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The woman who was tried and convicted as ‘Tokyo Rose’ has died at the age of 90 in Chicago. Iva Toguri was an American woman of Japanese decent who lived in the US and graduated college here. She was visiting relatives in Japan when WWII broke out and she was unable to return home. Speaking no Japanese, Iva was soon left desolate and starving. She answered an ad in the paper looking for an English-language typist for Radio Tokyo. After the war, she tried to return home only to be accused of being one of the women dubbed ‘Tokyo Rose’.

‘Tokyo Rose’ was the on air name of dozens of women who went on the radio during the war and spread propaganda aimed at demoralizing American troops into surrendering and convincing them that their girlfriends and wives were being unfaithful to them back home while they were fighting in the war. Most American soldiers laughed off the propaganda. Upon returning home, Iva was charged with treason and convicted in 1949 and just wanting to return home, she signed papers that implicated her for the crime. She spent six years in prison before being pardoned by President Johnson in 1977.