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DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
805 KIDDER BREESE SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060

Online Library of Selected Images -- Picture Data

Photo #: NH 97533 (extended caption)

WAVES at "Mail Call"

"In the Navy there's no call like "Mail Call" regardless of whether you are a sailor at sea or a WAVE based at some shore station. WAVES gather around for this daily high spot. WAVES, incidently, do about 80 percent of the work involved in the administration and supervision of the Navy mail service for the entire fleet and the Navy's extra-continental activities."
Quoted from the original caption released with this photograph effective 21 July 1945, in connection with the WAVES third anniversary.

Official U.S. Navy Photograph, from the collections of the Naval Historical Center.

Online Image: 120KB; 740 x 615 pixels

 

Introductory caption released with the original print for Photo # NH 97533:

"Eighty Six Thousand WAVES celebrate Third Anniversary"

"Having surpassed the aims of its most optimistic proponents to date, the Navy's Women's Reserve, totaling approximately 86,000 WAVES on the eve of its third anniversary, July 30, 1945, looks forward to even greater achievements in the coming year. WAVES now compose 18 percent of the total Naval personnel assigned to shore establishments. They now fill 38 enlisted ratings and a wide variety of both line and officer assignments. As the war goes into its final phase, the need for more men at sea brings a corresponding need for more shore replacements by the Women's Reserve. This series of pictures shows a few of the ways this organization is replacing men released for duty on the fighting front."

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6 March 2001