Category Women Veterans
COLD NIGHT IN FRANCE BEGAN MEDICAL, MILITARY MARCH ACROSS EUROPE IN WWII FOR ARMY NURSE, NOW 100
FRESNO – In the fall of 1944, just a few months after the Normandy invasion, Jane Boote endured a night she’s never forgotten. “That first night in France was the coldest night of my life,” the 100-year-old Army veteran and career nurse recalled. “The GIs thought they were doing us a favor by giving us […]
HOSPITAL AT CALIFORNIA ARMY BASE HONORS ONLY WOMAN TO RECEIVE MEDAL OF HONOR
At Fort Irwin, in California’s Mojave Desert, the Dr. Mary E. Walker Center is an administrative building that is part of the Weed Army Community Hospital system. The hospital system serves a military and civilian population of nearly 10,000. One day each December, hundreds of soldiers from Fort Irwin’s 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment march up […]
Pioneer, Trailblazer: Virginia Mae Days Was One of a Kind as CalVet Director
NOTE: As we honor women veterans during Women’s History Month, CalVet remembers one of its own. The late Virginia Mae Days served as CalVet’s director from 1975-81, retiring more than a decade before CalVet became a cabinet level department headed by a secretary. In a secluded hallway inside the California Department of Veterans Affairs building […]
COLONEL IRMA COOPER DEFIED THE ODDS
A leader throughout her long and distinguished military career, CalVet turns to Irma Hagans Cooper Colonel (retired) to take us across the bridge from Black History Month to Women’s History Month. The Los Angeles resident spent 30 years in the Army, much of it running medical facilities and commanding companies that went on to serve […]
LISA DANIELS LIVES TO TELL STORIES OF AFRICAN AMERICANS IN THE MILITARY
February is Black History Month, a time to highlight the contributions and achievements made by African Americans throughout history. But it’s an easy leap to say that for Lisa Daniels of Sacramento, every month is Black History Month and to go one step beyond: Every day is Black History Day. Daniels turned what began as […]
Twenty names, including first woman, etched into California Vietnam Veterans Memorial
SACRAMENTO – Like so many others who served in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, U.S. Army Specialist 5 Adrienne Lee Schamp was exposed to Agent Orange, a powerful herbicide used to defoliate forests and crops that provided cover for North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops. She worked in Army finance at Long Binh and […]
CalVet Women Veterans award winner Captain Elizabeth L. Hillman truly a trailblazer
In 2013, the U.S. House Armed Services Committee appointed former Air Force Captain Elizabeth L. Hillman, an expert on sexual harassment, assault, and discrimination in the military, to serve on a panel probing sexual assault in the military. The panel exposed how little progress had been made since the so-called “Tailhook” scandal of 1991, when […]
Governor Gavin Newsom appoints seven to leadership roles at CalVet
Governor Gavin Newsom announced a series of appointments this week, with the majority of them involving positions at the California Department of Veterans Affairs. Xochitl Rodriguez Murillo, 36, of Woodland, is the new deputy secretary of Minority Veterans Affairs. Murillo has a long history of public and military service. She is the mayor of Woodland […]
California Central Coast Veterans Cemetery to receive national honor for quality
SEASIDE – The Central California Coast Veterans Cemetery (CCCVC) in Seaside has been selected to receive the prestigious Organizational Excellence Award from the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (USDVA). The cemetery, which opened in 2016, is operated by the California Department of Veterans Affairs (CalVet). It was jointly developed and constructed by the USDVA, […]
CalVet’s Veterans Homes now among nation’s best skilled nursing facilities
Before he accepted the appointment from Governor Brown to head the California Department of Veterans Affairs (CalVet) in 2015, Vito Imbasciani MD made his rounds to some of the Veterans Homes of California. “I wanted to see what I was getting myself into,” he quipped. With decades of experience as a physician, including 27 as […]
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