by delivering babies as a midwife and later designed world-renowned parkas. Ezelle de- scribes her as “a very capable woman.” According to the America Memorial Foun-
dation, about 800 Native women served in the U.S. military during World War II, including in the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) and the Navy reserve called Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES). Minnie Spotted Wolf of the Blackfoot Tribe in Montana also became the first American Indian woman to join the Marines. Known for her skill in break- ing horses on her father’s ranch, she served as a heavy equipment operator from 1943 to 1947. In addition to serving in the military, thou-
sands of Native women supported the troops during both World Wars by working in war- related industries and through efforts such as Red Cross clothing drives. After every war, women have also cared for the physically and
mentally wounded when they came home. “Whether providing support in the form of supplies and healing or serving as leaders and warriors in their own right, Native women have always played critical military roles for their tribal nations and the United States,” says Alexandra Harris, a senior editor at the National Museum of the American Indian. She and NMAI Historian Mark Hirsch co- authored “Why We Serve: Native Americans in the United States Armed Forces.” Regardless of how Indigenous women
have served their communities and country, their stories are rarely found in the annals of American military history. In part, this omis- sion could be because those histories typically focus on battles, says Hirsch. Yet throughout the more than two centuries of U.S. military history, he says, “Women are at the center of the story, not a marginal part of the story.”
Women Airforce Service Pilots at Eagle Pass Army Air Base in Texas in 1944. Back row, left to right: Virginia S. Knapp Healy, Virginia N. Grant, Virginia M. Williams Hubbard, Ann M. Karlson Kenney, Anna Hopkins White, Eleanor Hinkle Vaughn, Virginia Mullen and Jacqueline Twitchell Morgan. Front row, left to right: Margaret Helburn Kocher, Anne TePas Wiltsee, Ruth Carter Johnson, Margaret Cox Stegall, Edith K. Smith Beal, Patricia J. Blackburn Bonansinga, Dorothy Sorensen Van Valkenburg, Mary A. Jershin O’Rourke and Ola Mildred Rexroat—the only American Indian to serve as a WASP during World War II.
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 19
IMAGE COURTESY OF WASP ARCHIVE, TEXAS WOMAN’S UNIVERSITY
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