Today is the 75th anniversary of Victory in Europe,
which I point out because Americans don't celebrate VE Day, at least not in my experience. I only know it's today because British bloggers are talking about things like sewing patriotic bunting!
(Bunting. That's another thing I don't see Americans doing, or not much. Here, instructions from the BBC, "Great British Bunting".)
The Imperial War Museum (London) has good coverage with lots of photos, including an article, "Who Were the Women in the Trafalgar Square Fountains on VE Day?"--about an iconic photo that I'd never seen.
IWM discovered who the women in the photo were by putting out a call on Twitter:
I got teary-eyed, watching real people being silly at the end of six years of war... To think, these young women had been girls when the war started.
Whenever bad things happen in my country (9/11, Covid-19), there's always an outcry from some quarters,
"Such a terrible thing has never happened before!"
How embarrassing. It's a helpful corrective, I think, to look at history, which is full of people living through unspeakably awful things. Or, not living through...
I appreciate that the IWM notes of May 8, 1945:
which I point out because Americans don't celebrate VE Day, at least not in my experience. I only know it's today because British bloggers are talking about things like sewing patriotic bunting!
(Bunting. That's another thing I don't see Americans doing, or not much. Here, instructions from the BBC, "Great British Bunting".)
The Imperial War Museum (London) has good coverage with lots of photos, including an article, "Who Were the Women in the Trafalgar Square Fountains on VE Day?"--about an iconic photo that I'd never seen.
IWM discovered who the women in the photo were by putting out a call on Twitter:
"Twenty-four hours later, we were contacted by a relative: their names were Cynthia Covello and Joyce Digney, and the two women were life-long friends.There's this 24-second film clip too--"amateur colour film shot by Lieutenant Sidney Sasson of the US Army Signal Corps, Army Pictorial Service".
Joyce and Cynthia first met in the Women's Land Army in the summer of 1944.
Joyce was 18 years old and Cynthia was 20. They became friends almost immediately and worked together on various farms...."
I got teary-eyed, watching real people being silly at the end of six years of war... To think, these young women had been girls when the war started.
Whenever bad things happen in my country (9/11, Covid-19), there's always an outcry from some quarters,
"Such a terrible thing has never happened before!"
How embarrassing. It's a helpful corrective, I think, to look at history, which is full of people living through unspeakably awful things. Or, not living through...
I appreciate that the IWM notes of May 8, 1945:
"It was a day of mixed emotions. . . . For many of the widows the war had produced, the noise and jubilation as people celebrated VE Day was too much to bear and not something they could take part in.
"There was also an air of anti-climax. The hardships of the war years had taken their toll on many people and left them with little energy for rejoicing."
The young women look so modern, as people in old color film sometimes do. (Only sometimes.)
ReplyDeleteMICHAEL: Hey, that's true! Especially the young woman with her hair down, just like today's hairstyle.
ReplyDelete