(dramatic music) - [NARRATOR] Stories from the women of World War II have been hidden-- for decades.

- [SEYMOUR] Mother had kept everything I had sent home, all my memorabilia.

And I never looked at it after the war.

Then one day (chuckling) I opened my trunk for the first time, and all of a sudden these old memories popped up.

I was surprised.

I had buried them all.

- [NARRATOR] Burying the stories was common after World War II.

Fear of endangering the men fighting overseas conditioned women, in particular, to keep the stories untold.

- [WILSON] Loose lips sink the ships.

That sign was- that went everywhere during the war.

- [HINMON] I never knew that my mother was a riveter until I was a grown woman.

It was definitely something they didn't talk about, and I think it might have been because they were told not to mention what you did at this factory.

- [NARRATOR] But even though the stories were hidden -- the women of World War II made history.

- [KING] I don't know that we thought we were making history, but if you're doing anything to help to speed up victory, you're making history.

- [COOKE] People don't think about the reason why men are in combat is because there are all these unseen people who supply the munitions and, and all the things of warfare.

Women stepped up big time.

They're the ones who made the history.

They're the ones who made the sacrifices.

And that was my mother.

(uplifting music) - [NARRATOR] They built the ships that fought at Guadalcanal.

They riveted the wings on the planes that bombed Germany.

They saved the wounded at Anzio.

They broke codes-- and boundaries.

They were farmers, scientists and mechanics.

They operated lumber mills, delivered milk and drove buses and taxicabs-- jobs few people thought women were fit to pursue before the war.

And they did it all while they managed their families through rationing, blackouts, and uncertainty.

They paved the way for the generations that followed, and continue to influence and inspire us today.

- [KENNEY] I think my generation especially, they're, they're not taking no for an answer.

I think of that as a very similar energy to the Rosie the Riveters who, though many men looked at them in hiring offices and said, "Hey, you can't do this," they did it anyway.

- [YELLIN] And it's the old quote, "Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in heels."

And I really believe that applies to the Women of World War II.

(soft piano music) (insistent string and percussion music) - [NARRATOR] We've uncovered stories in the archives and the attics.

Stories that began to unfold on December 7th, 1941.

(traffic sounds) - [TAKAHASHI] It was a Sunday morning.

The sun was shining.

It was a beautiful day.

My husband Henri and I were in our car at a gas station.

(tense music) - [GAZOWSKY] We had gone to church, and we were showing our wedding proofs before church to the folks, you know.

- [TAKAHASHI] The station manager was working that Sunday shift.

And, and he was always such a friendly guy.

But that morning when we pulled into the pumps, he had his back to us, and he was glued to the telephone on the wall.

Then he turned around slowly and very gravely, approached us with a very, very serious look on his face, and he said, "Hi, guys.

Do you know Japan has bombed Pearl Harbor and we're at war?"

(explosion) (second explosion) - [GAZOWSKY] When we came out of church, we got the news that Pearl Harbor was bombed, and it was December 7th.

And, and, it's just like-- we didn't worry about the wedding pictures.

We didn't worry about anything.

- [ELEANOR ROOSEVELT] (on radio) ...is of paramount importance... - [TRACY ROOSEVELT] Eleanor Roosevelt got on the radio that evening and rallied the public, and rallied women and others to support the effort.

And I think that was really typical of her.

She believed that everyone was on the same team and should be working hard to fight tyranny.

- [NARRATOR] The bombing of Pearl Harbor set off a chain of events rippling through every family.

- [KRIER] The very small town I grew up in-- every one of our young men enlisted immediately.

(crowd murmuring) My father was such a happy, storytelling man.

And the day we put my brother on the train to go to war, I came home and I found my father crying.

I never forgot that.

That left such a mark on me.

(haunting music) - [TRAWIN] I think the threat of Hitler was so strong and the injustice of what he was doing.

Everyone felt we were in this together and that it was a just cause.

(soft city street sounds) - [NARRATOR] With their families drawn into war, many women felt a strong sense of duty.

- [ROTHERMEL] All the farmer boys came home to work on the farm so they would not be drafted.

And I thought this was terribly unpatriotic of them.

And I would show them.

So I applied to the Red Cross because I knew that the Red Cross allowed women to go overseas.

(echoing vibraphone) (whooshing sound effect) - [NARRATOR] When men from around the country joined the fight against the Axis powers, this upended normal life in America, as supplies were rationed for civilians to support the war effort.

- [STOOKEY] You had to buy margarine instead of butter.

You got a plastic bag, and there was a color thing in it, and you squeezed the plastic bag like this, and it turned the margarine, which was white, yellow to look like butter.

And that was one of my jobs which I loved, but I hated eating it.

- [MOORE] It was difficult trying to set up housekeeping, because things were rationed, like kitchen stoves.

(echoing foreboding music) We had to go to the, I think it was the War Housing Authority, um, to get a special stamp to buy a kitchen stove.

(soft piano music) - [BUCKLEY] I grew a Victory Garden with my brother in California, and we used to collect silver foil, cigare- cigarette papers that you'd make into huge balls.

I have no idea what the Army did with these things, but we'd make these huge basketballs of silver paper.

- [NARRATOR] In addition to rationing, women prepared for potential attacks on the home front.

- [SOSKIN] We were targets under fire.

So psychologically, when you would go out in the evening, in this dim-out, you'd be aware of the threat, always.

And then, on occasion, the alarms that would go off.

(air raid siren) The coast side of all the streetlights were painted a dark gray so that we wouldn't form silhouettes for submarines out to sea, to bomb the coast.

- [BUCKLEY] They would give us pictures in school, you know, they show you pictures- "this is a Japanese airplane, this is an American airplane."

