Guild's Lake Courts was built as temporary worker housing for the steel and shipyard industries during World War II. The massive housing development in Northwest Portland consisted of 2,432 units of housing, five community buildings, five childcare centers, a grade school and a fire station. Guild's Lake Courts was the eighth largest housing project built at that time in the United States. The peak population in January 1945 was approximately 10,000 individuals. Archival research, face-to-face oral histories, and resident reunions were used to explore the social, architectural and political history of Guild's Lake Courts. The lens for understanding how the community operated is dominantly for the social history that of a childhood homefront experience. Four wartime themes emerged in this study: 1) that Portland's focus on prejudice dimmed during the war years, 2) that the community was a confluence of humanity, 3) that the design of the site and the housing was shaped by a convergence of New Deal innovations in design construction technologies and electrification and 4) that there was a willingness to sacrifice creature comforts during the war years. Guild's Lake Courts as a residential community under went three rapid evolutions prior to its demolition in 1951, a wartime housing operation 1942-1945, affordable housing 1945-1948, and a haven for Vanport Refugees June 1948-1950. Guild's Lake Courts history has been overlooked but it offers insights into the possible fate of the residents of Vanport City had the community not been flooded in 1948. The story of Guild's Lake Courts is a counterpoint story to Vanport City the largest of the three defense housing projects in Oregon that admitted African-Americans during the war years.

Very little scholarly work has been written about Cape Town during the Second World War. Indeed, very little has been written about South African society at all during this period. This study is an attempt to contribute towards scholarly discussion of the effects of war on South African society, and to try to understand the largely neglected effects of the War on those who took part in it. Much of this study focuses on the experiences of white Englishspeaking veterans. This is because the majority of soldiers fighting in the Second World War were from this particular population group, and also because it was this group that was about to lose commanding political influence upon its return to South Africa. A central theme of this study is the government's neglect of the returning soldiers, and their failure to live up to their promises. The change of government in 1948 was to ensure that the needs of the ex-volunteers were never fully addressed, and that the veterans would never occupy the central position in society which they thought was their right, having fought in a war which many members of the new government had opposed. The focus on Cape Town also ensures that this study remains separate from the many papers which have been written detailing the rise of Nationalism from the late 1930s until the 1948 election. Looking at the other side of the political spectrum - at the eventual losers - has important and interesting political and historical implications, and adds a new dimension to the political history of the period. The methodology used for this study is mainly oral - interviews were conducted with a small representative sample of veterans and have provided a basis for all secondary research. Using the testimony of veterans has proved a useful and original tool for examining the period in question. One further aim of the thesis is to provide an opportunity for the voices of the veterans to be recognised as an authoritative resource about the history of Cape Town during the War and in the immediate post-War period. The thesis is split into two parts to reflect the different nature of Cape Town society during and after the War. The early part deals with Cape Town during the War and the changes which were taking place there as a result of South African participation in the conflict. This section also examines the wartime experiences of the soldiers and assesses how these experiences helped to forge new identities and behaviour after the War. Part Two looks at the post-War period and the demobilisation process, examining how it treated and prejudiced the soldiers who were involved.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 303-334). / Also available by subscription via World Wide Web / x, 334 leaves, bound map 29 cm