Remembering on Memorial Day

Flanders Field

 

Memorial Day started after the American Civil War. It was created to remember and mourn the U.S. military personnel who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces. There have been many wars since that "Civil" War, or as I say when performing as local woman, Liberetta Lerich Green,

although that program mainly is about the Lerich family Underground Railroad Station.

Yet another  historical person I portray is Michigan "Hello Girl", Oleda Joure Christides. These bilingual switchboard operators were sworn into the army for World War I, but it took them 60 years to finally receive Veteran Status, including honorable discharges. In December 2024 the group finally was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.

While the Army in World War I bragged about its vaccination program, Hello Girl, Cora H. Bartlett, died of Typhoid and was initially buried in Tours, France, where she died. The people there gave her a funeral cortege with a floral blanket over her casket, which was rolled to their cemetery in June of 1919. Her casket was later removed in 1922 and sent to be re-buried at her family plot in the Hillsdale, Michigan cemetery of King Lake Cemetery. 

The Hillsdale County Historical Society has a page memorializing Cora. 

It also has a general page about the Hello Girls as well as about her fellow Hillsdale operator who was yet another Hello Girl, Norma Finch Carman. She survived the war and later married a Captain, Joel Carman, after they both saw action coming home from "Over There." That was the song Enrico Caruso sang to support all from the United States who accepted service in Europe.  

World War I was supposedly the "War to End All Wars." Of course it wasn't, but on this Memorial Day we should remember both those who died in their service or survived.

Love, the "War to End All Wars", and a century later

Painting of Oleda in Chaumont by her daughter, Michelle Christides

A week from today I will once again present the story of Oleda Joure Christides, a World War I "Hello Girl."  It will be at 11 a.m. at the Carnegie Branch of the Jackson District Library.  The last time I was able to do this program was in November of 2019 before the pandemic.  In preparing, I was feeling far removed from the story of this woman, a story developed from various sources including her two daughters.  One of the daughters, Helen, has since died and I miss her so much.  I had hoped to contact some of the family last November when Oleda was inducted into the Michigan Military and Veterans Hall of Honor.  Unfortunately I was too sick that week to attend.  Oleda's other daughter, Michelle, was also unable to attend, but sent a prerecorded video.  Michelle has done much to share the story of her mother and these brave women who went "Over There" and then spent 60 years fighting for their promised veteran's status.  The Doughboy Foundation long ago published her article, "The History of a Hello Girl."

That same Doughboy Foundation publishes a newsletter, which this month includes a Valentine's Day story about another aspect of the experience of these Signal Corps bilingual telephone operators. . . finding love.  It's a reprint of the California American Legion's story, "A Love. A War. A Citizen" and that, too, was something Oleda observed among many of her fellow Hello Girls.  I recommend  "A Love. A War. A Citizen" highly and found it helpful in getting me back into the world of Oleda and her colleagues.  There were 6 Hello Girls from Michigan, including Norma Finch Carman, who was from Hillsdale County, but worked in Detroit for the Michigan State Telephone Company.  She returned to her job, but in less than a year married Ellis Joel Carman at the Episcopal rectory in Hillsdale.  Joel had been a captain in the American Expeditionary Force in France.  In my program I mention another, Melina Adam, who was repeatedly reassigned because she fell in love with Signal Corps soldier, Jack Converse.  They didn't wait to come home and were married in Paris shortly after the Armistice.  The California American Legion story does an excellent job of showing the world of the AEF and these brave women.

I don't portray famous people of the past, preferring to present "History as seen by the 'average' person."  As the Michigan Military and Veterans Hall of Honor shows, that can include important history too easily overlooked.  (The history of the Hello Girls was pushed aside for 60 years, but I'm pleased to play my part in keeping it alive.)

Hello Girls - WWI/ Women's History, part 3

So much appears in Bell Telephone News volume 9 that it needs more than one article.  It opens with this cover showing both the "Hello Girls" and a male soldier for the August 1919 number

That's issue Number 1.  By the appearance of this issue Victory did indeed crown the American Expeditionary Forces and the Bell Telephone News was filled with news of returns from "Over There."

While the A.E.F. officially was established July 5, 1917, and last week's "Storytelling + Research" showed the first 33 of the "Hello Girls" arriving in Paris in March of 1918, the Timeline of World War I shows how quickly their entry made a difference.  While their motto of "War to end all wars" wasn't fulfilled, World War I was certainly stalemated until the A.E.F. arrived.  General Pershing kept them separate and refused to let the U.S. simply fill gaps in the allied armies.  As a result the cry of "La guerre est finie!" ("The war is over!") erupted on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. 

Oleda Joure Christides, whom I portray in telling about the "Hello Girls", was in the final unit sent to France.  She was barely 20 years old and so she was among the few, 50, still alive when in 1977 Congress recognized their service as true members of the U.S. Army.  There were even fewer by the time the army sent the official recognition of an honorable discharge and long overdue Victory Medal.  Those who died before receiving it were not given even that. 

Here's what appeared in the next issue of Bell Telephone News about Oleda and her friend and supervisor, Louise Gordon.

Bell Telephone News, Volume 9, Number 2, November 1919

Maj. Gen. Squier

They were close enough that when a fellow operator had to accompany Oleda on leave visiting her brother, Wallace, Louise was chosen.  It also mentions returning with another Michigander and head of the Signal Corps, Major General George Owen Squier.  His engineering and inventions included multiplexing, which he invented in 1910 and gave American communications an advantage over the Germans lacking it.