The shadow of it, the outline-- and the fact that it had the circle instead of the star.

- [KUHN] Women entirely came into their own, shall we say.

And even if you did nothing but write letters of encouragement, or if you helped pack packages or something like that, you were doing something.

(children playing, birds chirping) (upbeat music) - [NARRATOR] Life during wartime challenged prevailing attitudes about the roles of women, especially in the military.

(music intensifying) The government established an emergency branch of the Army called the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, or WAACs, which would become the Women's Army Corps by 1943.

(upbeat music continuing) In the Navy, women who served were called WAVES.

There were women Marines (upbeat music continuing) women in the Coast Guard called SPARs, and Women Airforce Service Pilots, or WASPs.

- [YELLIN] While they were let into the military, they were not given full status.

In fact, the name of the WAVES has the word "Emergency" and "Volunteer" in it.

And that was the only way they could get it done, was if the admirals believed that this was only temporary.

- [BUCKLEY] There were a lot of people who did not believe women should be in uniform.

Women should not be taking away jobs from men.

Women should be at home.

Women should be taking care of their children and women should not be doing these jobs.

- [SEYMOUR] It's a good feeling to contribute to your country.

Most of us had patriotic feelings, and we knew that the war was a desperate thing.

And we had to achieve this peace.

And we did have a vision of peace around the world.

(music crescendoing and fading) (whoosh sound effect) - [NARRATOR] With the nation united against a common enemy, and ramping up its military and industrial output, women joined the workforce as never before.

(birds chirping) - [KRIER] My mother was a good example, a very pa-patriotic woman.

My uncle enlisted.

(footsteps crunching on snow) And he was a rural mail carrier.

Now, he took the mail out in the winter.

(howling wind) You know, those severe winters in the middle west.

Well, they gave that job to my mother.

When the men left, the women had to do the jobs.

I think my mother was probably one of the very first Rosies.

- [NARRATOR] Women who contributed as workers on the home front in any capacity-- not just those who held the rivet guns-- are now considered Rosies, after the iconic Rosie The Riveter.

These women broke barriers.

And yet, many never told their stories.

- [HINMON] When I was about 10 or 11, I was going through my mother's scrapbook.

So I opened it up to a page, and on that page was a certificate that said that she had gone to aircraft riveting school.

And I said, "Riveting?"

Now I had learned about Rosie the Riveters and I had seen the "We Can Do It!"

So I went to my mother and I said, "Mom, were you an aircraft riveter?

'cause you have this certificate in your book."

She said, "You know better than going through my things!"

And she never answered my question!

So, one thing about my mother, she does not like people going through her things.

(laughing) (contemplative piano music) (factory noise) - [KING] When I finished high school, I didn't have the money right away to go to college.

So, being 18 years old, and the shortage of manpower in Baltimore City, my girlfriend and I went through what we called "Defense Training School," and we were trained to be riveters.

(drilling sounds) I was given a job working as a riveter at Eastern Aircraft, putting together small parts of a plane.

(poignant piano music) (factory sounds) The farmers worked hard.

(piano music) (farm machinery sounds) The housewife worked hard.

(piano music) (kitchen sounds) Everybody worked hard.

(piano music) (factory sounds) I don't think it was important enough to talk about that much, (chuckling) to tell you the truth.

(drill whirring) - [COOKE] Most of them did not believe that they had done anything historically significant.

If you don't think you've done something significant, there's nothing to talk about.

These women took care of business during the war.

(metal drilling) - [YELLIN] When they say, "I didn't do much," I- I just never believe it.

And that's really what I've learned is that these women have never been given their due.

The positive attitude, the optimism, the belief that, "We can do it!"

It was their armor.

It's how they survived.

To wake up every morning as a single mother who has to go to work and leave your children and work in a place that was designed for men, by men and be the first to do that.

And then you didn't have time to shop necessarily for your family, but you were still responsible for the home-- but you also had to work, (factory sounds) and you had to do it when possibly and probably your husband and maybe some of your brothers and cousins and friends (explosions) were at war.

That was the kind of everyday experience of these women.

(factory sounds) (uptempo piano music) - [KRIER] We realized how bad these men needed all this, so we were, were very patriotic.

This wasn't my job or your job.

It was our job.

(sewing machine whirring) (uplifting piano music) - [MOORE] I heard on my car radio "Women, do something for your country.

(welding sparks) Go to the Richmond shipyard and be a welder."

And, uh, I walked in and the receptionist asked me, uh, could she help me?

And I said, "Yes."

(welding sparks) "I want to be a welder."

(laughing) And she said, "We have lots of jobs in the offices, lots of openings."

Uh, I said, "Oh, no, I want to be a welder.

That's what they want us to do.

So that's what I'm gonna do."

I had no idea what a welder did.

(echoing piano music) - [KRIER] There were mothers who lost a son and they didn't quit working because they lost their son.

They said, "I don't want another mother to lose a son because he doesn't have the equipment he needs."

- [MOORE] We wanted to get those ships out there where they could be doing what they were supposed to do.

- [NARRATOR] The push to fill factory and shipyard jobs around the country provided life-changing opportunities for all women, and in particular, for African American women.

- [COOKE] Most Black women, more than 80%, were employed as domestics and sharecroppers.

So during the war with increased and diverse economic and employment oppportunities, Black women fled to those jobs and those opportunities.

- [WILSON] A friend of mine worked down there.

She was always getting me into stuff.

So I went down to the Navy Yard.

She said, they need every able body to work who can work, (factory sounds) 'cause they need everybody who can help in any way to help win this war.

Well, that job helped my future.

Made me make much more money.

So they did me a favor when they made me come to the Navy Yard.

