The Impact of World War I Upon the Lives of Women

Women also played an important role during the Second World War. Prime Minister Mackenzie King established the National Selective Service in 1942 and announced that recruitment of women for the war effort to be, “the most important single factor of the program.” Once again women worked in factories and in field hospitals to support the war effort. Women volunteer groups sold war bonds, distributed ration cards and knitted goods for the men and women overseas. It can even be argued that women had a larger role during the Second World War than they did in the First. However, these women benefitted from the courage of the women who fought for the right to vote a generation before them. What women did in the Second World War was equally as important for the war effort; however it was the women who realized their value and subsequently fought for their right to vote that brought forth the women’s right movements in Canada. Indeed, Prime Minister King’s public declaration of the importance of recruiting women is an indication of the progress women had made in the two decades since enfranchisement.