Frances E. Wills Thorpecollection: Veterans History Project (Library of Congress

https://memory.loc.gov/diglib/vhp/story/loc.natlib.afc2 [login to see] 3/
In 1944, Frances Wills Thorpe, a young African American social worker from Pennsylvania, became one of the first two African American officers in the Navy’s WAVES (Women Accepted into Volunteer Emergency Service) program. Along with Harriet Pickens, she trained at Smith College, and then was sent to Hunter Naval Training Station in the Bronx, teaching Naval history to incoming recruits. For Thorpe, integrating the WAVES carried with it a sense of isolation that persisted throughout her time in the service. She recalls her Navy days in her memoir, which describes a life filled with achievement and adventure, including experiences such as befriending the poet Langston Hughes, living as an ex-patriot in Paris, and counseling battle-scarred veterans after the war.