Lt. Pickens and Ensign Wills, 1944
Lt. Harriet Ida Pickens and Ensign Frances Wills, first Negro Waves to be commissioned. They were members of the final graduating class at Naval Reserve Midshipmen's School (WR) Northampton, MA., December 21, 1944. On July 30, 1942, the WAVES became a World War II division of the US. Navy, and consisted entirely of women. The name was the acronym for Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service. The word "emergency" implied that the acceptance of women was due to the unusual circumstances of World War II, and at the end of the war the women would not be allowed to continue in Navy careers. Their official name was the Naval Reserve (Women's Reserve), but the nickname of the WAVES stuck. The WAVES did not initially accept African-American women into the division. From the fall of 1944 onwards, the Navy trained roughly one black woman for every 36 white women enlisted in the WAVES which was below the 10% cap agreed upon by the armed services in 1940.
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Photo credit: © Photo Researchers / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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