Patricia Paré Camire, Women's Auxiliary Army Corps, Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, 1943
Item 98865 info
Franco-American Collection, University of Southern Maine Libraries
Patricia Paré Camire (left) with friends in the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps (WAAC), Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, 1943.
Patricia Paré, an Auburn native, married fellow Aurburnite Albert "Buck" Camire in 1942, shortly after Buck was drafted into the Army to serve in World War Two. When Buck was sent to the Philippines, Patricia enlisted in the WAAC. She finished her basic training at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, and then chose to serve at Fort Grenier Field, NH. She worked as an administrator in the legal office until Buck was discharged at the end of the War.
Patricia later described her experience in the service as enjoyable: "I would have liked to have stayed in...I liked the discipline...I'm still that way."
The Women's Auxiliary Army Corps was created in 1942 in order to free up men to serve on the front lines by recruiting women to take their place in support roles. At the time, the organization was controversial - men in the army resented being pushed into combat roles by the WAACs, while more generally, the idea of allowing women to travel and pursue an independent career was not widely accepted by their fathers, brothers and husbands. Nonetheless, the WAAC proved indispensable to the greater war effort, and General Douglass MacArthur called its members his "best soldiers."
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