As Reid Soskin approached adulthood, her options were limited. "The expectations for black women when I was growing up was you became a domestic servant or you worked in agriculture. That would have been my fate, except that I married. So,...See moreAs Reid Soskin approached adulthood, her options were limited. "The expectations for black women when I was growing up was you became a domestic servant or you worked in agriculture. That would have been my fate, except that I married. So, I completely escaped that life of servitude." When WWII broke out, Reid Soskin and her husband wanted to work for the armed services but were turned away because they were black. They finally found jobs at a Bay Area shipyard. "I worked in a Jim Crow segregated union hall. It was the time when formal racial segregation entered my life." Over half a century later in 2000, when she joined a planning meeting for a new Bay Area National Park focused on the WWII home front experience, "I immediately recognized the sites that formed the park were all sites of racial segregation. I became actively involved in the plans to make sure that that history was not omitted." Rosie the Riveter World War II Home Front National Historical Park opened in 2007, and, at age 85, Reid Soskin became one of its first rangers. "I work five hours a day, five days a week. I give three to five presentations in our little theatre. I sell out like Hamilton." Now 96, Reid Soskin is still working. "I don't expect to retire at all. I'm going straight from the park to the cemetery." Written by
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