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“Bandel's letters are witty, detailed accounts of her experiences written during the formative years of the U.S. Women's Army Auxilary Corps.”—The Journal of Military History
The letters of a prominent female officer during World War II.
One of the negative consequences of the 1978 integration of the various women’s auxiliaries into the mainstream of the U.S. military was a loss of institutional memory. The Women in Military Service for America Memorial Foundation was established, in part, to preserve a thread of history by documenting and celebrating the rich and varied experiences of women in the U.S. military. From 1942 to 1945, Lieutenant Colonel Betty Bandel (retired) served in the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC, later WAC, the Women’s Army Corps), eventually heading the WAC Division of the Army Air Force. During these years she wrote hundreds of letters to family and friends tracing her growth from an enthusiastic recruit, agog in the presence of public figures such as Eleanor Roosevelt (code named Rover), to a seasoned officer and leader.
Bandel was one of the Corps’ most influential senior officers. Her letters are rich with detail about the WAC’s contribution to the war effort and the inner workings of the first large, non-nurse contingent of American military women. In addition, her letters offer a revealing look at the wartime emergence of professional women. Perhaps for the first time, women oversaw and directed hundreds of thousands of personnel, acquired professional and personal experiences, and built networks that would guide and influence them well past their war years. Thus, Betty Bandel’s story is not only an intimate account of one woman’s military experience during World War II but part of the larger story of women’s history and progress.
"In her pre-WAC life, Bandel was a journalist, so her letters are every historian's ideal primary source, crafted with great awareness, detail, and wit. The collection of letters were selected and edited for length by Sylvia J. Bugbee, an archivist at the University of Vermont where Bandel was a professor of English after the war. Bugbee provides some contextual information when introducing each chapter but allows the WAC story to rest on Bandel's reflections of her daily activities and impressions of army life."—H-Net, Humanities & Social Sciences Online
The book traces Bandel's gradual maturation from a junior officer to a senior leader, says Bugbee, who believes the book's letter format offers a personal view that simple narrative lacks. While the letters are at times informal, they also are representative of women's contributions to the war effort. Bandel's recollection of joining the army, found on the book's first page, offers a revealing sense of the times"—The View, UVM's online staff newsletter
Click here for TABLE OF CONTENTS
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BETTY BANDEL was a professor of English at the University of Vermont from 1947 until her retirement in 1975. She has published numerous books on Vermont history, New England music, and Shakespeare.
SYLVIA J. BUGBEE is an assistant archivist, Special Collections, at the University of Vermont. She has a master’s degree in U.S. history.
LORRY M. FENNER is an active duty Air Force Colonel who has spent twenty-three years in intelligence, space operations, and academia. She has served at operational units, in command, and at the Pentagon on both the Joint Staff and Air Staff as well as on the staff's of National Commissions on Intelligence and on the 9/11 terrorist attacks. With a Ph.D. in history from the University of Michigan, she has taught at both the Air Force Academy and National War College. She recently co-authored, Women in Combat: Civic Duty or Military Liability? (2001) and serves on the Board of the Alliance for National Defense and on the editorial board of War in History.
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