Milkweed was a precious commodity during World War II
In the late stages of World War II, for those Americans who were not actively involved in the fighting, the key word was “rationing,” as Americans were urged to conserve key resources, so as much as possible would go to the war effort.
Throughout the war years, the U.S. government forbade the sale of new car tires to conserve rubber, only allowing average motorists to keep five — a set of four, plus a spare. Boots, typewriters, bicycles, fuel oil, gasoline, and automobiles were all rationed to save materials for the war effort.
Not every material could be rationed so easily. Some were simply out of reach, such as the floss of the kapok tree, which at the time was the key ingredient that made life jackets float.
While kapok trees grow elsewhere around the world, the Dutch East Indies were where American industry had the easiest access to them. But early in the war, despite the efforts of the Allies, Japan occupied the territory and would do so until its surrender in 1945. This would cut the Allies off from their main source of floss.
Eventually, the U.S. government settled on a substitute — the Asclepias syriaca, better known as milkweed, a common plant found in parts of the northern United States and Canada. Dr. Boris Berkman pitched the idea of using milkweed to Congress, proclaiming that it served as an even better flotation agent than kapok floss.
By 1943, with $225,000 of federal funding, Berkman and his “Milkweed Corporation of America” had a state-of-the-art processing facility in Petoskey, Mich., and milkweed would be put to use for America’s fighting forces. Petoskey was chosen because surveys determined it to have the largest concentration of milkweed in the United States, and it was easily accessible by rail.
It took 1,200 to 1,600 milkweed pods to make just one life jacket. Not to mention, the pods had to be picked at a very specific time of year: during early fall. Across the nation, millions of Americans — many of them schoolchildren — went to work collecting milkweed pods in onion sacks that would be sent to Petoskey for processing.
David Nicklas, 89, of Renfrew, who was one of many children in his class tasked with collecting milkweed pods.
Later on, during the early 1950s, Nicklas would join the Army himself, as part of the 101st Airborne Division Screaming Eagles. Afterward, he spent 36 years of his life teaching at the North Allegheny School District.
“In grade school, we had a field across the school that had milkweed,” Nicklas said. “We had to go collect it and put it in burlap bags. They gave us savings stamps. When you got enough stamps to fill a book, when you cashed it, it would be good for $25 in about 10 years.”
Ultimately, thanks to the efforts of everyday citizens like Nicklas, the processing plant in Petoskey churned out over a million life jackets for America’s fighting forces.
After the war, Berkman hoped that he would be able to find new commercial uses for milkweed. However, industry instead found better synthetic substitutes, and with no further need for milkweed, the processing plant in Petoskey went up for sale.
While there is no real commercial potential for milkweed anymore, there are those who still have use for it. The “Save Our Monarchs” environmental campaign urges citizens to grow their own milkweed to preserve the endangered population of monarch butterflies, who rely on milkweed to survive and reproduce.
