Artifacts
by Betsy Holmquist
Photos Courtesy of Cynthia Purvis and UM's 1945 Sentinel
The War Years Life was very different on the UM campus
during the Second World War. More than 1,000 men from the Army
Air Force and Army Specialized Training Program lived and trained
on campus and residence halls were emptied for their use. Male
students sought beds in fraternity houses or off campus. Female
students moved into fraternity houses.
Courses changed. World geography, world resources, and world politics were offered.
Students began an International Relations Club. Faculty members
taught courses outside their areas of expertise: thirty-one
faculty members were on leave of absence for the war effort and
forty others were teaching the trainees. Only 179 civilian male
students were on the campus by the 1943-44 school year.
One Family Frances Simons Purvis ’41 and Leroy
“Brick” Purvis ’39, pictured below, knew each
other growing up in Great Falls and both attended UM. But a
chance meeting in Washington DC, where they both were working,
propelled Frances into the ranks of war brides. They married the
Saturday after Pearl Harbor. Fran moved to Greenwich Village to
work for the United Nations Relief Agency and Army Captain Purvis
went overseas.
In early 1944, while stationed in Italy, Brick was
routed a copy of the University’s alumni News Bulletin. In
a letter to the association, he wrote, “The issue came to
me from Major Franklin S. Logan ’36, who got it from
Captain Robert S. Larson ’37, who got it from somebody else
—and so on down the line. I’ve sopped up every line
of it, and believe you me, it was a real letter from home... .
Please put me down for a year’s membership to the Alumni
Association—for which is enclosed $1.00,” he
concludes.
Following the war, Brick attended Harvard Law School,
joined Opinion Research Corporation and later became president of
Gallup & Robinson Inc. in Princeton, New Jersey. He and Frances
had four children. They maintained their connection to Montana,
summering on Hauser Lake. Frances deeded the lake property to UM
several years ago. UM coeds rolled bandages for the Red Cross
(right), sold war bonds (above), and took on leadership roles on
campus. Jane Jeffers Rybus ’46 became the first woman
president of ASMSU in the 1945-46 school year.
Red Cross pins and service ribbons attested to the hours
volunteers spent making surgical dressings. Through the course of
the war, Red Cross volunteers nationwide rolled 2.5 billion
bandages.
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