The job market for The Greatest Generation (born between 1901 and 1927), The Silent Generation (born between 1928 and 1945), and Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1967) looked very different from how it does today.
Many held jobs that are practically extinct in modern-day America, performing them through the Great Depression, World War I, World War II, and beyond.
Their grit and determination have inspired every generation that’s come after them. On Facebook, Upworthy readers shared the incredible jobs their parents, grandparents (and even great- and great-great-grandparents) from the Greatest Generation, the Silent Generation, and the Baby Boomers held. These jobs not only helped build America, but also established some of the incredible places we still use today.
American jobs in World War I and World War II
“My maternal grandfather was a RAF pilot in WW1. His missions included flying against the Red Baron.” – Carolyn Walsh Risser
“My grandfather helped repair the Pacific Fleet after Pearl Harbor and throughout the War.” – ML Downing
“My dad could fix anything. Once his car broke down & fixed it on the road with sewing machine parts. In WWII he worked in the Jeep pool repair. If they didn’t have the parts, they made them.” – Virginia Davis
“My grandpa was in the 101st airborne and jumped on D-Day. He was also at Bastogne. Pretty much the Band of Brothers story.” – Pat Crowley
“My father was a master mechanic building steam turbines during WW2 for the DeLaval Company.” – Bill Adams
“Father [was an] engineer building airstrips on Okinawa during WW2 and a civil engineer after the war.” – Dan Dickinson
“Grandfather was a Coastguard Chief Petty Officer. He was in charge of the guard that caught Nazis on the Jersey shore. My other grandfather was a Navy Diver. He repaired ships with battle damage in WW2.” – Jim Merrill
“My grandfather was Head Baker on the USS Indianapolis, which delivered components of the world’s first atomic bomb before it was torpedoed and sank in 1945, spurring the biggest and deadliest shark attack in world history. My grandfather was spared due to a freak accident on board shortly before.” – Jessie Goodwin
American women’s jobs
“My grandma worked for the newspaper as a photographer and paste up artist … born in 1912 and married at 28…she was truly a woman ahead of her time.” – Gretchen Kreuzer- Levesque
“My grandmother was a telephone operator during WW2.” – Lois Way
“My mom served as a nurse in WWII.” – Jean DeMerchant
“All of them of course, but grandma was one of the original Rosie The Riveter during WWII.” – Brenda Bailey
“My mom lied about her age to weld ships in WWII era as her way of supporting her brothers who were off fighting.” – Barb Dorst Horn
“My mother was an elevator operator at the United Nations. My grandmother worked there also, as a switchboard operator. This was back in the 1960s.” – Bill Carey
“My grandmother was a pianist for silent movies when she was young. She would learn the score then watch the movie from the pit and play the score as it was set out for the movie.” – La-Wren Mary
“My grandmother was the 1st secretary for the Job Corps back in the 60’s. Mostly helping young women complete their high school education, then job training, and placement. To date that program has trained and placed over 3 million men and women into full time jobs and careers. From Forestry to the Front office!” – Roy Chapman
“My Mom was a systems analyst at Rockwell, working on the B-2 bomber and the Apollo Rockets. A techie before there were techies! She grew up the youngest of 13 during the Great Depression. Had just a 10th grade education. Went to Jr college at night to move up in her career. She was determined!” – Mary
“Starting in 1915, My Polish immigrant grandmother was the ‘headwoman’ of the production line of a clothing factory in Providence, Rhode Island. She supervised 80 Polish women workers. Every time there was a pattern change, she reset the machinery, trained the women and kept manufacturing on schedule. She did this for forty years while raising three children. She and her husband (also a factory worker) put all three kids through college in the middle of the Depression. My grandmother only spoke Polish, however, my mom achieved the highest score on the English entrance exam the year she entered the University of Rhode Island.” – Sheela Hewitt
Small-town American jobs
“My Grandfather was the custodian in a small town elementary school. Among other things the students brought him broken toys to repair. Some of those students attended his church where he taught Sunday School. There’s more.” -Michael Williams
“Grandparents were farmers in Oklahoma through the dustbowl and depression. My dad hopped a freight train and came to California in the early 1930s, where he met my mom, a Native Californian, as was her dad.” – Jim White
“Garbage truck driver, maternal grandpa. It was my dream job. I spent half my summers riding in the truck, finding toys, comics, candy, soda etc. It was a daily treasure hunt adventure for a kid. My high score was two whole boxes of OLW (Swedish Lay’s-ish) and 40 bottles of soda with more than six months left on the date.”
“My grandparents were homesteaders out West, and active in the REA that brought electricity to their remote region.” – Kathleen Miller
“During the Depression, through WW2 and Korean Wars, they had a mom n pops restaurant. They never turned anyone away hungry, even if, as grandma said, they sometimes only had ‘rock soup’!” – Gillian Cranehahn
American innovation jobs
“My dad was part of the team that designed the navigation system for the Apollo 11 mission that landed on the moon in 1969.” – Debbie Smole-Jenkins
“Dad was an FAA inspector. He often checked out Eisenhower’s Air Force One.” -Beverley Davis Robertson
“My dad was a commercial artist, trained at The Art Institute of Chicago right after WWII. One of his specialties was calligraphy, and he also designed over 200 type fonts, many of which are still in use today.” – Genie Martin
“My dad ran a jackhammer in building Norris dam, the first dam in the TVA system.” – John Edward Chandler
“One of my great greats was a train engineer in the Panama Canal Zone, which I thought was really cool.” – Brierly Davis
“My father worked at NASA and its predecessor NACA for 40 years.” – Dave Howell
American industrial jobs
“Mom and my godfather ran a print shop that gave jobs to former steel mill workers. Back in Pittsburgh when the steel mills closed in the 80s. The smell of printers ink brings me right back to running around. The print shop with my barbies in hand.” – Marie-Noelle Whalon
“My granddad worked down the mines, my other granddad at the railway station, so did my dad. Hard working, never missed a day …my dad worked sometimes 48 hours during heavy snow. Did barriers manually, defrosted some tracks. Hard working people, very proud. And my dad was a great dad, still miss him.” – Beate Finch
“My grandpa was a telegraph lineman in North Dakota for the Great Northern Railroad.” – Tom Potter
“Never knew him, but my great great grandfather was a riverboat captain on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers.” – Dolores Sonntag
“My dad, as a young man, worked on the historic Fort Peck dam on the Missouri River. One of the first notable projects of the New Deal. The construction skills that young cowboys gained there set him up for success later in life.” – Yvonne Linnabary
“My dad worked manufacturing during the day, and to buy a house for our family, he was a night Soilman (the person who emptied the buckets in outside non-flush toilets) a horrible job but he wanted to support his family.” – Claire Lewin
