The Hello Girls

The Hello Girls PDF Author: Elizabeth Cobbs
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674237439
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
In 1918, the U.S. Army Signal Corps sent 223 women to France at General Pershing’s explicit request. They were masters of the latest technology: the telephone switchboard. While suffragettes picketed the White House and President Wilson struggled to persuade a segregationist Congress to give women of all races the vote, these courageous young women swore the army oath and settled into their new roles. Elizabeth Cobbs reveals the challenges they faced in a war zone where male soldiers wooed, mocked, and ultimately celebrated them. The army discharged the last Hello Girls in 1920, the year Congress ratified the Nineteenth Amendment. When they sailed home, they were unexpectedly dismissed without veterans’ benefits and began a sixty-year battle that a handful of survivors carried to triumph in 1979. “What an eye-opener! Cobbs unearths the original letters and diaries of these forgotten heroines and weaves them into a fascinating narrative with energy and zest.” —Cokie Roberts, author of Capital Dames “This engaging history crackles with admiration for the women who served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps during the First World War, becoming the country’s first female soldiers.” —New Yorker “Utterly delightful... Cobbs very adroitly weaves the story of the Signal Corps into that larger story of American women fighting for the right to vote, but it’s the warm, fascinating job she does bringing her cast...to life that gives this book its memorable charisma... This terrific book pays them a long-warranted tribute.” —Christian Science Monitor “Cobbs is particularly good at spotlighting how closely the service of military women like the Hello Girls was tied to the success of the suffrage movement.” —NPR

The Hello Girls

The Hello Girls PDF Author: Elizabeth Cobbs
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674237439
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 401

Get Book Here

Book Description
In 1918, the U.S. Army Signal Corps sent 223 women to France at General Pershing’s explicit request. They were masters of the latest technology: the telephone switchboard. While suffragettes picketed the White House and President Wilson struggled to persuade a segregationist Congress to give women of all races the vote, these courageous young women swore the army oath and settled into their new roles. Elizabeth Cobbs reveals the challenges they faced in a war zone where male soldiers wooed, mocked, and ultimately celebrated them. The army discharged the last Hello Girls in 1920, the year Congress ratified the Nineteenth Amendment. When they sailed home, they were unexpectedly dismissed without veterans’ benefits and began a sixty-year battle that a handful of survivors carried to triumph in 1979. “What an eye-opener! Cobbs unearths the original letters and diaries of these forgotten heroines and weaves them into a fascinating narrative with energy and zest.” —Cokie Roberts, author of Capital Dames “This engaging history crackles with admiration for the women who served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps during the First World War, becoming the country’s first female soldiers.” —New Yorker “Utterly delightful... Cobbs very adroitly weaves the story of the Signal Corps into that larger story of American women fighting for the right to vote, but it’s the warm, fascinating job she does bringing her cast...to life that gives this book its memorable charisma... This terrific book pays them a long-warranted tribute.” —Christian Science Monitor “Cobbs is particularly good at spotlighting how closely the service of military women like the Hello Girls was tied to the success of the suffrage movement.” —NPR

Ashley's War

Ashley's War PDF Author: Gayle Tzemach Lemmon
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062333836
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 238

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Book Description
The New York Times–bestselling account of an elite team of female soldiers is “compelling. . . . In battle as in life, these women refuse to quit” (Christian Science Monitor). In 2010, the Army created Cultural Support Teams, a secret pilot program to insert women alongside Special Operations soldiers battling in Afghanistan. Their presence had a calming effect on enemy households, but more importantly, the CSTs were able to search adult women for weapons and gather crucial intelligence. They could build relationships—woman to woman—in ways that male soldiers in an Islamic country never could. In Ashley’s War, Gayle Tzemach Lemmon uses on-the-ground reporting and a finely tuned understanding of the complexities of war to tell the story of CST-2, a unit of women hand-picked from the Army to serve in this highly specialized role. The pioneers of CST-2 proved for the first time that women might be physically and mentally tough enough to become Special Ops. The price of professional acceptance was personal loss and social isolation: the only people who really understand the women of CST-2 are each other. At the center of this story is a friendship and the shared perils of up-close combat. At the heart of the team is the tale of a beloved and effective soldier, Ashley White. “An unforgettable story of female soldiers breaking the brass ceiling. . . . This book will inspire you.” —Sheryl Sandberg, #1 International bestselling author of Lean In “A tremendous story. . . . Very moving.” —The Daily Show with Jon Stewart “Ashley’s War shares the remarkable stories of one of the first teams of women serving in the U.S. Army Special Operations Command.” —Senator John McCain

Soldiers' Stories

Soldiers' Stories PDF Author: Yvonne Tasker
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822348470
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 330

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Book Description
A comprehensive analysis of the changing representations of military women in American and British movies and TV programs from the Second World War to the present.

