Violet A. Kochendoerfer (1912–2001)

From the University Press of Kentucky: In 1943, Violet A. Kochendoerfer, an independent and adventurous young Minnesota woman, joined the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps, known as WAACs. Always alert to new opportunities, she soon left for a job with the American Red Cross and saw much of World War II in the European Theater of Operations as she served as director of service clubs attached to military units in Britain, France, and Germany.

In her memoirs, she tells of enduring buzz bombs in London as her 315th Troop Carrier Group took part in D-Day operations; of providing service clubs for the 82nd Airborne Division as it forced the last bridgehead of the war; of witnessing the final surrender of the main German Army and the liberation of a concentration camp; and of meeting and celebrating with the Russians after the Germans surrendered.

Her story, some of it told through letters she wrote home, provides a woman's unique perspective on historic events usually recounted only by men.

Violet A. Kochendoerfer became the first woman to graduate from the Starr King School for the Ministry in 1962 and served Unitarian Universalist churches throughout the USA and Canada before retiring to Minnesota.