'Women in War' gallery opens at Berman Friday
May 14—Former Air Force sergeant Sandy Amidon didn't exactly work with nuclear bombs; she made sure people who did were able to handle the pressure.
Amidon visited the Berman Museum's opening for its new Women In War exhibit Thursday night and reflected on her four years enlisted in the military in the 1980s. She was recruited as a college graduate with a psychology degree, but was somehow assigned a cooking job in Germany. Just weeks before she finished the training, someone realized her skills could be put to better use at Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota, where she performed mental health exams on fellow service members who patrolled the planes and bunkers where the bombs were held.
The strain of the job tended to crack people over time, she said, when patrolling police officers would count the rivets on planes to pass time during four-day shift rotations on base, and become abusive at home.
"I had a guy sent in and he said he was on his second wife, his second dog, and so on, and I said, 'What do you mean, second dog?' And he said, 'Well, I killed the first one,'" Amidon recalled. "That was an obvious red flag."
Amidon was one of a few female veterans to attend the new exhibit, which walks visitors through women's involvement in the United States military from World War I and later.
Sabra Gossett, registrar at the Berman Museum and Amidon's daughter, organized the exhibit. She said she had always wanted to create an exhibit like it, owing to her mother's military service, and a tendency for female veterans to fall out of the limelight.
"I know it's a trend among female vets, and I wanted to show them that they are seen, that we know they did things," Gossett said.
The exhibit features artifacts such as uniforms throughout the decades and various propaganda and advertising geared toward pulling women toward war efforts. Gossett said the biggest push for women to join the military was during World War II.
"Men were joining like crazy after Pearl Harbor, and women wanted to do something too," Gossett said. "They were told, 'if you do this job it'll free up a man to go serve.'"
A timeline can be followed around the room from the World Wars to modern day, where Amidon's duffel bag sits among uniforms from a few decades ago. The most recent end of the timeline culminates in camouflage uniforms on loan from retired Air Force Chief Master Sgt. Emily Shade and retired Lt. Col. Zyna Captain, two more women who visited the exhibit's opening.
Captain (who said she had enjoyed jokes about her last name when she held the "captain" rank, and referenced "Catch-22" character Maj. Major) said she came from a military family and was expected to join after college, then was free to do as she pleased after four years.
She was on her way to her first assignment at Beale Air Force Base when she saw a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird take to the air.
"This really slick-looking, black, spy plane went screaming across the gate, and I'm like, 'Yes!' I truly knew from that minute I was going to stay," Captain said. She retired in 2007 after 24 years in the Air Force.
She said that she believes there will come a day when there won't be any more "first women" taking on military roles, a point when either sex will take the job they want and succeed simply by performing it well. But the change will take time, she said, maybe generations.
"I believe it's coming, and it helps that we have a vice president who is a woman, a speaker of the house who is a woman... we all need role models," Captain said.
The Berman Museum's Women In War exhibit opens to the public Friday and is included with regular admission at the museum.
Assistant Metro Editor Ben Nunnally: 256-235-3560.