Soldier Girls

Soldier Girls PDF Author: Helen Thorpe
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1451668120
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 432

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Book Description
“A raw, intimate look at the impact of combat and the healing power of friendship” (People): the lives of three women deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq, and the effect of their military service on their personal lives and families—named a best book of the year by Publishers Weekly. “In the tradition of Adrian Nicole LeBlanc, Richard Rhodes, and other masters of literary journalism, Soldier Girls is utterly absorbing, gorgeously written, and unforgettable” (The Boston Globe). Helen Thorpe follows the lives of three women over twelve years on their paths to the military, overseas to combat, and back home…and then overseas again for two of them. These women, who are quite different in every way, become friends, and we watch their interaction and also what happens when they are separated. We see their families, their lovers, their spouses, their children. We see them work extremely hard, deal with the attentions of men on base and in war zones, and struggle to stay connected to their families back home. We see some of them drink too much, have affairs, and react to the deaths of fellow soldiers. And we see what happens to one of them when the truck she is driving hits an explosive in the road, blowing it up. She survives, but her life may never be the same again. Deeply reported, beautifully written, and powerfully moving, Soldier Girls is “a breakthrough work...What Thorpe accomplishes in Soldier Girls is something far greater than describing the experience of women in the military. The book is a solid chunk of American history...Thorpe triumphs” (The New York Times Book Review).

Bush Wives and Girl Soldiers

Bush Wives and Girl Soldiers PDF Author: Chris Coulter
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801457246
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
During the war in Sierra Leone (1991–2002), members of various rebel movements kidnapped thousands of girls and women, some of whom came to take an active part in the armed conflict alongside the rebels. In a stunning look at the life of women in wartime, Chris Coulter draws on interviews with more than a hundred women to bring us inside the rebel camps in Sierra Leone.When these girls and women returned to their home villages after the cessation of hostilities, their families and peers viewed them with skepticism and fear, while humanitarian organizations saw them primarily as victims. Neither view was particularly helpful in helping them resume normal lives after the war. Offering lessons for policymakers, practitioners, and activists, Coulter shows how prevailing notions of gender, both in home communities and among NGO workers, led, for instance, to women who had taken part in armed conflict being bypassed in the demilitarization and demobilization processes carried out by the international community in the wake of the war. Many of these women found it extremely difficult to return to their families, and, without institutional support, some were forced to turn to prostitution to eke out a living.Coulter weaves several themes through the work, including the nature of gender roles in war, livelihood options in war and peace, and how war and postwar experiences affect social and kinship relations.

Women in the Military

Women in the Military PDF Author: Jeanne Holm
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780891415138
Category : United States
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This revised edition of Maj. Gen Jeanne Holm's classic work on the history and role of women in the U.S. armed forces brings the reader up-to-date by covering the role of American military women in all post-Vietnam military operations -- including the recent Persian Gulf War. Just as important is her discussion of the changing role of women in the military during the 1980s and 1990s. Book jacket.

Women Heroes of the US Army

Women Heroes of the US Army PDF Author: Ann McCallum Staats
Publisher: Women of Action
ISBN: 9780914091240
Category : Young Adult Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
"The story of women serving in the United States military begins before the founding of the country. Though early laws prohibited women from becoming soldiers, they still found ways to serve, even disguising themselves as men in order to participate in active battle. Women Heroes of the US Army chronicles the critical role women have played in strengthening the US Army from the birth of the nation to today. These smart, brave, and determined women led the way for their sisters to enter, grow and prosper in the forces defending the United States. Through the profiles highlighting the achievements of these trailblazers throughout history, young women today can envision an equitable future"--

Behind the Rifle

Behind the Rifle PDF Author: Shelby Harriel-Hidlebaugh
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN: 1496822021
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 206

