Today is Maggie Fricke's 92nd birthday.
"Eh, it's just another birthday," she chuckled.
Fricke is known by some of her neighbors as the woman who walks her dog, Honey, two or three times a day in their neighborhood off Jot Em Down Road.
But Fricke is no ordinary woman. Fricke served as a Navy WAVE - or Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service - during World War II. Fricke sat down with WDUN's Alyson Shields Tuesday and talked about her experience in the WAVES.
"I signed up on my 20th birthday, 1944," she recalled. "Left on the 20th of August for New York City to Hunter College for Women, where we had our boot camp. I was in the Navy - the war was almost over then - for almost two years until May of 1946."
The branch was established in 1942, allowing the Navy to release male officers and crew for active sea duty, while bringing in female officers and other enlisted women to carry out on-shore duties.
When asked why she wanted to join the military, Fricke had no hesitation. "We all were very patriotic back in those day," she said. "I just felt that I wanted to do something for my country."
From boot camp, Fricke was sent to store keeper's school due to her previous work as a purchase part worker at Lockheed in her hometown of Los Angeles. She raised through the ranks to become a Store Keeper First Class.
"I was sent to Store Keeping School in Milledgeville at Georgia State College for Women. They took in the WAVES and taught them to be store keepers. When I finished that, I was sent to temporary duty in Norman, Okla. for 30 days and then they assigned me to Galveston, Tex. where I spent the rest of my time.
"I was in the accounting office. We did payroll and I helped pay AK's and AF ships - supply ships or troop ships - and they would come in to the port there and we'd pay them," she said.
After her 22 months of service, she decided to wrap up her military career. "I wanted to be an actress. So I decided I could go home now and become a star in Hollywood," she said.
Fricke said her military experience shaped her life in several different ways. "I thought it was very good training for the girls," she said. "It taught them about good hygiene and all of that, taught you how to take orders and give orders and to get along with people. I just think it was very good for you."
And, her life changed forever after she met her husband at a theatre program after she returned home. "After I got out I went to drama school in Hollywood. It was Geller Theatre Workshop... we had a GI Bill and we got schooling, I got a chance to purchase a house with a mortgage at a certain percent, and awful lot of benefits," she said. She and her husband were married for 63 years, prior to his death five years ago.
Fricke described her husband as a "gypsy" and a wonderful singer. "The entertainment industry was flush with people trying. Neither of us got our jobs or anything like that. So he got into his own business of cleaning swimming pools, so he could move around, go any place they had a lot of swimming pools and get jobs."
Fricke said they lived for nine years in Hawaii, as well as living in Washington and Arizona. She continued working in accounting and payroll, as well as managing a condominiums and mobile homes. She and her husband had a son, whom she now lives with.
When asked what advice she'd give to a young woman interested in a military career, Fricke again answered without hesitation. "I'd tell her to take it. I think it's very good they now get to go overseas and do the things like that. And they can join at 18 now. I think it's very good for them."
"We had a magnificent bill, like I said I got schooling, I could buy a house, and other things like that. It was just wonderful."
She finished the interview by saying she was glad she did it. "I was always very happy I joined."
