Elizabeth Ann Ray 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?: 11 June 2008 oral history transcript; Military service resume; sheet of Women in the Armed Services stamps; photographs from service 1944-1973.
Full biography: Elizabeth "Betty" Ann Ray (1913-2011) served as an officer in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC), Women's Army Corps (WAC), and Women in the Air Force (WAF) from 1942 to 1965. Ray served as director of WAF from 1961 to 1965. Elizabeth Ann "Betty" Ray was born in 1913 in Winnsboro, Texas, and was raised primarily in Oklahoma. In 1934 she graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a degree in journalism. After graduation Ray worked for a newspaper in Anadarko, Oklahoma. Ray was later recruited by the war department and served in the Public Relations Bureau in Washington D.C. In 1942, Ray joined the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps and completed Officer Training School at Fort Des Moines, Iowa. She had brief assignments at the training center at Daytona Beach and in Washington, D.C. in the WAAC Headquarters in the Pentagon before being transferred overseas. Ray was sent to the headquarters of General Dwight D. Eisenhower in Algiers, Algeria, then appointed commander of a WAC intelligence squadron at 15th Air Force Headquarters in Bari, Italy. She returned to the United States in late 1945 and was assigned to the inactive reserve." On May 10, 1949, Ray was reactivated in the Women in the Air Force and sent to Mitchel Field, New York, where she commanded female troops then worked in personnel and public relations. In 1950 she also attended Armed Forces Informational School at Carlisle Barracks. From 1953 to 1955 she served as deputy director of WAF. From 1955 to 1958, Ray served as executive secretary for DACOWITS (Defense Department Advisory Committee on Women in the Services). She then became a director at Strategic Air Command (SAC) headquarters at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska. In 1961, Ray was appointed director of WAF, and served in this capacity until her retirement from the military in 1965. After her retirement as assistant dean for academic affairs at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, Ray moved to Southern Pines, North Carolina, where she died on 7 December, 2011.
Topics: Women's History
Military
Branch of service: Army -- WAAC
Army -- WAC
Air Force -- WAF
Conflict: World War II era (1940-1946)
Subject headings: World War, 1939-1945
United States. Army--Women
United States. Air Force
Contributing Institution: Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives, UNCG University Libraries

: Lt. Elizabeth Ray saluting child; Lt. Elizabeth Ray crouches and returns the salute of a little girl she befriended at a base in Bari, Italy, in 1944. The girl wears a garrison cap and a shirt with army patches, while Ray is in WAC service dress.

: Oral history interview with Elizabeth Ray; Elizabeth "Betty" Ann Ray primarily discusses her lengthy career in the army and air force. Elizabeth "Betty" Ann Ray briefly discusses being raised by her widowed father, moving frequently around Oklahoma because of his job, attending Oklahoma College for Women and University of Oklahoma, and her brief career in journalism. She primarily discusses her career as an officer in the military from World War Two through the mid-1960s in which she rose from the rank of third officer to a colonel and director of Women in the Air Force. " Ray provides some of the details of her service during World War Two, particularly her duties in Africa and Italy. Of note are her descriptions of traveling overseas in a convey, meeting General Eisenhower, and a plane crash in which several WACs under her command died. She also details her duties at Strategic Air Command (SAC) and for the Defense Department Advisory Committee on Women in the Services (DACOWITS). " Other subjects include the integration of women into military service, the assassination of John F. Kennedy, Ray's views on women in the military, her concept of service, and her opinions on political and military leadership.

: Retirement ceremony of Elizabeth Ray; Colonel Elizabeth Ray stands in front of a color guard during her retirement ceremony at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas, in 1965.

: WAC troop review, Bari, Italy; WACs march in formation four wide during troop review in Bari, Italy, in 1944. Lt. Elizabeth Ray is seen at bottom in command.

: WAF 25th anniversary collage; Collage featuring photos of Women in the Air Force (WAF), celebrating the WAF's 25th anniversary in 1973. Across the bottom, the former directors of the WAF are pictured. They are: Jeanne M. Holm, Elizabeth Ray, Emma Riley, Phyllis Gray, Mary Jo Shelley, and Geraldine Pratt.

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Women Veterans Historical Project

Elizabeth Ann Ray Collection

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