Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES)

In 1946, Joy Brigh Hancock was appointed Director of the Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES). Hancock began her Navy career as Yeoman (F) during WWI, when women were mass recruited as a result of shortages in clerical positions. In 1942 she was commissioned as a Lieutenant in WAVES and quickly rose in rank, by the end of the war she was established as the program's Director. Photograph courtesy of Captain Joy Bright Hancock, USN (Retired).