Rationing During World War Two

My mother told me some about rationing. It didn’t seem to bother her to the extent that it did Marie. Mom and Dad lived on the farm. Mom churned her own butter, had their own milk, meat, and vegetables. Mother talked about the stamps they were issued for coffee, sugar, flour, and gasoline more than she did anything else. The age difference between my mother and Marie was three years.

Marie, however told me things about the rationing that made me wonder how I would do in the same situation.
Marie said that you had to place an order with the meat market for the meat that you wanted. You also had to pick it up when you said you were going to or they sold it to someone else. There was no ration on horse meat so she got horse meat sometimes. She had to cook it longer, but it tasted okay. The market told her to always save the fat from the meat. She said that sometimes she went through the Black Market to get things she absolutely had to have. Marie did a lot of baking cakes for weddings and birthdays. She would trade her stamps for things that she didn’t use that much of for stamps for sugar. She was allowed five pounds of sugar per person a month. She could have four pounds of butter a month for the family. She could have one pound of hamburger per person, and also pork. Marie said that they allowed her one pound of coffee per person a month. She told me that sometimes she would wait for hours for a pound of butter, only to be told that they had run out. I asked her why she thought the government had rationed the butter. She said she didn’t know for sure, but wondered if the majority of it was being sent to the soldiers. She said that margarine was not rationed. She told me it was white and had a little coloring pill in it that a person broke and kneaded the color throughout the margarine to make it look yellow. I was all excited because I remembered that. Marie just shook her head at me and looked at me like “Why on earth would this woman get excited about margarine?” Well I will tell you an example. When we were little we would go to my aunt and uncle’s house that lived in a city and that was our job to “color” the margarine. I just thought it was fun!
The government issued ration books that had stamps inside for different things. Each person in the family received their own book of stamps. To me it is amazing how people were forced to live in our “free” America. Marie also told me that there were sirens that warned people that an attack was eminent; a black out then ensued. Marie said that every one used black or green shades to keep the inside light from showing.
There was a knock on the door one night from a person telling her that her light was showing outside. After that she put a candle inside a tin can so that it would not be seen outside.
Marie said that even heating oil was rationed. She was allowed nine gallons of oil a week for heating and nine gallons of gasoline a week for the car if you had one. Gasoline at that time was ten cents a gallon.
Another thing that Marie told me was that after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor the government froze wages, and rents. Everything stayed at a stand still. People had to give up their aluminum pans and gold coins so the government could melt them down.
Marie has a big thick cook book that her father gave her for a wedding gift. She said he paid a dollar for it. In that cook book she has several of the War Ration Books complete with stamps inside.