Target practice on Treasure Island, using.
WAVES recruitment poster List of Directors On 15 October 1948, the first eight women were commissioned in the regular Navy: Joy Bright Hancock, Winifred Quick Collins, Ann King, Frances Willoughby, Ellen Ford, Doris Cranmore, Doris Defenderfer, and Betty Rae Tennant took their oaths as naval officers. On 7 July 1948, Kay Langdon, Wilma Marchal, Edna Young, Frances Devaney, Doris Robertson, and Ruth Flora became the first six enlisted women to be sworn into the regular U.S. Although the WAVES officially ceased to exist, the acronym was in common use well into the 1970s. To reflect this, the V9 and V10 Volunteer Reserve programs were discontinued and renamed the W9 Women's Officer Training and W10 Women's Enlisted Training programs. With the passage of the Women's Armed Services Integration Act (Public Law 625) on 12 June 1948, women gained permanent status in the armed services. From the fall of 1944 onwards, the Navy trained roughly one black woman for every 36 white women enlisted in the WAVES this was about 2.77%, below the 10% cap agreed upon by the armed services in 1940. In November 1944, Harriet Ida Pickens and Frances Wills graduated from the Naval Reserve Midshipmen's School (Women's Reserve) at Northampton, Massachusetts, and became the first female African-American WAVE officers. The WAVES did not initially accept African-American women into the division. A large proportion of the WAVES did clerical work, but some took positions in the aviation community, medical professions, communications, intelligence, storekeeper, science and technology. Within their first year, the WAVES were 27,000 strong. The war ended before any WAVES could be sent to other locations. possessions, and a number were sent to Hawaii. Late in World War II, they were authorized to serve in certain U.S. The WAVES could not serve aboard combat ships or aircraft, and initially were restricted to duty in the continental United States. The WAAC became the Women's Army Corps (WAC) on 3 July 1943, giving its members military status similar to that of the WAVES.
They also received the same pay and were subject to military discipline. From the very beginning, the WAVES was an official part of the Navy, and its members held the same rank and ratings as male personnel. The important distinction between the WAAC and the WAVES was that the WAAC was an "auxiliary" organization, serving with the Army, not in it. The WAVE Graduates from the V9 and V10 programs were considered part of the U.S.
Officer candidates went through basic training as seamen recruits, then became midshipmen during officer training, and graduated as ensigns. Women seeking to become officers in the WAVES or SPARS attended the V9 WAVE Officer Candidate Volunteer Program. The Women entering as enlisted personnel in the Navy or Coast Guard attended the V10 WAVE Enlisted Rating Volunteer Program. This occurred two months after the WAAC ( Women's Auxiliary Army Corps) was established, and Eleanor Roosevelt had convinced the Congress to authorize the women's component of the Navy.
Navy history, and the first director of the WAVES. She was the first female commissioned officer in U.S. Mildred McAfee, President of Wellesley College, was sworn in as a Naval Reserve Lieutenant Commander in early August 1942.