Iowa author shares untold stories of black women who helped win World War II

CEDAR RAPIDS - Stories of American army nurses, war correspondents, Red Cross volunteers and political activists who helped win World War II, all of them black women, will be celebrated during a program Monday at the African American Museum of Iowa.

Iowa author Cheryl Mullenbach, of Panora, is to share stories from her book 'Double Victory: How African American Women Broke Race and Gender Barriers to Help Win World War II.” The event, in honor of Women's History Month, begins at 6:30 p.m. and is free to the public. The museum is located at 55 12th Ave. SE in Cedar Rapids.

Mullenbach became interested in the topic after a reunion of Women's Army Corps members in Des Moines several years ago. The first members of the corps were trained at Fort Des Moines in 1942, and in that class, about 40 of the 400 women were black. Mullenbach wanted to learn more about their stories.

'Initially I couldn't find anything, and I was curious as to why that might be,” she said. 'It got me thinking, if I don't know about these women, a lot of people don't know about them, and their stories need to be told.”

In 2012, she wrote her book, using newspaper archives as a starting point for her research. She was also able to interview some of the women, though most had already died. Others were hard to find because they had married and changed their names.

'I was very, very lucky to find women whom I could interview,” she said. 'And I found some fascinating women.”

Women like Ora Pierce, an army nurse stationed for a time in Florence, Ariz., at a hospital that treated American soldiers. A group of German prisoners of war also worked at the hospital. The black nurses were required to eat in a different mess hall than the white military officers and men, but Pierce learned the German men were allowed to eat with the white soldiers.

'She put up a stink about it and went through the NAACP,” Mullenbach said. 'Eventually, the rule was overturned.”

Such segregation pervaded black women's experiences. Fort Des Moines had a swimming pool that black women could only use between 5 and 7 p.m. on Fridays, though it was open to white women anytime. After each Friday night, the pool was drained and sterilized.

Though they were treated as second class citizens, the women were integral to winning the war. One unit of black women was sent to France, where its members reorganized the mail service to make sure soldiers on the front lines would get their mail. Others had more lonely jobs, like Hazel Dixon Payne, the only woman to serve on the remote Alaska-Canadian Highway.

Mullenbach said she wanted to preserve these stories for future generations.

'I looked for the untold stories,” she said. 'These women never got the recognition they should have. Part of it was sexism, and part of it was racism, and part of it was people just not caring about the past.

'I want all of us, but young people especially, to look more closely at the people in our lives and listen to their stories,” she said. 'There might be people who we think haven't had a lot of out-of-the-ordinary experiences, but they might be heroes.”

If You Go

What

: How African American Women Helped Win World War II by Iowa author Cheryl Mullenbach

When

: 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Monday

Where

: African American Museum of Iowa, 55 12th Ave. SE, Cedar Rapids

Details: (319) 862-2101, blackiowa.org

l Comments: (319) 398-8434; alison.gowans@thegazette.com