Click to View Slide show
Sgt. Herb Saylor, “Typifying the Women Who Wait” are Sofia Wolff and 4-months-old Daughter Helen, Wife and Child of Captain Herb Wolff, Depot Test Pilot, 1944, 2016.26.3, Gift of Ruth Galleher
“A Panama Jungle Soldier’s Dream,” Alexis Smith in Leopard Skin Suit, 1944
Vitagraph, Inc., 2016.26.1, Gift of Ruth Galleher
Victor J. Green, “Leap Year Girl,” Caricatured Types of Women around Army Camps,
K-Pasa A.P.O.825 Officers Club, 1944, 2016.26.3, Gift of Ruth Galleher
Dorothy Young, Letter Describing What it Means to Be an “American Girl,” n.d.
II.2019.25.1, Gift of Michael Flanagan
U.S.O. Dance to Boost Morale for Military Personnel, n.d.
2001.100.002, Gift of Mary (Rossetti) Wirfs
Rules for Patriettes Dances, 1941
2007.067.005.002, Gift of Sharon A. Hollenbeck Akridge
“Cina Bolar, Plane Talk’s Pin-Up Girl,” 1944
Plane Talk, 2016.26.4, Gift of Ruth Galleher
Bed Ticking Becomes Sandbag Covers, Balboa, Canal Zone, 1942
ACME, II.2019.52.1,Gift of Bradley Wilde
<
>
x
A Woman’s Role
Society expected women to fit into stereotypical roles: the “American girl,” wife, mother, girlfriend, or sex symbol. Caricatured representations of these featured exaggerated traits and behaviors, including women desperate to get married. These depictions created a welcome distraction and amusement for soldiers, yet perpetuated unobtainable ideals for multifaceted women.
A Woman’s Reality
Women in the Canal Zone, like women in the United States, were resourceful and took on duties previously unavailable to them while also maintaining their pre-war roles. Many took advantage of opportunities to work outside the home in men-only workplaces. Others provided entertainment for stationed men as volunteers for the United Service Organizations or invited as “Patriettes” to dances.
This online exhibition is based on the exhibition of the same name that was presented at the University of Florida George A. Smathers Libraries, March 7, 2020 - February 26, 2021.
Curated by Elizabeth A. Bouton with assistance from Elizabeth Bemis | Online design by Elizabeth A. Bouton
Student assistant curators: Summer Bias, Coral Dixon, Sean O’Dwyer, and Anna L. Weissman | Title design and other materials by Olivia Bowman
This exhibit was developed spring 2019 as part of the graduate Exhibitions Seminar in Museum Studies taught by Lourdes Santamaría-Wheeler. It was driven by student inquiry and has been an experiment in collaborative exhibition development processes.
Unless otherwise noted, all items are from the Panama Canal Museum Collection, Special & Area Studies Collections, George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida.