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- Description:
- Former U.S. Coast Guard Women's Reserve (SPARS) radio technician Eleanor Jean Bechtel discusses her enlistment, the social environment in wartime America, her basic training in West Palm Beach, FL, and receiving electronics and radio instruction at the Ben Franklin Hotel in Philadelphia. She also talks about the base in Florida where she trained, seeing John Wayne and Robert Montgomery there filming a movie, and moving to post-war Japan to work as a civilian secretary.
- Date Issued:
- 2003-07-29T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- G. Robert Vincent Voice Library Collection
- 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:
- In a an oral history interview, Mary Duncan Clark talks about her twenty-eight year career in the U.S. Army Nurse Corps. She says that her friends persuaded her to enlist during World War II and that she began as a staff nurse, moved up through the ranks and ended her career as a chief nurse. She discusses her duty stations in the U.S. and overseas, including in Vietnam and describes base housing, her uniforms and her travels. She tells a humorous story of going through customs in an unfriendly country and putting her feminine hygiene products on top in her suit case so that it would not be searched. Clark also says she enjoyed working with an adoption board in Japan to find homes for the illegitimate children of American soldiers and that she decided right after D-Day to make the Army her career. Clark is interviewed by Marjorie Brown.
- Date Issued:
- 1986-04-26T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Helen McPherson Reynolds talks about her service in the U.S. Army Nurse Corps during World War Two. She says that after her induction in October 1942 and receiving training as an anesthesiologist, she joined the 232nd General Hospital unit and shipped overseas in February 1945. Reynolds says that she first landed in Saipan and was later sent to Iwo Jima to help prepare for the expected invasion of Japan. She says that she was one of the first ten nurses on Iwo Jima and describes the tent hospital in which she worked, the heat and the casualties she was treating from the battle on Okinawa. She says actor Tyrone Power piloted the plane which transported the nurses to Iwo Jima. Reynolds says that she was discharged from the Army in January 1946.
- Date Issued:
- 1983-05-01T00:00:00Z
- 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:
- Harriet Wise talks about her service in the Women's Army Corps during World War Two and in Asia following the war. Wise discusses her postings at various military bases around the United States during the war and being one of the few women sent to the Army Exchange Service School at Princeton University. Following the war, Wise says that she accepted an assignment in Japan and talks about her time in Yokohama and Tokyo and later being sent to Seoul, South Korea to serve as an assistant PX officer. Wise is interviewed by Geneva Kebler Wiskemann and Elsie Hornbacher.
- Date Issued:
- 1983-04-20T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Johanna Butt talks about her service in the U.S. Army Nurse Corps during World War Two and the Korean War. Butt says that she graduated from nursing school in 1943 and joined the Army that same year. She talks about treating wounded from Patton's Third Army in Europe, living in miserable conditions, being cold and not having enough to eat, V-E Day and finally being "separated" from the Army in February in 1946. She says that she was called up from the Army Reserves in 1951 for the Korean War and talks about being stationed in Japan with the 382nd General Hospital, the flood of casualties that came in from the fighting in Korea, returning to the States in 1954, teaching nursing, working as an Army recruiter in the Pacific Northwest and being turned down for service in the Vietnam war. Butt says she retired from the Army in 1970 and moved to Tucson, AZ to care for her mother and husband. Butt is interviewed by Ruth F. Stewart.
- Date Issued:
- 2004-01-14T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Devere Powell talks about her service in the U.S. Army Nurse Corps during World War Two. She says she enlisted in April 1943, received her flight nurse's training at Bowman Field in Kentucky, was shipped to Hollandia, New Guinea in April 1945 and then to Manila and finally to Leyte where she joined the 801st Air Evac Squad. She discusses her job of escorting casualties from the Philippine Islands and Okinawa to hospitals in Manila and tells a poignant story of giving her flight wings to a wounded former American POW as a souvenir. Powell says she was discharged from the Army as a First Lieutenant in December 1945. Interviewer Betty Thompson also discusses Powell's nursing career and her volunteer work in retirement.
- Date Issued:
- 1984-10-10T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Josephine Boecker discusses her service in the American Red Cross in the Pacific Theater from September 1943 to September 1946. Boecker describes being contacted by the Red Cross and later being called for war service, going through the required background checks, taking a leave of absence from her job, and enduring a grueling three month training regimen. Boecker says that she believed she was headed to North Africa and was surprised when she found herself aboard a train bound for the west coast and duty in the Pacific. She describes the four week trip to New Guinea, being stationed at the 47th General Hospital near Milne Bay, the camp conditions, sanitation, the food, the steps taken to prevent malaria, the perpetual rain, camp social events, and her job of setting up entertainment and recreation facilities for the troops. She says that she spent her leave in Australia and later moved forward with the troops to the Philippines. She recalls her reaction to the news of the dropping of the atomic bomb, being sent to Japan to staff a hospital in Tokyo, the destruction she saw, and the effects U.S. occupation had on Japanese society. Sound quality deteriorates near the conclusion of the recording.
- Date Issued:
- 1985-02-15T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project
- Description:
- Linden N. Anderson talks about her long career in the American Red Cross which included service in World War Two and the Korean and Vietnam wars. Anderson reminisces about her childhood, attending the University of Texas, teaching in Texas public schools and finally joining the Red Cross in 1943. Anderson talks about her training with the "doughnut dollies", being stationed at the 91st General Hospital, shipping out to England and being stationed in Wales until her unit could be moved to a hospital at Oxford. Anderson says that her job was to provide entertainment for the wounded and build morale and that she often took patients on bus tours throughout England. After V-E Day, Anderson says that she returned to the States, but was soon recalled by the ARC to serve in Japan and in Korea during that conflict. Anderson also says that she remained in the Red Cross for twenty-years after Korea, discusses her duty stations in Libya, Germany, Korea and the U.S., describes treating casualties in Japan during the Vietnam war and finishing her career in Corpus Christi in 1973. Anderson is interviewed by Ruth F. Stewart.
- Date Issued:
- 2004-02-18T00:00:00Z
- Data Provider:
- Michigan State University. Libraries
- Collection:
- Women's Overseas Service League Oral History Project