(shipyard sounds) - [KING] When I was given a job at defense, I was making more money than anybody else in my family.

So I saved the money and the war bonds so I could enter college.

- [NARRATOR] While the opportunities may have been new, some of the challenges were not, like what Betty Reid Soskin encountered in Richmond, California.

(street traffic sounds) - [SOSKIN] Because there were so few African Americans in the Bay Area, it was a period s- pre-segregation.

Not so much that segregation didn't exist, it's that there weren't simply enough of us to make any rules or laws against.

The city of Richmond went from, I think it was 24,000 to 108,000 in a matter of two years.

Suddenly the recruitment for the war effort imported segregation whole, Black and white, so that we brought together, in Richmond, California, a world of people who would not... share drinking fountains for another 20 years.

(somber piano music) - [COOKE] The iconic image of Rosie the Riveter is a white woman with a bandana.

I have yet to see a recruitment poster with a Black woman on it.

(somber music continuing) If you don't see yourself as part of the movement because there are no images of you... Black women were the last hired and the first fired.

- [SOSKIN] The war came to us, segregation came to us.

One of the important things that came out of that was that all of those things in the society which were going to accelerate and explode into the 60s as the civil rights struggle that swept the country, probably started here.

It would be terribly important, terribly important that we understand the, the heroism of the people of that time who couldn't change the social system right then, but that over time manage, managed to start that.

(uplifting music) - [NARRATOR] Those who follow in the Rosies' footsteps work to honor their place in history.

(uplifting music) - [COOKE] I'm proud to be the son of a World War II Rosie the Riveter.

I wish my mom could be here for this, but I feel like she's here.

She knows, because she started all of this by telling me her story.

(uplifting music resolving) - [HINMON] I want everyone to think of my mother as the backbone of, not only of our family, but the backbone of the nation.

She was one of the many that did so much to contribute, and it was never about her.

It was about pulling up everybody.

(music fading) (muted synthesizer music) (whooshing) - [KRIER] After the war, I started getting angry because the men came home to, uh, parades and flying flags and Rosie came home with the pink slip.

They totally ignored the women.

- [THOMAS] We had about ten women in the office during the height of World War II.

And right after the war (typing sounds) the myopic editors, publishers all over the country fired the women.

I must say it was a, a terrible blow, though, because they had really es- made it in their field.

(bright flute and string music) - [KRIER] As the years went on, I started getting more angry about it all the time.

And so at least 40 or 50 years ago, I started.

I'd write to anybody and everybody trying to get recognition and trying to make the w- the women realize that they were Rosies.

(bright uptempo flute music) So many of them didn't think that their job was important.

(bright flute music continuing) I said, "We couldn't have got that plane off the ground had it not been for the electrical system you made."

They just didn't realize that.

(factory machinery sounds) - [NARRATOR] Thanks to the tireless efforts of women like Mae Krier and others, the US government finally, and officially, honored the women who worked on the home front, the Rosie The Riveters.

- [COOKE] On April 10th, 2024, the Rosie The Riveters were given the Congressional Gold Medal for their wartime service.

- [KRIER] I do this-- symbolically accept the Gold Medal for all of you Rosies.

(cheering and applause) - [COOKE] One of the Rosies, Mrs Inez Saddler, when I told her she was a Rosie, she started crying and thanking me profusely, and she was saying, "I finally have something to leave to my family."

(uplifting music) - [HINMON] They voted to make Rosie for anyone who worked on the home front.

So at the time, previously, people only thought of a Rosie if you held a rivet gun.

But now Rosie could be somebody who worked at the USO, volunteered, rolled bandages.

When they did their work, they did it to win World War II.

(uplifting music) I was so happy when my mother got that Congressional Medal.

My mother ended up being a role model, and I knew that she had to go to work every day, so I did, too.

So I'm a veteran myself.

I joined the Army after I graduated from college, and I stayed in the Army for four years, and I worked hard to get my children through school, and it was like a ripple effect.

(inspiring music continuing) - [KRIER] I want to put the women and girls out there.

I want people to realize what women are capable of, and it's so important for me to do that, and that's my goal.

(cheering and applause) Our Rosies have left their footprints in the sand.

I think that's outstanding.

We're proud, we're so proud of the women and young girls who are following in our lead.

I think that's one of the greatest things we left behind is what we've done for women.

(applause) Up until 1941, they had no idea how capable American women were and we could do anything.

We proved that we could do anything.

(upbeat music building) Whatever they told us to do, we did it.

(upbeat music crescendoing) We did it well.

(music crescendoing and fading) (somber string music) - [NARRATOR] At the start of the war, women adapted to new roles, determined to defeat the Axis powers.

- [KRIER] Hitler had said that he wouldn't have any trouble defeating America because American women couldn't produce.

He said we were soft and spoiled.

Said we spent too much time on stockings, makeup, cosmetics.

We showed Hitler what American women were made of.

- [NARRATOR] Some women were inspired to go overseas to support the troops, as Emily Yellin's mother wrote in a letter to her family.

- [YELLIN] My mother worked at Reader's Digest, but after doing that for a couple of years, she really wanted to be more involved in the war, so she wrote her parents in Oklahoma a letter.

She said, "I just have to get out and try and do something active and direct, when so many other people are doing so much.

It's not enough for me to say that my husband is doing it, and that's my part in the war.

I want to do something myself."

She chose the Red Cross because it was a civilian organization and that she could go there as a civilian.

(soft orchestral music) (soft murmuring crowd) - [RICHARDSON] In the Second World War, everybody was very patriotic.

That's why my sister joined the Red Cross.

It wasn't just for an adventure or anything like that.

It was because she really, really felt it was an important thing to contribute to the cause.

