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| -Short Attention Span Theater- | |
| Neither Rain, Nor Racial Bias | |
| 2009-02-26 | |
| In WWII, Black Women's Army Unit Helped Mail on Its Way to GIs It was 1944, and they came from small towns and big cities, high school graduates and working professionals who answered their country's call for service at a time when much of the nation barely recognized their citizenship. Uncle Sam was looking for a few good African American women to join the military in Europe. Black women weren't any more welcome in most branches than black men were until first lady Eleanor Roosevelt, at the urging of African American civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune, began agitating for a role for black women in the war overseas. The 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, a unit of 885 black Women's Army Corps (WAC) members, was charged with clearing up a huge backlog of mail sent to military personnel overseas. All that undelivered mail was hurting morale, Army officials said. The job was expected to take six months, but the unit, known as the Six Triple Eight, working round-the-clock in eight-hour shifts, finished the job -- handling 7 million pieces of mail -- in three months. Later, they were sent to France for a similar assignment. "We served our country proudly, and we did a good job," said Mary Crawford Ragland, 81, of Bladensburg. "When we came back, though, there were no parades, there were no speeches, there was no recognition. They gave us our papers discharging us and sent us on our way."
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| Posted by:Beavis |