Mary Cooper Floyd Collection

Details

Who's responsible?: Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives, UNCG University Libraries (Repository)
How much has been digitized?: Only a part of this collection has been digitized.
What's in the full collection?: 3 March 1999 oral history transcript; Article from the 610 Project The Special Devices Association publication featuring Mary with a photograph of Mary and James Caldwell in Naval uniforms taken in 1946.
Full biography: Mary Elizabeth Cooper Floyd of Leaksville-Spray, North Carolina, performed clerical work while serving in the United States Navy WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service) during World War II. Mary Elizabeth Cooper Floyd was born in Critz, Virginia, and raised in Leaksville-Spray, North Carolina. She attended Leaksville-Spray High School and then performed clerical work in a cotton mill in Spray. Floyd enlisted in the WAVES and completed basic training at Hunter College in New York. She was stationed in Washington, D.C., where she worked in the Radar Section of the Office of Research and Invention. She was later transferred to Long Island, New York, where she continued her clerical work, primarily taking dictation. Floyd returned home after being discharged in 1945. She attended McClung business school in Greensboro on the GI Bill. While there, she met and married her husband, who had also been in the navy. She went on to do clerical work at General Motors Acceptance Corporation (GMAC), but resigned after her marriage. The Floyds went on to have two daughters and a son and continued to live in Greensboro.
Topics: Women's History
Military
Branch of service: Navy -- WAVES
Conflict: World War II era (1940-1946)
Subject headings: World War, 1939-1945
United States. Navy--Women
Contributing Institution: Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives, UNCG University Libraries

: Oral history interview with Mary Cooper Floyd; Primarily documents Mary Elizabeth C. Floyd's clerical work for the U.S. Navy WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service) while stationed in Washington, D.C., and Long Island, New York, during World War II; and her life after the war. Floyd primarily shares information about the clerical work she performed while in the WAVES, focusing on her dictation skills. Also of note is her description of her cross-country travel with a navy roommate during leave times, including stops in Oklahoma and California. " Floyd also discusses briefly treatment of and attitudes toward women in the military; the patriotic spirit of the nation; political figures; the pleasant experience she had as a member of the WAVES; and her post-war business school training, marriage, and work for GMAC.

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Women Veterans Historical Project

Mary Cooper Floyd Collection

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