- [ROTHERMEL] I had a brother who was in the war in Europe at the time, and I wrote to him and he said, "The Red Cross is great, do join."

And that's all I needed.

- [NARRATOR] The women who volunteered in the Red Cross to go overseas were close to the front lines.

Their daily support was critical for the troops.

- [ROTHERMEL] We served donuts and coffee every day, of course.

We put on programs-- we had dances.

(jazzy music) (crowd noise) We were busy from the time we arrived, which was about 9 o'clock in the morning, until we left about 8 o'clock at night.

(melodic piano music) (idling truck) We worked long hours.

- [NARRATOR] Jean was stationed in Guam, in the Pacific Theater of operations.

(piano music continuing) - [ROTHERMEL] There were thousands of men on Guam who knew that their next step was going to be to invade the Japanese homeland.

And they knew they might not make it through.

So we tried to make their life as pleasant as we could.

(music echoing) - [NARRATOR] The women who joined the fight, both abroad and at home, served with courage and determination, but their efforts were not always appreciated.

Women in the military, in particular, faced hostility from those who didn't believe they had earned the right to wear their uniforms.

- [HOWELL] We would go shopping in various clothing stores, a lot of the sales people would just not see us.

We were invisible.

They didn't like us.

Because we took the jobs of their sons.

We put their sons in the active service in the war.

To be shot at, in other words.

So, I was very upset about it.

We wanted to do a good job just the same as their sons.

We weren't in the service for any glory.

We just wanted to help like everybody else.

- [NARRATOR] And they did help - as the Army and Navy trained more than 10,000 women to work as code breakers.

- [HOWELL] We graduated from boot camp as (crowd cheering) "Specialists-Q."

We were put in a communications outfit in Washington, D.C.

I was in a cryptography unit, and it was classified, of course.

One night, one watch officer stopped the whole unit and h- said to us, "You, through your efforts, we sunk a ship."

(explosion) Because they were able to break the code.

So he was giving us a little credit.

It meant a lot.

(gentle piano music) (ocean waves) - [MENDEZ] A lot of women were involved in the code breaking that um, that finally led to the breaking of the Enigma machine.

(dramatic string music) The Enigma machine was the German military coded communication system.

(pizzicato dramatic violin) With a lot of women working both in Britain and here in the United States, they cracked that code.

'Course then they had a dilemma because they could read the communications, but they couldn't react to what they were reading or the Germans would have known that they had cracked the code.

- [NARRATOR] By cracking the Enigma code, historians estimate that about 14 million lives were saved, and the duration of the war reduced by an estimated 2 years.

American women also worked actively in war zones-- as spies.

(mysterious pizzicato violin) One of the most successful was Virginia Hall.

- [MENDEZ] If you were giving medals for sheer courage, Virginia Hall probably would have collected all the medals.

She went into France.

She was working against the German occupations.

The Gestapo, they knew about her.

But they couldn't find her.

Because Virginia Hall was not only so brave and so full of courage, but she was this master of disguise.

(lively violin music) She disguised herself as a French peasant.

Very unattractive.

Kerchiefs over her head, big billowy skirts.

(lively violin music) She was up and down these back roads in the Loire Valley.

She was counting Germans.

She was looking at troop movements.

(violin music continuing) And she was sending these messages back to the Allies, really helping enormously in the war effort.

(violin music crescendoing) (airplane squadron roaring) (distant bomb exploding) (melancholy piano music) - [NARRATOR] Some of the untold stories we uncovered exemplified the courage it took to survive.

Japanese Americans endured persecution as a result of Executive Order 9066 in one of the darkest chapters in American history.

This led to the forced removal and incarceration of more than 100,000 people, most natural-born U.S. citizens.

- [TAKAHASHI] Our roots were Japanese, our faces and our names were.

But then our birth, our education, psychologically and in our hearts, we were American.

So, it was a very, very confused and despairing kind of feeling.

- [NARRATOR] The US government rounded up people of Japanese descent.

- [FUNABIKI] We lived in Japantown.

Neighbors would come over just terrified, not knowing what was going to happen to us.

The first generation men getting rounded up by the FBI.

It's amazing how quickly they appeared as if, uh, on cue.

They knew something.

(dramatic music swelling) They came to our house when they took my father.

It was like 2 or 3 in the morning, you know.

I remember vividly one of the men came over to my bed and, uh, he pulled the cover off and he says, "Is this a boy or a girl?"

And I was just frozen.

(dramatic, mysterious echoing music) - [NARRATOR] With the implementation of the executive order, entire families were sent to so-called "Assembly Centers."

- [IIYAMA] It was really a removal center, remove us from those places, but they called it "Assembly Center."

They didn't tell us where we were going.

They didn't tell us, uh...uh, what we would find.

(crowd sounds) (anxious synthesizer music) - [TAKAHASHI] It was a gloomy, gray day.

And we were instructed-- assemble in the Golden Gate Park area, with all the people milling around.

(anxious music continuing) It was very quiet.

People weren't talking.

We were all sad, confused, humiliated.

(crowd sounds) (anxious music continuing) - [FUNABIKI] People having lived there all their lives, having to pack it in two suitcases.

I can't even describe because no one had gone through this before.

(anxious music continuing) - [IIYAMA] We had five days in which to take care of our affairs.

Five of us were together with my mother and we went to Santa Anita.

Santa Anita's a racetrack.

And we lived in a horse stall.

(music crescendoing and fading) - [TAKAHASHI] It had been very hurriedly, so-called "cleaned out," but there was, uh, traces of the horse having lived there, and, uh, it still smelled it.

- [IIYAMA] Two thirds of the people who were put in camp were American citizens.