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Book Description
During the Civil War, Mississippi’s strategic location bordering the Mississippi River and the state’s system of railroads drew the attention of opposing forces who clashed in major battles for control over these resources. The names of these engagements—Vicksburg, Jackson, Port Gibson, Corinth, Iuka, Tupelo, and Brice’s Crossroads—along with the narratives of the men who fought there resonate in Civil War literature. However, Mississippi’s chronicle of military involvement in the Civil War is not one of men alone. Surprisingly, there were a number of female soldiers disguised as males who stood shoulder to shoulder with them on the firing lines across the state. Behind the Rifle: Women Soldiers in Civil War Mississippi is a groundbreaking study that discusses women soldiers with a connection to Mississippi—either those who hailed from the Magnolia State or those from elsewhere who fought in Mississippi battles. Readers will learn who they were, why they chose to fight at a time when military service for women was banned, and the horrors they experienced. Included are two maps and over twenty period photographs of locations relative to the stories of these female fighters along with images of some of the women themselves. The product of over ten years of research, this work provides new details of formerly recorded female fighters, debunks some cases, and introduces over twenty previously undocumented ones. Among these are women soldiers who were involved in such battles beyond Mississippi as Shiloh, Antietam, and Gettysburg. Readers will also find new documentation regarding female fighters held as prisoners of war in such notorious prisons as Andersonville.

Army at Home

Army at Home PDF Author: Judith Giesberg
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN: 0807895601
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
Introducing readers to women whose Civil War experiences have long been ignored, Judith Giesberg examines the lives of working-class women in the North, for whom the home front was a battlefield of its own. Black and white working-class women managed farms that had been left without a male head of household, worked in munitions factories, made uniforms, and located and cared for injured or dead soldiers. As they became more active in their new roles, they became visible as political actors, writing letters, signing petitions, moving (or refusing to move) from their homes, and confronting civilian and military officials. At the heart of the book are stories of women who fought the draft in New York and Pennsylvania, protested segregated streetcars in San Francisco and Philadelphia, and demanded a living wage in the needle trades and safer conditions at the Federal arsenals where they labored. Giesberg challenges readers to think about women and children who were caught up in the military conflict but nonetheless refused to become its collateral damage. She offers a dramatic reinterpretation of how America's Civil War reshaped the lived experience of race and gender and brought swift and lasting changes to working-class family life.

They Fought for the Motherland

They Fought for the Motherland PDF Author: Laurie S. Stoff
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
ISBN: 0700614850
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
Women have participated in war throughout history, but their experience in Russia during the First World War was truly exceptional. Between the war's beginning and the October Revolution of 1917, approximately 6,000 women answered their country's call as the army was faced with insubordination and desertion in the ranks while the provisional government prepared for a new offensive. These courageous women became media stars throughout Europe and America, but were brushed aside by Soviet chroniclers and until now have been largely neglected by history. Laurie Stoff draws on deep archival research into previously unplumbed material, including many first-person accounts, to examine the roots, motivations, and legacy of these women. She reveals that Russia was the only nation in World War I that systematically employed women in the military, marking the first time that a government run by men had organized women for combat. And although they were originally envisioned as propaganda—promoting patriotism and citizenship to inspire the thousands of males who had been deserting or refusing to fight—Russian women also proved themselves more than capable in combat. Describing the formation, provisioning, and training of the units, Stoff sheds light on their social and educational backgrounds, while recounting a number of amazing individual stories. She tells how Maria Bochkareva, commander of the First Russian Women's Battalion of Death, and her unit met its baptism of fire in combat and how Bochkareva later traveled to the U.S. and met President Wilson. Within these pages, we also meet Maria Bocharnikova, who served with the First Petrograd Women's Battalion that defended the Winter Palace during the Bolshevik Revolution and whose detailed account of her experience dispels much of the misinformation concerning that storied event. Stoff also chronicles the exploits of the Second Moscow Women's Battalion of Death, Third Kuban Women's Shock Battalion, and the First Women's Naval Detachment, all within the context of Russian society, the Revolution, and the war itself. Enhancing and informing this presentation are more than two dozen historic photos. Stoff's remarkable account rescues from oblivion an important but still little-known aspect of Russia's experience in World War I. It also provides new insights into gender roles during a pivotal period of Russia's development and, more broadly speaking, resonates with the current debates over the role of women in warfare.