Junior League: A History of Service

JUNIOR LEAGUE: A HISTORY OF SERVICE BY CAITLIN IRWIN AND CHALA CRIPPS MCDONALD

To mark Veterans Day and Remembrance Day, we are celebrating not only the military contributions of the Junior League women who came before us but also the achievements of those who have served in more recent times. Throughout the years, League members have devoted volunteer efforts across the nation to our country when we were at war. Since the early days of the organization, the women of the Junior League have been playing critical roles in various branches of the military, exemplifying perhaps one of the noblest interpretations of what it means to be a civic leader.

WORLD WAR I

World War I involved League members in wartime volunteer service – making bandages, knitting garments, and selling Liberty Bonds. 126 Junior League members served with the YWCA in France. Junior Leagues also played an active role in selling bonds and working in Army hospitals. The San Francisco Junior League formed a motor delivery service that served as a model for the nationwide Red Cross Motor Corps. League volunteers also “carried on” during the influenza epidemic that broke out following the end of the War.

WORLD WAR II

During World War II, Junior League members played a major role in the war effort by chairing hundreds of war-related organizations in virtually every city where Junior Leagues operate. The Association of Junior Leagues of America prepared the first national plan for central volunteer bureaus across the United States and provided consultative services for administrating them. League conferences were discontinued, and members were encouraged to join the women’s branches of the armed services or to take jobs in war industries, if they could. Oveta Culp Hobby, a Houston League member, led the Women’s Army Corps. Others, who carried on the volunteer effort, staffed USO Centers for servicemen and women and set up nurseries for war workers’ children. Volunteers helped in locating housing for war plant employees and in relocating evacuees from war-torn countries. The entire country was moved to support war efforts in every way possible to include changes in the labor market, volunteer endeavors, and making sacrifices— all for the good of national unity—and the Junior League of San Antonio (JLSA) was at the forefront of such efforts in our city.

In 1944, JLSA hosted a war loan drive dinner at the St. Anthony Hotel that brought in a total of $4,275,000 in bonds. Those that attended the sold-out $1,000-plate dinner were entertained by

8 motion picture and radio stars Dick Foote, Gene Autry, and Red Skelton. During this same time, JLSA donated a mobile blood unit to the Red Cross to assist with blood drives. This was the first mobile unit in Bexar County and could process 160 people per day and carried 12 beds, five tables, and laboratory equipment. Several JLSA members assisted the Red Cross by filling many of its needs as staff assistants, nurse’s aides, and Motor Corps volunteers. League members also helped recruit other women to assist at the convalescent hospital at Fort Sam Houston and served as medical technicians in the Women’s Army Corps.

In 1945, JLSA used over $2,000 from its annual Rummage Sale to fund rehabilitation programs specifically dedicated to servicemen at the Brooke General Hospital. The League also furnished a telephone and lounge room for patients and hosted parties at the camp with food, entertainment, and company. Some lucky soldiers were awarded with a telephone call home for the Christmas holidays. Additionally, League members beautified an outdoor recreation garden for the convalescent cadets.

By the end of World War II, the Junior Leagues, again, had proven their effectiveness in a time of national crisis.

WORLD WAR II VETERAN MEMBERS

During World War II, Flight Officer Kathleen Walsh Walker of the Junior League of Montreal assumed leadership of the Royal Canadian Air Force’s Women’s Division, which provided air and ground crews. Margaret Eaton of the Junior League of Toronto and Junior League of Winnipeg member Frances S. Aitkins became the two highest-ranking officers in the Canadian Women’s Army Corps (CWAC), whose members worked as drivers, cooks, clerks, messengers, and canteen helpers. Together, they took the first contingent of CWACs overseas. By the end of the war, more than 45,000 Canadian women had signed up to serve and 3,000 CWACs were serving in war zones. In 1941, Oveta Culp Hobby of the Junior League of Houston was named first commander of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, a job in which she traveled the country— carrying with her an electric fan and iron to press her colonel’s uniform—to tell groups of men and women about the role of women in the military. In 1953, she went on to serve as the first U.S. Secretary of Health, Education & Welfare.

At the age of 24, in 1943, Cornelia Fort, a member of the Junior League of Nashville, was killed in a mid-air collision while delivering an aircraft from Long Beach, California to a military base near Love Field in Dallas as part of her duties for the Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron, later known as the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots. Having narrowly escaped a Japanese combat plane at Pearl Harbor in 1941, she was the first female pilot to be killed on active duty in American history.

SUPPORTING THE MILITARY

Locally, JLSA strives towards strengthening our relationship with the thriving military community in San Antonio. Some of our own military members provide wonderful insight into possible projects.

Pamela Sanders Perry, retired Coast Guard member, suggests many ways we can support our military community. The League has the potential to be a constant in welcoming military-connected women, both spouses and active duty, into our community knowing that they may transfer sooner rather than later. Another one of the great ideas has been to partner with local retailers and other interested members to gather needed items to hold quarterly baby showers for service-connected women, as many military connected women are hundreds, if not thousands of miles away from their family when giving birth.

Army physician assistant Sharon Twin Denson juggles JLSA and her active duty status, where she has been assigned to Brooke Army Medical Center’s Internal Medicine Clinic after working in the Pentagon for the last four years. She advocates for a partnership between JLSA and San Antonio’s Wounded Warrior Project, the Military Caregiver’s Program, the Center for the Intrepid, and the Fisher House as a huge win for JLSA and the military community.

“Although I am an Army physician assistant, I did not work in that capacity in my last assignment. I was an aide-de-camp to the Army Inspector General, and this allowed me to travel around the country visiting multiple military installations," she says. "What I learned is that the strength of any military installation is greatly dependent upon the community in which

it sits. So, partnerships with community organizations is very important for the readiness of deploying units, soldiers and their family members.”

Sara Geissler, retired Navy officer, reminds us it is not all serious business. While serving on the USS Eisenhower, she says, “I had to maintain a flight status, so I needed to get my flight hours from the ship. The squadron that I flew with allowed me to shoot the side door gun out of the helicopter for target practice. I was also catapulted off the ship in a C-2 aircraft a few times which was also very cool.”

Far from exhaustive, this short list does not include all of the women of the Junior League who are still serving the military on active duty or as vital reserves. The Junior League has served and continues to serve as a vital part of the support to our troops. JLSA strives to give back to the community that provides us the freedom to volunteer.