~ Milkweed Silk & WWII ... & Trivia ... GIVEAWAY ~

GIVEAWAY ~Drawing tomorrow, enter on Nov. 16th post.
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Yesterday Lilly commented on my Antietam Illumination post about milkweed silk for parachutes. This hit a bell in memory so I decided to look up some data ….

Country school children were given gunny sacks to gather milkweed pods so they could dry. They were harvested for the kapok inner silk & used for filling life vests for bouyancy for our troops. They were also used in gloves & jackets to keep the troops warm.

This plant is highly toxic, but one child's mom said it was ok to eat before the sun rose & shone on it ... hmmmmm! I am not so sure.

While I was reading this data I ran across a couple of interesting notes & my personal memories ~

**People were asked to save old tin cans & old cooking fats ... the reason was make explosives. Fat contains something like 10% to 20% glycerine, which is vey useful in making things go 'BOOM'!

**Tin foil was saved by school children from gum wrappers & cigarettes.

**V mail ~ the sender would write the message on a special form which was then microfilmed to reduce space/weight & flown across the Atlantic ... at the other end the microfilm was photogrphcally enlarged, printed & mailed to the recipient.

**Stars were hung in home windows to indicate they had a family member in the military & a gold one for a soldier lost while serving.

**Margarine was white like lard with a packet of yellow (like food coloring) 'stuff'. We would squeeze it into the margarine & have a ball squeezing it until it was a bright buttery yellow. To this day I dislike margarine.

**Nylon was rationed for the war, so rayon stocking (nylons) were in vogue. Many women literally painted their legs with some coloring & took their eyebrow pencils & drew a line up the back of their legs. Or, they would paint their 'bobby socks/anklets' onto their legs ... that would 'wash' off in the rain.

**How children would play war killing their 'enemies'.
**I actually remember the black outs in the eves when lights went out, but we had heavy draperies on our windows that blocked out the light ... brown outs when power was dimmed by

the utility companies.

**War Bonds cost 10 cents a stamp, & when the book was filled ($17.50 value) we were issued by the bank a $25 savings bond that matured in 10 years.

~~~Awwww ... memories hopefully NEVER to return to this country.

Raise her high, protect her wide, she is our land, we hold in pride. (written by me)