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A Few Good Women: Memoirs of a World War II Marine

by Inga Fredriksen Ferris

316 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #06-1938; ISBN 1-4251-0181-X; US$23.00, C$26.45, EUR18.89, £13.23

An honest, revealing story of how it felt to be a Woman Marine in WWII, tells fifty tales in fifty chapters. It's a book that's hard to put down.

About the Book

A Few Good Women by Inga Fredrikson Ferris: The author, as “Freddy”’ takes you with her as she faces all the indignities one can expect in Marine Corps boot camp, and some that we unexpected. On their last day, the drill instructor makes a big mistake, creating total chaos. Yet his parting words to them are “Yew women are stupid”.

Freddy is sent on to the Naval Air Tactical Training Center in Norman, Oklahoma where for five months she studies to become an Aviation Machinist Mate, learning about all the things that can go wrong with a plane, and how to fix it. As he also learns that her bunkmate, Kilgallen, has recently spent ten years in a convent.

She fells uncomfortable around such piety until she discovers that while “Kil” retains great respect for her church, she has broken several Marine Corps regulations in order to get a transfer here from Washington, DC. (“There’s four hundred women there for every man, and all the men are marries.”)

That degree was not earned in mathematics or mechanical aptitude. Kil soon realizes it would be of little help to her here. She declares, “I’m a poet, a dreamer and a lover, and they’ll never make a mechanic out of me.” Clutching her rosary, she climbs up on her bunk and takes the problem to a Higher Power.

Theirs was the only entire class to transfer together to El Toro.

Sondra Metzger, editor of the Women Marines Association “Nouncements,” wrote of A Few Good Women, “Once I picked up this book, I had a hard time putting it down… It was a very interesting and easy read… Inga has a style of her own…gets to the point without being to descriptive and wordy. I really enjoyed her story telling, and I think you would too. Thank you, Inga, for sharing your experiences.”

Virginia Allred, past president of the National Women Marines Association, writes "For me, this book was a step back in time, an honest, vivid account of what life was like for Women Marines who served in World War II. The fast-paced dialog with clear verbal expressions makes for a quick and enjoyable read."

But this is not only a women’s book. Men, too, are curious to know what really goes on inside the women’s squad rooms. When my buddy, Pat Graves Smith, received her copy of A Few Good Women, Bob, her husband, would not let her have it until he finished reading it.

And Ted Fuller, columnist, writes that it’s “A candid, often graphic personal account that provides a long- overdue salute to the valiant, innovative women who served their country well.”

About the Author

Inga is now retired form Contra Costa County, where she worked as microfilm supervisor for the Clerk- Recorder’s Office. Now widowed, she keeps busy assembling story-telling albums from a fifty year collection of photographs. She lives in Matinez, California, near her children , grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and is a member of the Marine Corps League and the Women Marines Association.

Excerpts