For Veteran’s Day, I have a special post to honor Beverly Gertrude Schoenthal! Bev was the younger sister of Don’s mother, Arlene Elizabeth Schoenthal. Born in Dubuque in 1934, the third child of George and Edith (Gleason) Schoenthal, she was a graduate of Dubuque Senior High School (also my alma mater) in 1952 where she participated in basketball, was on the staff of the ECHO yearbook, and played percussion in the marching band.
In October, 1952, Bev entered the US Navy which, at that time, tagged women as a member of the WAVES. WAVES were the term for the US Naval Women’s Reserve created in 1942 during World War II as the military need for personnel expanded. WAVES worked in clerical, health care, storekeeper billets, managed the fleet’s post offices, and as codebreakers for the Navy’s Communication Division.
The Aeronautics Bureau was the most progressive branch and learned early that women were also a great addition to fields of engineering, gunnery, radar, aircraft navigation, and air traffic control. Women could be both in enlisted and officer positions in the WAVES. In 1948, Congress passed an act to give women a permanent place in the regular Navy and Reserves but the acronym continued to be used for the next 25 years.
In March 1953, Bev finished her course at the Airman Preparatory School at Naval Air Technical Training Center in Jacksonville, Florida in a class of 206 students which included mostly male sailors and marines. Bev was the first WAVE to win the “honor student” acclaim at the school. She was 18 years old and topped the class with a 90.18 point average for the eight week course.
The course was about aviation fundamentals including on-the-job training in ordnance, storekeeper, parachute rigging, structural mechanics, electronics, aerography, air controlman, and machinist mate. Achieving this honor as a woman, was almost unheard of! The headline of the local newspaper said it all: “Mere Girl Outdoes 205 Sailors, Marines at Jax.”
The article was shared across the United States, running in many newspapers. In Dubuque, it ran on the front page of the Dubuque Telegraph Herald on 15 March 1953. Bev went on for further training as an “Aviation Electronicsman.” After her service in the WAVES, Bev moved to California where she expanded her skills to include computer programming. In her retirement she lived in Oregon where she died in May of 2021.
If you would like more information or need detail about my sources, please contact me at renee@reneecue.com.