Original air date: December 14, 2023
Of all the U.S. military branches, the Air Force has the most female members. And — according to U.S. Air Force Recruiting — the branch has led the way in expanding opportunities for women to serve.
The history of women in the United States military began over 200 hundred years ago, their roles evolving over time. During World War II, for the first time, all branches of the military enlisted women. Nearly 350,000 American women served in non-combat roles to support the efforts.
This began the Women in the Air Force program. Nearly 30 years passed before the WAF ended in 1975, and women were accepted into the Air Force, the same as men.
Keli Crichfield joined the Air Force in 1977, starting out at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico. Her military career took her to air force bases in the U.S. and abroad, in countries such as Germany and Korea. Later in her career, Crichfield worked as a program manager on the Minuteman three missile.
Though the objects are not her own, Crichfield’s restoration work on aircrafts is an example of how military vehicles, weapons and other devices are brought home and preserved. These public displays in museums may spark conversations that connect people to the history of war.
KELI CRICHFIELD: I’m retired twice and I work here at [Hill Aerospace Museum]. We’re starting maintenance teams where we can have three or four people in a team to do restoration work on the aircraft and I am doing that as well.
Back when I first got to basic training everything was so much different than what you're used to at 20. When I got there it was at night, on a bus. And you're seeing all these squadrons of airmen just marching along, and they had their little reflective cuff on, with their little flashlight. And it was just different than anything else. What really got me and made me realize I was in the military was when the Jag — the legal office — came to talk to us. And he was listing all these things that you can't do, and all the articles that it would be if you got in trouble. And I thought to myself, 'Oh my gosh, I'm not gonna be able to do anything without getting in trouble.'
I was a crew chief, which means you're in charge of the aircraft and seeing that whatever is required by any of the specialties gets done before the next flight is scheduled. So it was your aircraft until the pilot signed it for his flight. The pilot had his name on the left side of the canopy and your name was on the right side of the canopy. So it was pretty impressive.
One of the big things of my career was in June of '96, when our barracks at Dhahran was bombed. It was just a huge, huge noise. They told us that if the truck had pulled up parallel to the barracks, it would have leveled quite a bit and we're thankful that it backed in toward the barracks and it made more of a crater than a damage. I mean, it damaged quite enough.
Being a woman in a male dominated field was hard, especially when I started in the military in 1977. There were a lot of men that didn't appreciate women in the field. There were the hard times but then there were times when as long as you did your work, they'd accept you. Of course, usually, that meant doing twice as much to prove you're half as good. But I very much enjoyed my career, saw a lot of things and I’m glad I went in the military.
Support for Bringing War Home comes from Utah State University, the National Endowment for the Humanities Dialogues on the Experience of War, and Utah Humanities.
