A Women's Place is in the Home...

Many of the women who were nurses were also volunteers to aid groups such as the Women’s Hospital Corps, Women’s Defense League, and the Women's Police Volunteers. Women who became doctors and nurses were paid more than a domestic job would have paid and caused much less harm compared to jobs in the factories building munitions and even preparing cotton. Factory jobs paid nearly twice as much as servant jobs due to their increased hazards such as exposure to chemicals, toxins, heavy lifting resulting in injury and use of heavy machinery resulting in injury. Despite these growing hazards, women continued to file into the new category known as “munitionette” because women felt as though to do a man’s job was to be equal. The propaganda convinced many that they needed to help their men, in order to show patriotism and others worked simply because it paid well. Because of the large scale increase in female factory workers, wealthy and privileged women at the time were left without help for their own domestic work and child care, forcing them to begin working harder, and even paying more for help as a result. Although women dealt with an abundance of hardship, the pioneering aspects of their involvement in the war created three ground-breaking changes towards equality.