"Always Ready"

After the United States entered World War II following the attack on Pearl Harbor, women stepped up and took jobs usually held only  by men, but with men drafted into and enlisting in the military, the home front was in desperate need of a workforce. Women served in the Armed Forces in both world wars but there were more opportunities for women during World War II. In 1942, the US Coast Guard established its Women's Reserve program. 

 Photo: uscg.mil

The Women's Reserve program hired women to serve in the Coast Guard offices as secretaries and clerks, which allowed more men to be deployed overseas. On December 7, 1942, Dorothy Tuttle was the first enlistee in the program. The first director of the program was Dorothy Stratton, who had originally enlisted in the the Women's Reserve of the US Naval Reserves (WAVES).

By the end of the war, Stratton rose from the rank of senior lieutenant to captain. She is credited with the nickname for the Coast Guard's Women's Reserve, SPARS. It came from the Coast Guard's motto in Latin and English; Semper Paratus, which means "Always Ready." As Stratton stated in her memo to the Commandant, Vice Admiral Russell Waesche, "a spar is...a supporting beam and that is what we hope each member of the Women's Reserve will be." (http://www.uscg.mil/history/people/DStrattonBio.asp)

 Photo: uscg.mil

Under Stratton's command, the SPARS program grew at an incredible rate. More than 10,000 women enlisted and over 900 women served as officers. During the war, the Coast Guard saw the highest ratio of women to men out of all of the Armed Services. Stratton is often referred as the commanding officer of the SPARS but she actually had no command authority. 

 Photo: womenofwwii.com

By 1944, African Americans were allowed to enlist, though not as officer candidates. Within the first six months, five women, Olivia Hooker, D. Winnifred Byrd, Julia Mosley, Yvonne Cumberbatch and Aileen Cook, enlisted as the fist African American women in the Coast Guard.

Women continued to serve in the SPARS until the program was disbanded after the war in 1946. However, in 1948 the Women's Armed Services Integration Act was signed into law by President Truman. Originally, it was only meant to allow women to serve in the Army (as they had in the Women's Army Corps) but it included all of the branches except for the Coast Guard. It was not until 1949 that women were allowed to serve in the Coast Guard again. 

Photo: newpitssburghcourieronline.com

Last week, Rear Admiral Joanna Nunan spoke at FEMA HQ in the agency's Women's History Speaker series. Nunan was one of the first one hundred women to graduate from the Coast Guard Academy. When she was a captain, she commanded a Coast Guard cutter "SPAR," which was named to honor the women in the Coast Guard during WWII. Rear Admiral Nunan was recently appointed as Military Adviser to the Secretary of Homeland Security and it was an honor to meet her.

Photo: Hilary Grabowska