During World War II, Charity Adams Earley was the first black commissioned officer in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC--later the Women's Army Corps or WAC), and she commanded the only organization of black women to serve overseas. Earley left the Army with the rank of lieutenant colonel—the highest possible rank except for the director of the WAC. Read about other Pathbreakers.

Research at the Women's Memorial Foundation is directed to discovering and disseminating the collective and individual experiences of women who served with the US Armed Forces.

Their history mirrors the history of women in America. Their experiences have reflected, opposed and frequently moved in the vanguard of the social and political conventions of the generations in which they lived.

Their stories are the stories of how women served the country before they were formally accepted as part of the nation's military and even before they shared the civil liberties legally guaranteed to male citizens, how they became part of the armed forces and how they acted as agents of institutional and social change along the way.