Female WWII Veteran Remembered

The Washington Post recently posted an article on Doris Rubenfeld Lewis, who passed away at age 83 in May of this year. She was a “teacher and artist, a wife and mother, a draftsman-she’d never call herself a “draftsperson”-and a Coast Guard veteran of World War II.” Although she lived most of her years in the Maryland/D.C. area, Lewis was born and raised in Bronx, N.Y. and graduated from the Cooper Union School of Art in New York.

In 1943, at age 22, Lewis signed up for the newly formed Coast Guard Women’s Reserve “better known by its nickname of SPARs, which combined the original Latin and the English translation of the Coast Guard motto: Semper Paratus, Always Ready.”

As an artist in the Coast Guard, she drafted designs of weapons, navigational tools and ship’s plans. She was also a platoon leader and a member of the SPARs band.

To read more about Doris Rubenfeld Lewis, read the full Washington Post article.