A Blog About Women Who Were Homefront Heroines: the WAVES of World War II
In this photo, Capen House is in the foreground and the Alumnae House is in the background. The two buildings are attached by a small breezeway located directly behind the mailbox. Alumae House was used as the WAVES headquarters during their officer training program at Smith College during World War II.
The photograph comes from the National Archives.
Another shot of Capen Hall, now the Alumnae House, used as quarters for WAVES officers in training at Smith College during World War II. It comes from the National Archives.
The WAVES took over a number of campus building for the training facility at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, which brought in its first full class of officers in October 1942.
Paunce Hall, seen in the photograph above, was the WAVES principle recitation hall. The photo comes from the National Archives.
Captain Herbert Underwood, who was the chief commanding officer of the Smith College training facility for WAVES Officers. He was a graduate of the Naval Academy who the Navy recalled from retirement during World War II specifically to help coordinate and train the new WAVES.
He took to his new duties with humor and creativity and by all accounts was highly respected by the women he supervised. After handling one unusual request (the marriage between two Navy officers) he noted: “Uncharted waters. Proceed with caution.”
In early October, 1944, the first full WAVES officer class began training at Smith College in Northampton, MA. The women would train for their duties alongside students enrolled in the college at the time, and many of the campus buildings and haunts were taken over by the Navy. The initial officer class began in August for a compressed training session; they would be the ones training this new class.
This is Capen House, which was the principle WAVES dormitory.
Susan Ahn Cuddy would go on to many Navy firsts. She became the first Korean American gunnery instructor in 1943. She was the first Korean American WAVE officer, selected to train at Smith College. After officer training she would go on to work in Naval Intelligence.
This image comes from the University of Northern Iowa Archives. It is from the base newspaper, The Iowave, telling of Ahn’s promotion to WAVE officer.
Part of learning military protocol for WAVES including marching in formation. At Smith College, the officers in training marched across the fields on the Smith campus, led by officers like Franny Prindle Taft.
You have to go down by the waterfall to get down to the fields. And hupping the troops over the waterfall. I lost my voice then and it’s never really come back … went down and octave and stayed there.
Taft also remembers marching in formation for dignitaries who would come to visit and learn about the WAVES, such as First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.
This photograph is courtesy of Franny Prindle Taft.
WAVES stayed in dorms on the Smith College campus when in officer training at Northampton, but they ate all of their meals at the Wiggins Tavern in the historic Hotel Northampton. Wiggins was an area landmark and popular with locals, but it became WAVES-central during the war.
Franny Prindle Taft says she was named as company commander when at Smith. That meant it was her job to get the troops the half mile from the campus down Main Street to Wiggins on King Street three times a day to eat – and then back again after the meals for training or to quarters.
I hupped the troops down the hill and then I had to be the last one in line to see that they all went through. And then I had to be the first one out. So I think what I got in the Navy was the ability to eat very fast.
This photograph is courtesy of Franny Prindle Taft.
The first class of WAVES officers were gathered on special recommendation from people who knew the women who would serve. This was done to make sure that the Navy had women in command who were, in essence, a “known” quantity: women who held certain values, were smart, driven, and would represent the Navy well.
Franny Prindle was one of those women. This is the letter she received from WAVES’ leader Mildred McAfee, inviting her to become a WAVE officer in August of 1942. Prindle was recommended by Vassar College Dean Mildred Thompson, a woman McAfee knew personally from her tenure as dean of Wellesley College.
Prindle returned the application and was a member of the first WAVE officer training class at Smith College. She remained at Smith for the duration of the war, training other officers.
Meet Franny Prindle Taft. She was a WAVE during World War II and spent her entire Navy career at Smith College in Northampton, training future officers. Taft was in the first full officer class at Smith College in the fall of 1942.
This photo was taken sometime in 1943 while she was on her honeymoon with her husband Seth Taft (the grandson of President William Howard Taft). They traveled up the Hudson River to Canada; both were officers in the Navy and had met while at college (she at Vassar, he at Yale).
I did work in cancer research at Yale right after I got out. That’s where I went immediately after graduation … I was making really almost no money, and I heard about the WAVES. I didn’t want to go into anything that was kind of just an auxiliary with people jumping around in uniforms and not really doing very much. And (the secretary to the Dean at Vassar College) assured me it was going to much more than that.
Frannie lives in the Cleveland area, where she teaches at the Cleveland Institute of Art.
This photograph is courtesy of Franny Prindle Taft.
Hinges of History 