bubble gum. Meredith remembered that a family friend, Eddie Cox, who owned the Yellow Jacket Inn restaurant, would obtain a box of bubble gum every once in a while during WWII. �Well, one day while we were visiting at the Yellow Jacket Inn, he pulled a box out from under his counter. He opened it up and gave me one, just one piece of bubble gum, but it was like winning the lottery.�

Meredith treasured the one piece of bubble gum so dearly that she chewed it and then saved it over for the next day, determined to make it last as long as possible.

After WWIIended, Brunson Food Market in Baytownadvertised the arrival of its first postwar shipment of bubble gum. I remember joining a long line of bubble gum fans, waiting to enter the store. Our line was so long that it extended across the street, literally stopping traffic.

Meredith wondered if the kids today could adjust to the rationing required in WWII. �It did teach me one thing,� she said, �and that was to do without. I don't think we complained. It was for the soldiers.�

� Wanda Orton Baytown Sun Columnist
"Wandering" July 20, 2012 columns