And the older people, the Issei, the immigrant population, could not become citizens because there were laws against Asians becoming citizens at that time.

(soft piano music) - [NARRATOR] The families were forcibly removed from their homes and ordered into incarceration camps in Topaz, Tule Lake, Manzanar, Heart Mountain, and others.

- [IIYAMA] It was like a jail because there were barbed wire fences all around us.

And uniformed American soldiers with their guns pointed in towards the camp.

(heartbreaking music) - [FUNABIKI] In Heart Mountain, the dust was just indescribable.

The floor planks had space in them and the dust would blow through the floor.

And so you breathed dust.

You ate dust.

Oh, I used to find dust in my underwear.

(heartbreaking music continuing) - [IIYAMA] There were no charges against us.

There was no opportunity for us to make a defense.

Our habeas corpus rights were totally taken away.

We were just ordered by the government to go.

And because we didn't know what else we could do, we went.

- [TAKAHASHI] Babies six weeks old and they were evacuated, too, you know.

I don't know what harm a newly-born infant could be, but it was considered a potential... enemy.

(heartbreaking music continuing) - [NARRATOR] Incarceration transformed the role of the Japanese American women within the community.

- [IIYAMA] Everybody worked.

My mother worked in the kitchen.

A lot of the women worked in the kitchen, and they worked part time.

And so my mother went to school, which she had never been able to do.

- [FUNABIKI] The first generation men, like my father, they were taken away.

So the women became heads of the family.

I look back and I really see the strength in some of those women.

Oh, that took courage.

(music fading) - [NARRATOR] Everyone drew strength and inspiration from the women who stepped up and took charge.

They were role models.

And, according to a Fortune magazine poll during the war, the most popular women in America were Eleanor Roosevelt and Betty Crocker.

- [YELLIN] And Betty Crocker wasn't a real person.

(laughing) I always think that's interesting, that some of the role models for women during World War II were not real people.

They were created as images.

(serene piano music) They used the Betty Crocker character to say, you know, "You can make food that's tasty and delicious, (chuckling) even with rationing."

- [NARRATOR] Eleanor Roosevelt, on the other hand, was very real.

- [THOMAS] She was fantastic.

She actually went to the battlefields.

She had many enemies, in the sense that thought that, that was not the place for a First Lady.

No other First Lady has ever really been that transported.

(piano music continuing) - [TRACY ROOSEVELT] Eleanor broke a lot of barriers for women in so many different ways.

She was the first First Lady to serve in a official position as Deputy Director of the Civilian Defense Corps.

She wrote a daily column, "My Day," where she shared her views and shared her opinions.

She thought a woman's place was everywhere.

I don't think she saw barriers because of gender or really because of race, either.

- [COOKE] It was not a secret that Eleanor Roosevelt was friends and, and had a soft side for African American people.

She was very good friends with Mary McLeod Bethune, who at the time was probably the most powerful Black person in the country.

- [TRACY ROOSEVELT] I think that Eleanor's main idea during the war was that the American cause was paramount.

And I think she found that to be the case for everyone and that everyone should participate.

- [KRIER] She cared for everybody.

She still is my most admired woman, and she always has been my most admired.

(music continuing) - [NARRATOR] Her power, strength and leadership has inspired women ever since.

And that became her legacy.

- [TRACY ROOSEVELT] She influenced me to want to go into public service.

And I think for so many of my cousins, whether they are artists or lawyers or writers or scientists, they all take on a perspective in their work that cares about other people, and that puts the public and humanity first.

And I think that is because of her inspiration.

(music continuing) - [YELLIN] Another way that women participated in the war effort that I don't think we recognize-- (applause) the USO sent entertainers overseas.

(applause) - [NARRATOR] One entertainer, a trailblazing role model, was Lena Horne.

- [FUNABIKI] Talk about Lena Horne-- she was fantastic.

Gorgeous and, uh, such an inspiration for young people.

Because I could see she was... giving messages to them through her song.

- [HORNE] We send our hellos and our songs and our laughter... yes, and our hearts, clear around the world to you.

- [BUCKLEY] My mother is Lena Horne, and she was... uh, World War II actually made her career as she would be the first to say.

Because, for two reasons.

Um, the NAACP was looking for someone to, in a way, break the back of Hollywood racism.

And they picked my mother to be the new Hollywood symbol... and that was also to prove that American racism was different from the Axis racism.

- [NARRATOR] Lena Horne wasn't content to remain a symbol in the face of the American racism she witnessed in the USO.

- [BUCKLEY] She had gone to Arkansas to sing in an army camp for Black soldiers, and they told her, "Well, you'll do the Black soldiers tomorrow.

Tonight we're going to do the white soldiers first."

The next morning she went to perform for the Black troops-- and it wasn't even in the regular place where she normally would perform-- and she saw all of these white troops yet again, sitting in front.

She said, "Why are the white soldiers here?

I sang for them last night."

"Oh, those aren't white soldiers," she was told, "These are German prisoners of war and the Blacks are sitting behind them."

For some reason, the USO didn't regard it as an indignity that Black troops were forced to sit behind German prisoners of war.

But my mother did, and I think any Black American who heard the story was outraged.

Well, she absolutely said to herself, as she said to me, "Screw this, I am leaving."

And she was subsequently kicked out of the USO for refusing to sing for these German prisoners of war who were seated in front of the Black GIs.

Even though she was kicked out of the USO.

She went on and performed for Black troops at her own expense, at camps all over.

(orchestral music swelling) - [NARRATOR] Women of World War II, like Lena Horne and Eleanor Roosevelt, continue to inspire us.

But famous women weren't the only ones who influenced the generations that came after.

