By Joe Blackstock | Contributing Columnist
On the chaotic day after Pearl Harbor was attacked in 1941, a company of women in military uniforms reported for duty at the Redlands City Hall.
The members of the Redlands unit of the Women’s Ambulance and Defense Corps were called to serve on Dec. 8, helping officials get the city on a war footing. And they weren’t there to make coffee.
The WADC members were not members of the military but rather a civilian group of women trained in advance to deal with emergencies or for a war which would take away many men with skills needed to keep a city running as normal. Numerous companies were formed in Inland Empire cities from Barstow to Riverside and Beaumont to San Dimas during the months before and after the start of the war.
The passage of time has been unkind to the many hundreds of Inland Empire women who stood up to help during the war. Their work has been forgotten.
I first heard about them as part of an inventory team at the San Bernardino County Museum in Redlands after a box was opened containing a 6-foot-long multi-colored satin banner. On it were “Women’s Ambulance and Defense Corps. San Bernardino Unit,” a name that was a mystery to us.
Some research soon made it obvious here was a story of local women who kept the homefront safe and operating during the war. They were already in full operation in most local cities well before the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Members wore military-type uniforms and held various ranks. They not only received first aid and drilling instruction, but were trained in communications, radio sending and receiving, driving ambulances and heavy vehicles, mechanical repair, pistols and rifles, gas mask use, fire warden duties and map reading.
The war for the U.S. was still more than a year away in November 1940 when Lt. Col. John W. Colbert, a retired Army surgeon, concluded women should be available and trained to assist in the event of war or any emergency. He organized the first unit of the Women’s Ambulance and Defense Corps in Los Angeles.
Other companies were quickly organized, and five months before Pearl Harbor, there were 3,800 women in Southern California training for all types of duties, according to the Los Angeles Times, July 4, 1941.
Another group but with the same goals, the Women’s Ambulance Safety Patrol, began in Rockford, Illinois in 1940. Pomona was the only local city associated with that effort, forming July 22, 1940, with eight charter members. Their slogan: “Safety in Time of Peace – Service in Time of Disaster.”
With a sense of urgency about an uncertain future, a company of 80 to 90 women – ages 18 to 45 – was enlisted for the WADC during recruitment activities at the Mission Inn in Riverside, reported the Daily Press on June 11, 1941. There was no fee but women had to purchase their own uniforms.
By January 1942, volunteers had grown to 30,000 women in 50 WADC units throughout Southern California. They stood prepared for any emergency, especially in the early weeks of the war when a Japanese invasion of the West Coast seemed very real, reported the Sun newspaper, Jan. 6.
The women took their roles seriously. A surprise mobilization on Sunday, Jan. 4, 1942, was ordered for the Redlands company with 50 officers and troopers quickly assembling in full gear at 10 a.m.
“When called, the trooper must don her complete uniform immediately and racing toward the front door snatch up her first aid kit en route,” wrote the Sun on Jan 6. “The latter, rolled in a blanket and tied with 10 feet of rope, must be kept at all times where she can put her hands on it at a moment’s notice.”
The idea was for each woman to be trained to handle whatever problem confronted them. The Pomona unit went to stables at Los Serranos Country Club in today’s Chino Hills to learn how to handle a horse – a skill needed if motor vehicles weren’t available during an emergency, reported the Pomona Progress-Bulletin on July 15, 1941.
Colton members attended a motor mechanics course at a garage in their city’s downtown on April 30, 1942. In Pomona, a similar course was given by a local mechanic two weeks later focusing on what to do if a tire blows or the engine stops while driving an ambulance.
And the training was not easy. Fontana’s company was visited by an Army drill sergeant who led them in a full hour of military drill, the Sun reported April 1.
The Sun on July 5 showed a photograph of three members of the San Bernardino battalion marching and wearing gas masks, part of the preparation for a gas attack. The paper mentioned in its caption the women were “three young and decidedly attractive members” of the WADC, perhaps making them feel less threatening than they appeared in the photo.
In Arlington, the local unit undertook first aid training in “artificial respiration.” It was also seeking donations of old sheets and pillowcases for bandages and old blankets for stretchers, reported the Daily Press on July 18. That same day, the unit planned a dance to raise money for equipment for its first aid station in the community.
The WADC was asked to help in surveying homes in the Riverside area to recruit women willing to volunteer to relieve the “dangerously depleted ranks of agricultural workers,” the Daily Press reported Sept. 26, 1942. Needed were women willing to help harvest grapes, tomatoes and walnuts.
And they trained for every eventuality. The Arlington unit was given instruction in the maintenance and use of a rifle, though all they had to shoot was an air rifle, reported the Daily Press on Oct. 8.
As the threat of an attack on the West Coast diminished, the women’s units continued training but turned to other tasks. The San Bernardino unit on Jan. 22, 1943, announced it had sold $18,310 in war bonds and stamps for the war effort.
That unit also began recruiting one of the first junior units – 60 girls aged 14 to 18 to learn first aid, help in communication during emergencies and sell war bonds.
San Bernardino WADC was also one of two groups that made quilts from scraps of cloth for nursery schools, which cared for local kids while their mothers were working, the Sun reported Oct. 24, 1943.
Members would also go to the U.S. Naval Hospital in Norco to assist the wounded being treated there.
By the end of the second year of the war, training by the women’s units declined with so many of the members working at defense jobs and industrial plants.
On Jan. 9, 1944, the WADC units of San Bernardino and Riverside counties were reduced to reserve status. Weekly meetings were changed to a monthly basis, in part to save gasoline which was still in short supply for civilians.
Two months later, Pomona’s Women’s Ambulance Safety Patrol was disbanded, with members voting to donate the balance of the patrol’s funds to Casa Colina medical center.
In the nearly 80 years that have passed, the incalculable hours these women gave on behalf of their communities have been lost in history.
I suppose, in the traditional sense, the women trained by the WADC weren’t actually the “Rosie the Riveters” who performed heavy industrial jobs in factories later during the war. But it’s not a stretch to think they certainly may have been Rosie’s older sisters.
Car show
The 12th annual Cucamonga Classic Car Show originally scheduled for this Saturday will instead be held on July 15 at the Sycamore Inn, 8318 Foothill Blvd., Rancho Cucamonga, by the Route 66 Inland Empire California Association.
A scheduling problem required the change of date. The show, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., raises funds for the restoration of the garage at the group’s historic Cucamonga Service Station. Details: www.facebook.com/Route66IECA/
Joe Blackstock writes on Inland Empire history. He can be reached at joe.blackstock@gmail.com or Twitter @JoeBlackstock. Check out some of our columns of the past at Inland Empire Stories on Facebook at www.facebook.com/IEHistory.