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- Description:
- Katie Kerr talks about her service in the American Red Cross during World War Two. Kerr describes becoming a medical technician, volunteering for the Red Cross in March 1944 and serving as a hospital recreation worker. She talks about her initial duties and training at American University in Washington D.C. and later being shipped to England. She talks about her time in England, how complicated relationships could become, recreation activities the Red Cross organized to entertain the troops, and some of her patients and their injuries. She remembers V-E Day, anticipating being sent to the Pacific Theater, coming back to the States in July 1945, taking a job at Lansing, Michigan's Sparrow Hospital, and meeting her husband, a Michigan State Police Trooper. Kerr talks about how she felt when the atomic bomb was dropped and signs off the interview by reciting her serial number. Kerr is interviewed by Elsie Hornbacher.
- Date Issued:
- 1984-08-14T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Elizabeth "Betty" Brown says she that she wanted to join the Women's Army Corps but failed to pass the physical, applied for the American Red Cross and served in Army and Navy hospitals for four years and then two years as a service club director. She talks about organizing recreational activities for patients in the 65th General Hospital in Europe during World War II and says that after V-J Day she was sent to Guam to work for several general hospitals. Brown describes the variety of uniforms she wore and coming up with creative ways to entertain patients. She says that just being away from home was the biggest wartime adjustment she had to make. Brown also talks about her postwar employment with the YWCA, earning a masters degree and serving in the Peace Corp. Brown is interviewed by Marjorie Brown.
- Date Issued:
- 1986-03-14T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- In the second of two oral history interviews, Virginia Emrich describes her service in the American Red Cross during World War Two. Emrich says that she was sent to Australia in 1944 and then to Manila in June 1945 where she was quartered in a bombed-out building with indoor toilets and showers, but with little privacy. Emrich remembers regularly hearing gunfire and bombs as U.S. troops tried to dislodge the Japanese, setting up a recreation hall for the 11th Airborne Division and regularly suffering earthquakes and tropical rains. She says that she was never hungry during her time in the Red Cross, but was often homesick, cold and tired and always sustained by the conviction that she was doing something worthwhile. Emerich says that she was sent to Japan in September 1945 to open recreation clubs for U.S. occupation forces and that although she enjoyed her time in Japan, she finally asked to be shipped home to care for her aging mother.
- Date Issued:
- 1983-06-11T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Rosalie Crosbie talks about joining the American Red Cross in 1945 and serving in post-war Europe. She discusses her duties on trains crossing Europe with children and war brides, assisting people reconnecting with family, the condition of European cities, the lack of food for civilians, the pervasiveness of the black market, running recreation clubs for U.S. servicemen, and entertaining U.S. troops in the fall of 1945 as they clamored to be back shipped home. Crosbie says that she met both General Eisenhower and the Duke of Windsor, attended the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials, and was later faced with the task of adjusting to civilian life back in the States and the death of her mother. Crosbie is interviewed by Elsie Hornbacher.
- Date Issued:
- 1984-06-20T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- In a written memoir read by Marjorie Brown, Ruby Busch recalls her service in the American Red Cross during World War Two. Busch talks about where she served, her uniforms, her medical care, her housing, her duties in Europe, and her memories of D-Day, V-E Day, and counting American bombers as they returned to England from their missions. Busch says she has enjoyed her experiences in the WOSL and associating with women who had similar experiences.
- Date Issued:
- 1986-04-30T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- In a 1983 oral history interview, Dorothy M. Harrison talks about her childhood in Royal Oak, MI, attending the University of Michigan and her service in the American Red Cross during World War Two. Harrison says she volunteered for the ARC in late 1942 and after receiving their training, her unit was shipped to Europe as part of a forty-ship convoy which was attacked by a German submarine during the crossing. Harrison also talks about opening a service club with the 93rd Heavy Bombardment Group in Hardwick, England, moving to the 337th General Service Engineers and later to the 363rd Photo Reconnaissance Group as part of the push across Germany as the war ended. She describes her quarters, her duties, celebrating Christmas with the troops during the Battle of the Bulge, struggling to get the equipment and supplies she needed to keep the clubs running, and the sexual harassment she experienced. Harrison says that she returned to the U.S. in September 1945, resumed her career as a librarian and married and moved with her husband to Louisville, KY to raise a family.
- Date Issued:
- 1983-01-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- In the first of two oral history interviews, Virginia Emrich talks about running Red Cross recreation clubs for U.S. troops during World War Two. Emrich discusses her Red Cross training and says that she was slated to go to Europe, but protested the assignment because she wanted to go to the Pacific and was finally sent to Brisbane, Australia in 1943. Emrich says that her first assignment in Australia was to staff a club which had a beach, golf course, and tennis courts and recalls troops from New Guinea and other front line units rotating through Brisbane for rest before the Philippine invasion in October 1944. Emrich says she was later moved to Darwin on the north coast of Australia to run a recreation club and describes her duties there, the tropical heat and humidity, the rains, mud, and insects and says that the troops were not allowed to swim in the ocean because the stingrays were so fierce. Emrich is interviewed by Virginia Cornett.
- Date Issued:
- 1983-05-04T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Dorothy M. Harrison describes the efforts of the Louisville Unit of the Women's Overseas Service League to collect and persevere the histories of its members and then talks about the life of Mildred Stutzenberger who served in the American Red Cross during World War II. Reading from local documents and an interview with Stutzenberger, Harrison talks about Stutzenberger first working in hospitals in the China-Burma-India Theater of Operations and then transferring to club work at the Bengal Air Depot in India. According to Harrison, Stutzenberger also served in Guam and Saipan and with the occupation forces in Japan. Harrison also recounts Stutzenberger's retirement and later death from lung cancer.
- Date Issued:
- 1983-01-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Mildred Blandford talks about her service as a secretary in the American Red Cross during World War Two. Blandford, who served from August 1944 to November 1945, says that she joined the Red Cross for overseas adventure and spent most of her time stationed at the 194th General Hospital in Paris. She says that she was quartered in a Parisian hotel with maid service, but that service in the hospital was no picnic and meant leaving her secretarial duties often to help care for the onslaught of wounded soldiers. After VE Day, Blandford says that she volunteered for duty in the Pacific and was sent to Okinawa where she found herself living in a tent rather than luxury hotel. She talks about her daily tasks and again helping out with wounded G.I.s. and describes two typhoons that hit the island and how staff tried to protect the patients in the tent hospital from the storm. At war's end, Blandford says that she returned to Louisville to work, but later went back to Paris for school and to work for NATO. Blandford is interviewed by Dorothy M. Harrison.
- Date Issued:
- 1983-10-01T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Katherine Wilson talks about her service in the American Red Cross in Europe during World War Two. Wilson says she joined the Red Cross right after Pearl Harbor, was sent to England in early 1943 aboard the Queen Elizabeth, helped to set up a hospital in a cow pasture and treated casualties coming from the North African campaign. She says that her Red Cross unit was later sent to Omaha Beach, thirteen days after D-Day, to set up another hospital about eight miles from the front. She talks about treating burned tank crewman, dispensing cigarettes, helping patients to write letters home, and coordinating social activities for the troops. She says that her hospital unit was next moved to Belgium where it received a deluge of casualties from the Battle of the Bulge and was forced to pull out in the face of German advances. She talks about celebrating V-E Day on a speeding troop train through Belgium and that she had a chance to site see in Germany before finally being sent back to the States. Wilson is interviewed by Dorothy Harrison.
- Date Issued:
- 1985-12-08T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project