Mary Fierros was a worker on the home front, a Rosie, during World War II.

Her grandniece, Anjelah Johnson-Reyes, remembers her fondly.

- [JOHNSON-REYES] Oh, Tia Mary was a firecracker, full-on spicy Latina.

(uplifting orchestral music) Tia Mary was the kind of woman who had a story for everything, she loved to tell stories.

- [NARRATOR] During the war, Mary was a riveter.

- [JOHNSON-REYES] I know she was scared to use the riveter gun in the beginning and she would talk about how it was scary for her.

She didn't wanna do it, but then after a while, you know, it just became something that she was a natural at cause she's so strong.

I know she took great pride in being a Rosie and everything that she was tasked to do.

(factory machine noise) - [NARRATOR] Mary's work during the war changed her life.

- [JOHNSON-REYES] After she was a Rosie, she went on to work at Levi Strauss and she worked in the factory and she was making denim.

And then she ended up working her way up to a manager's position within the company.

And she did all that on a third grade education.

She was fighting for rights.

She was making sure that everybody in the factory knew their rights within the union.

She's always been that kind of woman who stirs people up and encourages others and is strong.

- [NARRATOR] Anjelah Johnson-Reyes is a performer and comedian-- and her Tia Mary's work and life live on in the stories Anjelah shares.

- [JOHNSON-REYES] I talk about my Tia Mary in my standup comedy.

She loved that, when she would come to my shows, and whether I was doing the joke about her in the show or not, (applause) I would always mention her at the end of my show.

And I would say, "And, you guys, I have a very special guest here tonight.

My Tia Mary is here," and everybody would start cheering and she would stand up and she would wave at everyone, like this was her moment.

(serene piano music) At the time, they weren't celebrities.

They weren't the movie star.

(factory riveting noise) And I'm sure there was probably people even opposed to what they were doing.

Now we get to give them their flowers.

We get to honor them.

(welding sparks) The women weren't just nameless silhouette standing in for a man while he went and did the important thing.

This was their time to do something that wasn't just what was expected of them during that time.

(uplifting piano music) But they got to step out and step up, and they did.

(music continuing) - [NARRATOR] As long as we continue to share their stories, Mary Fierros, Lena Horne, Eleanor Roosevelt and all of the women of World War II live on.

(music fading) (bright orchestral music) - [NARRATOR] Women were America's secret weapon in the fight against the Axis powers.

They provided the Allies with critical materials, infrastructure and personnel.

They were also instrumental in solving one of the military's most pressing morale problems-- undelivered mail.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] As a service member myself, mail could brighten up a real bad day.

So just imagine-- 1940s...

There's no social media, okay?

The only way that you communicated with your family was by letters.

And so... Army officials came up with this idea, "Well, we got to get the mail to the troops because mail is a morale booster."

And so the unit, the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion was formed.

(upbeat music) It was a multi-ethnic, predominantly African American female unit.

- [BUCKLEY] The Six Triple Eight who were based in England, were in charge of all V-Mail for Europe and V-mail was mail.

And mail was the most important thing for all GIs.

Charity Adams, who was the highest-ranking Black woman officer, had the great job of all time.

She was the commander of the Six Triple Eight.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] Charity Adams says you don't think that what you're doing is history while you're doing it.

You're just doing the mission.

And so that's what they thought.

"Well, I'm just doing the mission."

(mysterious string music) - [NARRATOR] This mindset kept the story of the Six Triple Eight untold for years.

(marching sounds) Many never even shared it with their daughters.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] Some of them knew that their mother had been in the service but didn't know what, what they did.

- [MARTIN] My mom wanted very much to be a secretary.

Unfortunately, at that time, Blacks were not allowed to work in offices, even up north.

She had read in a magazine where Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune and First Lady Roosevelt, they were looking for Black women to join the military.

So she said, "Why not?"

- [HELM-FRAZIER] They literally went out and handpicked these women to come into this unit, because these women were considered some of the best of the best.

(poignant string music) - [MARTIN] These ladies had to take tests, they had to be interviewed to see if they would even qualify to go overseas.

And my mom was lucky enough to be one of the ladies.

They didn't know what the job was.

They just knew they wanted to go overseas and do their part.

(music fading) (upbeat flute begins) - [NARRATOR] The Six Triple Eight had arrived in Birmingham, England, with an unenviable task: untangle a more than 2-year backlog of undelivered mail for troops serving in the European Theater of operations.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] The mail was coming in and being put into a aircraft hangar, stuffed floor to the ceiling.

(bright flute and string music) Major Adams devised a plan to say, "Okay, if we are going to redirect, reduce, re-sort this mail I need this unit to literally work around the clock."

- [BUCKLEY] They were totally scrutinized.

Everything they did was scrutinized.

You faced racism and you faced sexism.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] Most people did not think that women should be in the military, (inspiring music) let alone Black women, okay?

Charity kind of knew that.

She, and in turn, also expected so much more from them.

It was kind of like, "The Army standard," then it was "Major Charity Adams standard."

(music crescendoing) - [NARRATOR] Sorting the mail presented unique challenges.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] People could barely write, let alone spell their name.

Some of the addresses they could barely make out.

(driving string music) Army leaders gave them six months.

Each shift processed approximately 65,000 pieces of mail.

- [MARTIN] It was set up as something that was not supposed to take place and they were to fail.

And they didn't.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] I wish I was a fly on the wall when they realized that these women had reduced this over two-year backlog of mail there in Birmingham in three months.

(string music intensifying) - [MARTIN] The younger people don't realize.

They ask a question and two seconds later, they have an answer.

Here it is people who are off fighting a war and they ask a question, they've got to wait two years to get an answer.

Some of them didn't even know that their children were born.

