More about Guilford Dairy and its wartime use of horses
Put logic aside. Gas rationing in World War II was not meant to save gasoline.
Gordon Knowles of Greensboro, who remembers the war years, said it was rubber that Uncle Sam was trying to stretch, not gas.
In a letter responding to a story last month about Guilford Dairy switching to horse drawn milk wagons during the war because of gas and tire shortages, Knowles the only reason for rationing gasoline was "to limit driving and therefore conserve tires."
"Gasoline was plentiful during the war," Knowles said, "but after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, 90 percent of the United States' crude rubber was cut off, and our production of synthetic rubber earlier in the war was miniscule. Tires were essential to the military."
One thing the government didn't ration during the war was brain power. If only Americans used the same ingenuity to overcome today's problems and shortages as they did then. Nothing in those days went to waste.
Knowles said fiber was extracted from silk and nylon hose to make powder bags for artillery weapons, tin cans for various military usage and even household cooking grease. It was a fource of glycerin, Knowles said, to make explosives.
"I can remember helping my mother,'' he said, "carry those things to the curb for weekly pick up."
