ABSTRACT
This chapter examines how war widows availed themselves of their newly gained rights. Unlike veterans, who mostly negotiated via organizations, widows acted overwhelmingly as individual citizens. A large part of the letters IOVR received over the interwar period came from them. The archives show that, whether formally schooled or not, women from all over the country reached out to the central administration, making themselves visible to the government and asserting their rights as citizens. It was a truly unprecedented phenomenon. The IOVR’s goal had been to enable continuity after 1920 and prevent further pain (primarily economic) for these families that had already suffered and lost so much. IOVR had a vision of families continuing to act as before, with widows hopefully remarrying and continuing to play the most socially acceptable role for women in Romanian society at that time—that of wife and mother. But that is not necessarily what all widows had in mind. Here are some of their stories of desperation, affirmation, compliance, powerlessness and empowerment.
