on Oct 18th, 2006Over Here: How the G.I. Bill Transformed the American Dream
Over Here
How the G.I. Bill Transformed the American Dream
By Edward Humes
In 1944, the U.S. government feared the flood of returning World War II soldiers almost as much as it longed for peace. To avoid economic catastrophe, FDR, Congress, and veterans groups devised a modest measure, the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944.
They intended this G.I. Bill of Rights simply as a bit of help for the sixteen million men and women who so bravely served their country. Instead, quite by accident, it transformed America and rewrote the American Dream.
The G.I. Bill made homeowners, college graduates, professionals, rocket scientists, and a booming middle class out of a Depression-era generation that never expected such opportunity. Today’s America was built on the bill’s greatness. The Greatest Generation would not exist without it.
Here are the stories of some of these men and women — how their lives changed because of the bill, and how this country changed because of them.
Author
Edward Humes is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who has contributed to Talk, the Los Angeles Times Sunday Magazine, Los Angeles magazine, and others. Humes’s numerous books include School of Dreams and the bestselling Mississippi Mud, Mean Justice, and No Matter How Loud I Shout. A graduate of Hampshire College, he lives in Southern California.