One "Hello Girl" who did not return, Cora Bartlett, was the subject of an earlier article here on July 11, 2015.   I strongly recommend clicking that hotlink.  Because the photos there were removed (I believe by the Hillsdale Historical Society, to whom I gave information about her) this photo combines two segments of "In the Camera's Eye" that formed the center of each issue.  Cora's portrait spanned both pages and doesn't align completely.

Portrait in Bell Telephone News, Volume 9, Number 3; Funeral Volume 9, Number 5

Hillsdale County area provided three operators, Ms. Gordon from Litchfield, who worked in Detroit, Cora Bartlett, and Norma Finch, who fell in love with and soon married Captain Ellis Joel Carman shortly after her return. 

Bell Telephone News, Volume 9, Number 7, page 6 - February 1920

Later in that same issue on page 11 it's interesting to read of the need for new employees.

Bell Telephone News, Vol. 9, No. 7, p. 11 (February 1920)

Prowling old issues of Bell Telephone News isn't always easy.  Information sometimes appears in small bits of chatter with little chronological timing.  On page 6 of Volume 9, Number 5, (December 1919)  this comment was placed under the Jackson District. 
   "Hillsdale is not Paris, but Miss Norma Z. Finch and Miss Elizabeth Shovar are quite content at the former exchange and have no desire to return to the French metropolis.

   "When the call came from the Signal Corps for operators, Miss Finch of Hillsdale and Miss Shovar of Detroit responded.  They became 'buddies' in France.  They were 'buddies' through the grueling days of the last advance on Paris when they knew that in case of evacuation, the Signal Corps would be among the last to leave.  During the long months after the armistice the exchanges were still operated in Paris.  Thousands had returned home and the operators wanted to go home, but they stayed until the A. E. F. was sufficiently demobilized to discontinue the service.

   "Miss Finch and Miss Shovar are glad to be home.  They appreciate everything about the town as nobody can who has not had their experience."

Here's an earlier article from the previous month in November 1919 about the return of Ms. Finch and Ms Shovar with two other Detroit operators.

Bell Telephone News Vol. 9, No. 4 (November 1919)

Those same operators and Ms. Gordon joined with Oleda Joure to meet in a stateside memorial service for Cora Bartlett after her burial was in France. 

These articles were part of the return to the United States, but the war had changed the world and more would be needed than just "Girls -- a lot of 'em."

The "Hello Girl" Who Died "Over There" (and Another Who Survived)

Back in April I began posting about the "Hello Girls", the bi-lingual phone operators who worked in France during World War I with the U.S.Army Signal Corps.  While they did get shelled and experience some of the other wartime experiences "Over There", only one died and she was from Hillsdale, Michigan.  Cora H. Bartlett wasn't killed by shells or gas, but the world-wide pandemic of the Spanish Influenza, which has been the deadliest in modern history.  The international death toll has been estimated at 20 to 50 million, with 675,000 American victims.  Like Bartlett, it killed mainly healthy young adults, with more U.S. service members killed during the war than from battle.  She died in the spring of 1919 after the Armistice was signed November 11, 1918.
Update: The Hillsdale Historical Society has confirmed the cause of death was Typhoid.  While Spanish Influenza killed many in the war, Typhoid continues to kill and is nowadays something travelers can vaccinate themselves to prevent.  By 1911 the U.S. Army vaccinated its soldiers.  This is yet another example of their not taking the women seriously as soldiers.  Typhoid is a bacterial infection controlled also by better sanitation such as clean drinking water and hand washing.  Those precautions weren't always possible in wartime.

UPDATE: In checking back here I see that the photos have been taken down.  I strongly recommend going to the Hillsdale Historical Society webpage about Cora Bartlett. 

Burial cortege in France for Cora Bartlett

She was buried in France with full honors.  A memorial tombstone to her was also added at the King Lake Cemetery in Hillsdale County.











Bartlett wasn't the only Hello Girl to suffer from the Spanish Influenza.  Mabel Lapp, of Evanston, Illinois, left the Chicago Telephone Company and became ill while on ship bound for France.  Lapp recovered and went on to serve as she initially planned. 

Norma Finch Carman

I shared my research about the Hello Girls with the Hillsdale Historical Society so they could add Ms. Bartlett  and fellow Hillsdale Hello Girl, Norma Finch Carman.  Miss Finch returned to Hillsdale after the war and married her wartime sweetheart, Captain Ellis Joel Carman.  She later moved to his home in Denellen, New Jersey for the remaining 42 years of her life.  By dying in 1962 she was with the majority missing Congress finally giving Veteran Status/Honorable Discharge in 1978 on the 60th anniversary of the war's end.

Update: Norma Finch Carman's information including photo is now at the Hillsdale Historical Society site.

Much of what I was able to learn about each of them came from old issues of Bell Telephone News, in volumes 7, 8, and 9.  It's somewhat amusing that an article on the need for new women employees follows the article on the Finch/Carman marriage, noting the large number of post-war weddings.

The Hillsdale Historical Society was gracious enough to add an article about the Hello Girls and post information about the two women on their People pages crediting me with passing the information along to them.  I also mentioned another Hillsdale County woman, Louise Gordon, who is usually listed as Detroit because she worked for Michigan State Telephone Company there, but her home was actually the Hillsdale town of Litchfield.

Research is continuing as I prepare to bring stories and songs of these brave women.  Along the way I found this wonderfully appropriate quote from Samuel Johnson in his Works, Lives of the Poets, talking about Joseph Addison, Johnson said "History may be formed from permanent monuments and records; but Lives can only be written from personal knowledge, which is growing every day less, and in a short time is lost for ever. What is known can seldom be immediately told; and when it might be told, it is no longer known."

There's so much more to be found and told!