So she took it to heart and even till the day she died, mail was very important to Mom.

She frequented that post office in Buffalo, it was the Central Park Post Office.

And I mean, she could not NOT go to that post office.

That was a weekly trip.

- [NARRATOR] And in a fitting tribute, in 2022, the Buffalo, New York Central Park Post Office was renamed for Indiana Hunt-Martin.

(cheering and applause) (somber piano music) - [NARRATOR] But not all of the 6888 made it back home.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] Major Adams announced they had lost three.

These were young women serving, and the Army would not send their bodies back to the United States.

They took up a collection and they had a service for these three women who were not going back to their families.

- [NARRATOR] They were buried in the American Cemetery at Normandy.

- [HELM-FRAZIER] Over 9000 buried here, and there are only four women.

Three were 6888 members.

One was a Red Cross worker.

- [NARRATOR] That Red Cross worker was Elizabeth Richardson.

Her brother remembers her well.

- [RICHARDSON] My sister was in the Red Cross and served overseas in England and France.

She had a great sense of humor.

And also, she was a very good artist.

She would've liked to have been able to make a living being an artist.

She was really one of the first, in my belief, to really want to get out and get a job and be part of the world.

We all were proud of her.

She was doing what she thought was right.

(dramatic orchestral music) I never felt that even entered her mind that it was heroic.

But it was, in many ways.

It was...

It was... a rem- remarkable contribution that they made.

(poignant piano music fading out) - [NARRATOR] Like Elizabeth Richardson, many women made remarkable contributions on the front lines, and also made the ultimate sacrifice.

More than 200 women who served as military nurses died during the war.

- [YELLIN] I don't think that we recognize what the nurses had to do during World War II.

We think of them as sort of, you know, these lovely women who were safely behind, uh, the front lines taking care of these injured men.

But they did so much more, and they saw horrific things and they had to really put up with the kinds of conditions that the soldiers did.

A nurse in a war is a pretty treacherous job.

- [LEBEAU] A buzz bomb hit our hospital.

(muted explosion) And they killed 25 of our men.

But I had worked night duty on the shock ward that night... and I was getting off.

(dramatic music) (distant battle sounds) And the nurse was coming.

She was crying.

She said, "Don't go there."

She said, "It's awful.

There're limbs all over."

She said, "They'll need you tonight.

Go back, get some sleep, they'll need you tonight."

(dramatic music continuing) - [NARRATOR] The nurses stationed in the Philippines in 1941 were thrust onto the front lines of the war on the same day (explosion) Pearl Harbor was attacked.

As the Japanese army assaulted Manila, the American and Filipina nurses were among those evacuated to an area called Bataan.

- [NORMAN] What happened on Bataan was, we didn't have enough food, they didn't have enough medicines, the troops were not prepared for this kind of combat, and the Japanese controlled the air, the land and the sea.

- [NARRATOR] Over the four months in Bataan, the nurses cared for thousands of patients in hiding, often while under artillery fire.

When Bataan fell, Lieutenant Josephine Nesbit was faced with a dilemma.

- [NORMAN] The order came in, "Get your American nurses out of there."

And she said, "Okay, what about my Filipino nurses?"

Remember, they'd come to Bataan and they helped out.

Josie Nesbit said to the Colonel, "We're not going.

You don't let my Filipino nurses go, none of us are going."

And he was so shocked at this career Army nurse saying to him, "No," that he changed the order and all the Filipino nurses got to go, too.

There is no doubt that saved many lives.

- [NARRATOR] The nurses retreated to Corregidor, but eventually were captured by the Japanese and put in an internment camp for almost 3 years.

- [NORMAN] This is the only prisoner of war group in World War II that all survived.

And again, these weren't 25-year-olds.

There were a lot of 40-- the chief nurses were 60.

I think the message for the nurses who served in World War II, was said by one of the POWs, and it's how I end my book, and... they- she said, "You know, we cared for people.

We did our work.

We did it with honor, and we never looked back."

(melodic vibraphone music) (melodic vibraphone music) (whooshing sound) - [NARRATOR] Other extraordinary women took to the skies to put their lives on the line.

Some called them "fly girls."

- [WOOD] It was fun being a fly girl.

A very important job.

And just like the pilots, they swagger.

We were swaggering, too.

- [NARRATOR] They were the WASPs-- Women Airforce Service Pilots.

- [YELLIN] The WASPs was so revolutionary, the idea of women being pilots.

The women went through the same training as the males who became pilots during World War II, because they had to fly the same planes.

(piano and vibraphone music) - [TRACY ROOSEVELT] Eleanor Roosevelt received a letter from Jacqueline Cochran in 1939.

And Miss Cochran was a famous aviator, and she asked for Eleanor's support in forming the WASPs.

She kept advocating to FDR and to his military advisors.

And, by 1942 and 1943, they were actually engaged.

(dramatic piano music) - [SEYMOUR] Jackie Cochran wanted to be sure that not one or two women, but a group of women-- we were able to check out in every plane.

I think she wanted to have a position for women in aviation.

(bright piano music) This war was long and it was costly.

And it took the-- all of America to achieve success.

(piano music continuing) (airplane flying in distance) - [WILLIAMS] She was suggesting that women could do courier service and be effective within the United States.

(piano music continuing) - [VEAL] They were gutsy and fun and serious and patriotic and, by gosh, they were going to help the war effort.

- [JUDD] To get the WASP training program started, Jackie had to make some very... unhappy concessions.

One of the concessions was with Congress, that the WASP was an experiment.

So naturally, as an experimental temporary employee, we were not military, although we took military orders.

We didn't have insurance, or any medical coverage.

