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Chapter  World War II and Texas Rural Schools The Depression and World War II had a tremendous effect on U.S. society. The massive government effort to build a successful war machine to supply the Allies and the United States’ own defense effort effectively ended the Depression. The military buildup included more than military contracts and a recruitment campaign—the United States also needed to create a military infrastructure to support and train enlistees. Across the South military training bases transformed rural areas, rural people left for urban areas in search of work in industries, and millions of young men and women donned uniforms and served in the military. Texas had had army installations and training bases since World War I, but the military expansion in the 1940s included naval yards and bases and prisoner of war camps across the state. As the war effort revolutionized Texas’ economy and society, inequalities in the state’s public schools became apparent and threatened to limit their efforts to provide students an education. While the war ravaged much of Europe, the United States ended the war as the most prosperous nation in the world. Only 12 percent of Americans served in the armed forces, and aside from the attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States had suffered physically very little during the war, but she had suffered economically. First, during the Depression, people suffered from want and lack of money and jobs, then during the war Americans rationed commodities and fuels, recycled metals, and saved money by buying war bonds. The Depression taught Americans thrift and sacrifice; World War II mobilized the nation, transformed the economy, and resulted in sea change for the South and for Texas. As one writer predicted in Texas Outlook in early 1942, the war would “result in an opportunity to build decent standards of living for millions who have never had the right kinds of food, adequate clothing and comfortable shelter.” wwii and texas rural schools 59 postwar influences upon education The postwar baby boom also had an effect upon Texas. In 1947, 198,662 newborn Texans marked a significant increase from the 127,072 births in 1940, a 41.4 percent increase, according to the National Office of Vital Statistics. The same report noted that across the United States newborns totaled a record 3.9 million, and the next year, 1948, had the second highest number of births in history with and estimated 3.7 million children. The fantastic growth in the birthrate meant the school rolls would swell, and the need for housing would be critical. Fortunately, in 1944 Congress passed the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act, or GI Bill, to help returning military personnel integrate back into the workforce and economy. Besides paying for college or trade school, the GI Bill offered low-interest housing and business loans. The government would help expanding families finance housing. On July 1, 1947, William Levitt, a former federal housing contractor, began building inexpensive homes on Long Island, New York. Other contractors copied Levitt’s assembly-line methods for rapidly building affordable homes, and “Levittowns” became synonymous with communities of single-family homes that sprung up in the postwar years across the nation outside of cities in the “suburbs.” The new homes alleviated the problems presented by the baby boom, but they created a new concern: new housing developments meant an expansion of public schools. At the same time people began to realize the need for more school construction a large source of Texas school funding was threatened. The Tidelands Controversy, the battle over the ownership of offshore petroleum reserves aroused bitter feelings between some states and the federal government . Texas, along with several other states with a Spanish legal heritage, traditionally claimed a state’s ownership of submerged land extended three leagues (approximately ten miles) offshore. In 1945, however, the federal government stated that Texas could only claim a three-mile boundary. The first lawsuit challenging the states’ claims was against California. Although attorneys general for the other coastal states filed an amicus curiae brief, Texas Attorney General Price Daniel went so far as to argue before the Supreme Court on behalf of the state’s claim to the three-league boundary. Ownership of the tidelands was an especially important question to the state of Texas and its public schools because the legislature had earmarked the revenues from offshore leases for...

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