Pittsburgh veterans reflect on role women have played in U.S. military
WWII, Iraq vets tell their stories
The story of cracking the Enigma code during World War II was classified until the 1970s. But Pittsburgh cryptologist Julia Parsons didn’t tell even her husband that she’d been a part of that crucial effort until the 1990s.
“We were told not to talk about it, so I didn’t,” she said, laughing this week in a phone interview.
Ms. Parsons, 97, told her story on Thursday at a John Heinz History Center panel discussion on women in the military marking Pearl Harbor Day, alongside three other women veterans: Rose Ganter (Red Cross, Vietnam), Rose McDermott (Air Force) and LaShaundra Hammonds (Marine Corps).
On Friday at noon, there will be a patriotic flag-folding ceremony in the Great Hall of the Heinz History Center in the Strip District to mark the 77th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Flag ceremonies are included with regular museum admission.
In interviews prior to the event, Ms. Parsons and Ms. Hammonds — a post-9/11 veteran — each reflected on her service and respective roles in the military.
“In 1942, the war had just started,” Ms. Parsons recalled. “Everybody was gone; there was nothing for the girls to do. And I wasn’t the only one who was very annoyed with that thought. This was a time of very genuine patriotism. Everyone wanted to do something.”
A native Pittsburgher, Ms. Parsons graduated from what was formerly known as Carnegie Tech and started working at the Army Ordnance Corps, though she said this “felt like an assembly-line job.” When she heard that the Navy was taking on women as officers, she volunteered immediately and was ordered to Washington, D.C., to report for duty.
She began top-secret work deciphering Enigma, the seemingly “unbreakable” German military code. Ms. Parsons’ section worked on decrypting code related to German U-boat traffic.
“I had no experience with this, but the girls at the office were already up and running and showed me the ropes,” Ms. Parsons said. “We were all treated very well. We were never ridiculed. The people that worked with us were mostly like we were; the men were mostly college math professors.”
Smithsonian Magazine estimates that at least 10,000 women served as codebreakers during the war.
Ms. Parsons left the service after the war and went back to college for a teaching certification before teaching English at North Allegheny High School. She married and had three children, and her family has grown to include eight grandchildren and six great-grandchildren who live all over the world.
“I didn’t realize until I joined the Navy that the rest of the world was not like Pittsburgh,” Ms. Parsons said. “At the time, I was just delighted to have a chance to get involved and do something for the country, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.”
Marine Corps
LaShaundra Hammonds is a post-9/11 Marine Corps veteran who served two tours in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. She enlisted straight out of high school after first encountering the Marine Corps at a jobs fair.
“You learn how to go from being a civilian to a Marine, the toughest military unit in the world, in three months,” Ms. Hammonds said. “The way you think changes, the way you carry yourself changes. Everything changes. They break you down and build you into a new person.”
Ms. Hammonds has lived in Penn Hills since 2012. She co-founded the Hammonds Initiative with her husband, a nonprofit that mentors atrisk youth ages 12-18. They focus on violence prevention and intervention and on developing youth leadership skills.
On the subject of women in the military, Ms. Hammonds said she believes it’s harder for women to fit in because the idea that women should not serve still persists.
“You have to be tougher as a woman, more authoritative,” she said. “This was something I ran into quite often, times when I had to prove myself because I was a woman.”
While the number of women in the military has risen continuously but erratically since the 1970s, as of 2016 women made up 16 percent of enlisted forces and 18 percent of the officer corps, according to a 2018 Council on Foreign Relations article.
Ms. Hammonds went on to say that this attitude is more prevalent at home than on deployment, when “it matters less that you’re a woman or an African-American. In that situation, we’re all just part of a team, and we need each other.
Every now and then, Ms. Hammonds steers a mentee toward the military. In 2018, she received The New Pittsburgh Courier Women of Excellence Award and is a graduate of The Art Institute of Pittsburgh, as she found a passion for cooking during her time in the military. She also works part time for the U.S. Post Office.