It wasn't fair, but not one of us said one word against it, or Jackie for accepting it.

Because had she not accepted those conditions, there would have been no training base for women.

(music crescendoing) (airplane engine starting) - [VEAL] We got our flying time in.

Almost seven months of intensive flying and intensive ground school because we were guinea pigs.

They thought women were not prepared to fly.

They weren't strong enough.

They couldn't do it.

And they were terribly strict.

I mean they'd wash you out for any little slip-up.

You didn't get a second chance.

(driving piano music) You had a heck of a lot to learn, including Morse code and flying on instruments and getting our instrument rating.

- [NARRATOR] WASPs played a critical role in the wartime effort.

They ferried planes from factories to air bases, tested new aircraft, and towed targets for live ammunition practice.

- [YELLIN] The idea was to teach these men how to shoot at this moving object.

And so who's going to fly those planes?

"Oh, let's get the women.

They're expendable."

(laughing) And I spoke to one of these women who said, "Yeah, and believe me, we let that target go out as far as it possibly could."

(airplane engine roaring) - [NARRATOR] Even routine testing of the planes could be treacherous for the WASPs.

- [VEAL] All of a sudden the engine caught on fire and the flames are shooting right back over the cockpit.

There's no chance of making a second run.

I had to just make it.

And I did.

(chuckles) (soft piano music) (planes landing) - [YELLIN] The women who served in the WASPs were not given military status.

They were considered civilians.

The women in the WAVES and the WACs and the rest did.

- [VEAL] The war was winding down and the men wanted their jobs back.

They wouldn't recognize us as veterans.

- [YELLIN] The thing that strikes a lot of people as the most unjust, women who died as WASPs, and there were about 32 women who had crashes, (airplane taking off) because they were flying these planes that had never been tested.

(airplane engine roaring) And those women, if they died doing that, were not given military funerals, and the other WASPs would take up a collection to send their bodies home.

(poignant piano music) - [NARRATOR] In 2007, many of the WASPs gathered in California to pay tribute to Jackie Cochran at her gravesite.

And even though their flying days may have been behind them, they had not lost their love of flight.

- [JUDD] I need my parachute!

- [NARRATOR] And in 2009, these pioneering women were finally recognized with the highest possible award that could be bestowed upon them-- the Congressional Gold Medal.

(piano music fading) (intense synthesizer music) - [NARRATOR] Decades later, the women of World War II are finally beginning to receive recognition for their part in winning the war.

A new generation of young women is carrying on their legacy of hope and determination-- using the lessons they've learned from the women of World War II to make sure the stories of their heroes will never be forgotten.

- [KENNEY] I was in fifth grade.

It was a school project that my teacher assigned me.

She had me build a model monument to someone or something, not yet recognized, in Washington, D.C. And I had just watched the movie "A League of Their Own."

It's about the women baseball players.

And I found myself enamored by them.

I was really interested to know what else these women were doing during the war for the first time that was unprecedented.

And I learned about the over 18 million civilian women who stepped into new jobs and decided that my monument should go to them.

And when I showed it to my teacher, she said, "You know, you should really try to get this built."

(music crescendoing) And I take things very literally, so I was like, "Okay."

(bright vibraphone music) (birds chirping) This wasn't something I learned about in school.

(vibraphone music continuing) I learned about Normandy, but I didn't really learn about how that was all possible and how it really was supported by the women.

And I didn't also realize that all of the opportunities I have now as a woman in the workforce wouldn't have been available to me had I been born, you know, in the 1920s.

(piano and vibraphone music continuing) - [NARRATOR] Raya Kenney turned to her congresswoman, Eleanor Holmes Horton, to help make the National Memorial to the Women Who Worked on the Home Front a reality.

After years of lobbying, Raya's efforts paid off.

In 2022, Congress authorized the establishment of the memorial, and planning began for its construction.

- [KENNEY] I think what really kept me going through this whole thing were the women themselves.

I've had the opportunity to meet with so many of them.

I want them to know how much it has changed my generation and how much my generation looks up to them and how what they did has literally shaped the way the world works now.

And if you go and look at our mall, it's supposed to be a representation of our history and the things that we've been through as a country.

And to not see women in that picture suggests that women haven't been a part of history-- that we haven't done anything-- which is not the case.

(music swelling) There's something visceral about it for me, 'cause I know I would not be sitting here in this room had it not been for the Rosies.

(music crescendoing and fading) (energetic orchestral music) (swoosh sound effect) - [THOMAS] We were not exactly welcomed by the men, (chuckling) but they had to finally accept us.

And when the scales fell from their eyes, they finally realized that some women were even better than they.

(laughing) (energetic music continuing) - [COOKE] There were 600,000 African American women who went to work during the war.

It is important that all Americans know that... they found agency, they were patriotic, they began the process of changing their lives.

(music crescendoing and fading) - [KENNEY] There's power in memory.

There's power in stories.

We are who we are because of the people who came before us.

They opened doors for us that we probably didn't even know were there.

And so to know that, going forward, is, um, integral to how we understand each other as people.

- [YELLIN] I think that if my mother were here, she would look at the time that she spent and the women of her generation, and she would want what they gave to be acknowledged, much more so than it ever was in her life.

When I looked at the whole of my mother's life, the seeds of who she became later are all there.

I saw this time as an inadvertent revolution.

I don't think any of the women of that generation set out to change the role of women in American society, but they did it anyway.

- [NARRATOR] They saved the world, opening it to possibilities.

They carved a new path for themselves-- and for all of us who follow in their footsteps.

And together we can continue to tell the "untold stories" of the Women of World War II.

(music fading) (energetic orchestral music) (energetic orchestral music) (energetic orchestral music) (energetic orchestral music)