VFW Post 1033 and Auxiliary is proud to celebrate Women’s History Month, throughout March, recognizing and celebrating the countless contributions of our nation’s women service members, veterans and the many others who have aided in the defense of our country.
Women’s History Month began in 1981, when Congress passed a joint resolution Public Law 97-28, designating ‘Women’s History Week” beginning on March 7, 1982, to recognize and celebrate ‘American Women of every race, class and ethnic background’ whose roles and contributions had been ‘consistently overlooked and undervalued in the body of American History”.
In 1987, President Ronald Reagan signed the newly passed Public Law 100-9 designating the month of March as Women’s History Month. Since then, every American president, Democrat or Republican, has issued proclamations. The 2024 White House proclamation on Women’s History Month can be found at https://www.whitehouse.gov/ – go to the looking glass icon and type in Women’s History Month.
VFW Post 1033 and Auxiliary would like to honor one of the Highlands’ own – Louise M Perkins – Covington High School Class of 1949. After graduating from CHS in 1949, Louise returned to Chesapeake to be with her family. In 1951, she decided to go into the Air Force. After being accepted, she left home on July 5, 1951, and headed to Lakeland Air Force Base in Texas. They were called WAF or Women in the Military at that time. After eight weeks of training, she was sent to Arizona State College to take a two-year business course in six weeks. She graduated PVT 1st Class.
Louise was then sent to Selfridge Air Force Base as a secretary and quickly became the first female in the new Air Force to work on a flight line taking the pilot’s flight plans.
After three years in the service, Louise met a sergeant who worked on the flight line, married him and had a daughter. She left the service and moved to Florida, where her husband died shortly after. After her husband passed away, she joined the Coast Guard while working in the Federal Building in Norfolk. She remarried, had twin sons and traveled to different US States following her husband’s military career. Louise enjoyed the Air Force tremendously and would probably have stayed in service if things had turned out differently. Thank you for your service, Louise Perkins.
We would also like to honor the eight female Vietnam veterans whose names appear on the “The Wall that Heals,” which will be coming to our area October 3-6.
The following is a poem Louise wrote entitled I AM A VETERAN which covers generations of wars.
I AM A VETERAN
By Louise M. Perkins
I am a veteran
I’m proud to say
I served my country
The U.S. of A.
In the European theater
And the Pacific too
I fought for my country
And for me and you
On the isles of the Pacific
On the sand and shore
I fought for my country
Til I could fight no more
In land of Korea
In the heat and cold
I fought the enemy
So brash and bold
In the jungles of Nam
Fighting hand to hand
I fought the enemy
Til I left that land
I wasn’t in combat
or on foreign soil
But I did what I could
With my labor and toil
So I am a Veteran
I say with pride
I think of the wounded
And the many who died
I’ll always remember
The sacrifice they made
We live in freedom
Because of the price they paid.