Alba Ferry '42, a pioneer in the war effort, worked as an air raid warden in Cambridge.

"It was kind of fun. They wanted to see if the women could replace the men and, of course, we did."

During the spring of 1942, Radcliffe received more calls from the Red Cross, the Women Appointed for Voluntary Emergency Service (WAVES) and the Women's Army Corps (WAC) to recruit women then ever before, according to the Radcliffe Officer's report for 1941-42.

In the graduating class, 165 women worked in first aid fields right after graduating and 29 found employment in motor mechanics--compared to a scanty 11 entering Cambridge child care.

And the need for Radcliffe graduates with scientific training quadrupled in one year, according to the report.

Mary V. Acheron '42 began working in a New York chemical warfare plant the September after her graduation. After three years she was promoted to supervisor and guideline writer.

"They were hiring women to replace men and I had enough chemistry to qualify," says Ahern. "It was one of the most incredibly interesting assignments of the war."

According to Ahern, the secrecy leading up to the drop of the American A-bomb shrouded the entire country.

"As of August 1, 1945, we had gotten all the cancellations of everything dealing with chemical weapons. And August 6 was the bomb," Ahern says. "So it was very well-planned, although nobody knew about it.

Judith E. Friedburg '42 also found herself in a traditionally male-dominated field after graduating from Radcliffe. Friedburg worked for two years in the American embassy in London, where she performed such duties as bomb damage assessment in the English countryside.

After returning to the United States on the carrier ship "Liberty," her experience abroad helped her land a job as a writer for Time magazine--a position which was then normally only available to men, she says.

While Friedburg admits she feels very lucky to have won the post, she points out that "there were many opportunities because there were many jobs to be filled." Friedburg later went on to become one of the founders of Travel and Leisure magazine.

The increased availability of jobs, coupled with active recruitment policies, enhanced the student body's awareness of the events of the war, Friedburg says.

And Friedburg, who headed the America First organization while at Radcliffe and was a leading political activist on campus, says there was definitely a pro-war feeling on campus that had not previously existed.

"Pearl Harbor was a shock. Now Britain's fight was our fight," says Friedburg. "We wrote letters to newspapers, talked to groups and to senators, and we brought students to Harvard from Czechoslovakia."