"Soon to be a PBS Masterpiece series starring Samantha Bond (Downton Abbey) and Francesca Annis (Cranford). Away from the frontlines of World War II, in towns and villages across Great Britain, ordinary women were playing a vital role in their country's war effort. As members of the Women's Institute, an organization with a presence in a third of Britain's villages, they ran canteens and knitted garments for troops, collected tons of rosehips and other herbs to replace medicines that couldn't be imported, and advised the government on issues ranging from evacuee housing to children's health to postwar reconstruction. But they are best known for making jam: from produce they grew on every available scrap of land, they produced twelve million pounds of jamand preserves to feed a hungry nation. Home Fires, Julie Summers's fascinating social history of the Women's Institute during the war (when its members included the future Queen Elizabeth II along with her mother and grandmother), provides the remarkable and inspiring true story behind the upcoming PBS Masterpiece series that will be sure to delight fans of Call the Midwife and Foyle's War. Through archival material and interviews with current and former Women's Institute members, Home Fires gives us anintimate look at life on the home front during World War II"--
Presents a history of the Women's Institute, a World War II social organization of women devoted to helping Britain's war effort and supporting the populace at home with food, clothing, medicine, and housing.
Drawing on archival material and interviews with members and family (such as Peggy Sumner, Sybil Norcott, Ann Tetlow, Dorcas Ward, Ruth Toosey, Gwen Bark, Edith Jones, and Clara Milburn), Summers, an author, documents the history of the Women's Institute during World War II, which was devoted to humanitarian efforts in England and Wales. She focuses on the involvement of ordinary women in the village institutes in rural Britain and describes the key players who ran the organization at the national level; women's efforts during the war, such as jam-making, food production, and knitting; and the post-war lives of these women. Annotation ©2015 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)
Soon to be a PBS Masterpiece series starring Samantha Bond (Downton Abbey) and Francesca Annis (Cranford)
Away from the frontlines of World War II, in towns and villages across Great Britain, ordinary women were playing a vital role in their country’s war effort. As members of the Women’s Institute, an organization with a presence in a third of Britain’s villages, they ran canteens and knitted garments for troops, collected tons of rosehips and other herbs to replace medicines that couldn’t be imported, and advised the government on issues ranging from evacuee housing to children’s health to postwar reconstruction. But they are best known for making jam: from produce they grew on every available scrap of land, they produced twelve million pounds of jam and preserves to feed a hungry nation.
Home Fires, Julie Summers’s fascinating social history of the Women’s Institute during the war (when its members included the future Queen Elizabeth II along with her mother and grandmother), provides the remarkable and inspiring true story behind the upcoming PBS Masterpiece series that will be sure to delight fans of Call the Midwifeand Foyle’s War. Through archival material and interviews with current and former Women’s Institute members,Home Fires gives us an intimate look at life on the home front during World War II.
