Putting On Her Face
by
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In the summer of '42, everyone was still in shock over Pearl Harbor. I wanted to do something -- add something.
The first threat to me personally came during our summer vacation. My best friend was our family's guest at Star Lake in northwest Minnesota. Together we called on a neighbor whose son had been a summer pal of mine. As we might have expected, he had joined the Navy. The brew of men in uniform was intoxicating to our young eyes, but his mom was unhappy.
Her first words belted out the killer news: "I feel sorry for you girls!"
"You do?"
"The loss of life will eat away your marriage prospects." For verification, she nodded her head.
To us, the enlistment posters were promising excitement and exploration.
"Not only that, the ones who do return will woo younger girls."
Instead of replying, we negotiated a swift retreat.
"She's a witch," my friend passed it off.
"What if she's right?" Marriage was not a number one priority for me. Sometime after the war -- maybe. A career gal, yes, but certainly not an old maid.
The night course was my investment, fed my longing to "put on a new face" for the larger world. In the middle of its six month program at night school, Edie Summers, a co-student, called my attention to a flyer, a Civil Service exam, first step toward a number of jobs. The two of us took it and passed. Soon after, we received job offers from the Civil Aeronautics Administration. An initial CAA training was to be held in Chicago within two weeks. My parents were aghast.
"Bea, you can't even cook." I could see Mom's crash course coming up.
"We'll eat out, rent rooms."
"That's expensive, Bea."
Dad took another tack. "Finish the radio course. Jobs will open up here in Minneapolis. Bea, this is a big step, and Chicago is a huge town, a rough town."
I read from the pamphlet. '"The school is near Lake Michigan and downtown. Eating establishments and lodging close-by. Good transportation.' Dad, our permanent assignment won't be a city. The senior communicators will have those all staked out."
The door to freedom had opened a crack, and I was not to be denied. My parents were concerned, less trusting than I. They did agree the pay was good, and the field was wide open. The male communicators were being drafted in large numbers. Women were needed to do their job for the first time, and I was in on the ground floor.
"Just stay clear of those service men -- a bad lot." Dad blurted out amongst the bevy of last minute instructions.
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About the Book
Bea Stephens was nineteen and female in the early 1940’s. She was uncomfortably removed from the war effort. Men of her generation were headed overseas or in training. Brave women enlisted. Bea came upon a job with Civil Aeronautics never before offered to women. Her story takes the reader through initial training in Chicago, Illinois. It travels with her to five stations in a three-year period. Each is a challenge to her as a young girl on her own, and to her skill as an Aircraft Communicator. There is romance, travel, and the making of a woman in this novel. Her protagonist is the war itself, and the difficulties placed upon young citizens of her time.
About the Author
Jo Grimm has been writing since 1964, when she discovered poetry was her language of choice. It became her scrapbook of events, reactions, desires, and a catapult into all things new. Several college courses in creative writing, a mentor who believed in her, and contests offered by the Kansas Authors Club, prepared her for quality and quantity magazine publication. Married, and the mother of three children, this continued as a hobby until the children graduated from high school. The scrapbook was heavy with poetry by then, and she was challenged to present some of them in book form. When the Word Came was published in 1988. It was not until retirement -- and a computer -- that she tried fiction writing -- short stories, novellas, articles, and now a novel. She continues to live out her poetry, and the fiction has ranked favorably in contests. Several short stories have been published, and she is now a team writer providing weekly columns in two local newspapers.