Fort Des Moines, Iowa: 1st Training Center for the WAAC

One of many informative displays at the Fort Des Moines Museum and Education Center, Fort Des Moines, Iowa.

It was 1942, and the world was at war.  
 
The December 1941 entry of the United States into what later became known as World War II made everything in America more intense if not always faster.  
 
The frantic need for success in a nation unprepared for war often goaded the U.S. Congress to do what it previously would not.  

​On May 14, 1942, Congress approved the establishment of the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corp (WAAC).  The following day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the bill into law.  On May 16, Oveta Culp Hobby was sworn in as the first director of the WAAC.
 
Little did the people of Iowa know that Fort Des Moines, located on the south side of their capital city, would become the site of the first training center for the newfangled WAAC. 
 
The whole nation was watching.

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