Remembering wars: organizing the American economy

Studs Terkel in "The Good War": An Oral History of World War Two (1984) didn't just interview the non-famous partipicants in events during the war. John Kenneth Galbraith was made deputy director of the federal Office of Price Administration which administered the wartime wage and price controls. One of his employees there was a young man named Richard Nixon. In his interview with Terkel, Galbraith said:

Leon Henderson was one of the unsung heroes of World War Two. He had been the administrator of prices and civilian supply as well as a powerful figure on the War Production Board. There has been an enormous literature on Albert Speer and the way he was presumed to have organized (German production. Henderson, with a few younger colleagues, of whom I was privileged to be one, organized the United States far more effectively than Germany had ever been. The man whose organization failed [Speer] is celebrated, while the man who had in mind the successful national venture [Henderson] is lost to history. Day alter day, he came back wearily from meetings, having fought the battle for some necessary action against recalcitrant trade associations, business executive types.

The businessmen who came to Washington were generally industrial bureaucrats, public relations types, who could best be spared at home. There were many times when we nearly forgot there was a war going on. Our conflict with them was not ideological. It was over the fact that they never wanted to move. We have a public picture of the businessman as a dynamic figure, always ready for action. His wartime image was somebody who could never bring himself to action as the situation required. He would come to the conference and say, "Let us wait awhile. I think this is something we can accomplish on a voluntary basis. I'm sure business will see its responsibilities. This is not a time for radical action." We really had to fight them all the way.

Tags: john kenneth galbraith, leon henderson, second world war, world war two