Remembering Women’s Service

The story of how one of the nation’s first Women’s Veteran Memorial was recently built in Springfield, Oregon.

Sarah Hovet

January 17, 2018

A sea of umbrellas forms in Springfield, Oregon at Willamalane Park. It’s Nov. 10, and this gathering does not just feature the standard outfits of an Oregon fall day—rain boots and Columbia jackets— but hats that read “Vietnam Veteran” and “Afghanistan Veteran” and shirts emblazoned with “This Is What a Woman Veteran Looks Like.”

The unveiling of the Springfield Women Veterans’ Memorial commences with speeches from Springfield veterans Shelley Corteville and Ree McSween, as well as one of the artists who conceptualized the memorial, Alison Brown. A trumpet rendition of “Taps” follows, then 30 seconds of quiet in which the tapping of rain on pine needles is the only sound. After the moment of silence, the group moves from the grass to the cemented circle of a plaza. The paths leading into the park twine around the cast of a cannon on the street corner and a memorial for Vietnam veterans on a small plaza. The paths then lead to a statue wrapped in a black tarp, the Springfield Women Veterans’ Memorial, the only one in the state of Oregon and one of only a handful of such memorials in the nation.

Female veterans often face gender- specific obstacles during their service in addition to being rendered invisible in ways male veterans are not.

Three lionesses stand on the memorial’s base. One looks over her shoulder, the second looks skyward and the third snarls, paw raised. In turn, these felines represent women veterans’ past, future and present.

Underneath their paws, objects represent the five branches of the United States military: the rock for the Army; the anchor for the Navy, Coast Guard and Marine Corps; the falcon for the Air Force. Sprinkled around the lionesses’ paws, blue African violets symbolize hope.

Memorial: Serving to help people remember events or persons; in memory.

Shelley Corteville is a civically engaged citizen. She serves as director of local nonprofit Egan Warming Center. She is the chairperson of the local chapter of Veterans for Peace and the memorial grant co-writer. Corteville stood by the memorial as it was unveiled. She collaborated with the city’s Legislative and Public Affairs Manager, Niel Laudati, to bring about the memorial. Laudati approached her with the idea, and she wrote a letter to include in the grant proposal.

“This is our memorial,” Corteville says.

The first meeting the committee held after receiving the grant turned contentious. Men from Veterans of Foreign Wars and other men’s veterans groups attended and began telling Corteville and the other female veterans in attendance about what their memorial should look like. But Corteville wanted to centralize women’s voices in the meeting.

The memorial is for all female veterans, not just active duty women, which made her want the statue to have a timeless quality.

Inclusivity proved complex. A statue of a woman in combat boots would not represent the women who served as nurses. Moreover, the women wanted no reference to family in the memorial due to the tendency to conflate women veterans with veterans’ wives, daughters and mothers.

“It’s disparaging,” Corteville says. “Women veterans’ experience of life is far different from those of women who haven’t served. It’s not the same as being a wife. But we’ve all heard that it is, many times.”

The women also did not want weapons depicted in the memorial. Corteville and many others became peace activists after their service.

After deciding what they did not want, the women chose the qualities they wanted the memorial to embody. They wanted it to reflect fortitude, honor and pride.

Corteville faced other challenges during her time on the committee. Some men did not understand why women needed their own memorial. But Corteville speaks of women veterans’ erasure. “Often people don’t even know who we are in the community.”

On Veterans Day, veterans often receive free meals, drinks, coffee and other amenities. A friend of Corteville’s went to a restaurant, wearing all her insignia, and had to catch the server’s attention as they began offering the specials to male veterans, glossing over her.

Once, Corteville walked into a Department of Veterans’ Affairs clinic with her husband at the time, also a veteran. The staff immediately ushered him over to receive a flu shot. He did not even have to show his veteran’s ID. Corteville stood there. She spoke up and asked for a flu shot. The staff replied, “Oh honey. We’re only giving those to the veterans.” They gave her a flu shot after she provided evidence that she was a veteran. The next year, she faced the same treatment.

In the service, Corteville wore men’s boots and men’s uniforms because the military did not make gear fitted for women’s bodies.

“I hope this memorial will make them feel less invisible,” Corteville says of the women veterans who are often overlooked or forgotten about.

Service: A contribution to the welfare of others.

In early fall of 2017, Corteville lobbied about these issues in Washington, D.C., even discussing them with congresswomen. Women’s Action for New Directions sponsored her to go to their biannual conference and lobby.

Corteville lobbied to improve truth in recruiting, ensuring that recruiters pitching to high school students are transparent about life in the military. The Army raised recruiters’ monthly quotas on Oct. 1. This places pressure on the recruiters, leading them to stretch the truth when recruiting at high schools. She reflected on sitting in a room and listening to a recruiter assure a teenager that he could be a medic and not face combat, when the recruiter could not be certain of that.

“Had I had all the information, I might have made a different decision,” she says of her high school choice to join the military. Her recruiter claimed to be married to a woman in the Army and used that to reassure Corteville of women’s treatment. The recruiter then proceeded to come to her home and tried to convince Corteville’s mother to go out with him.

Corteville joined the military after graduating from high school in Merced, California. During her four years of active duty, she was raped five times by fellow soldiers.

In the years since, policy on military sexual assault has not improved. The military’s Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office released a report in 2012 that documented a rise in military sexual assault as well as a drop in reporting. Between 2011 and 2012, incidents of sexual assault swelledby36percent,from19,300 to 26,000. Rates of reporting dropped from 13.5 percent to 9.8 percent during that time.

“These things are about power,” Corteville says. “And that’s why they need to be taken out of the command structure.”

Under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, trials unfold differently than in the civilian justice system. Victims must have military lawyers and cannot have civilian lawyers. Prosecution remains within the military. Active military personnel go before court martials, not judges.

But having a trial at all depends on whether the officer to whom the rape is reported does anything. And even that depends on military personnel reporting. Men and women alike face ostracization for reporting.

The fifth time she was raped, Corteville reported. And then a man pounded on her door one night and proceeded to yell at her. He was not the man she had named, but he had heard misinformation that she had reported him. The privacy of her reporting had been compromised. Her case never went any further.

Pride: A reasonable or justifiable self-respect; a company of lions.

Wherever she goes in town, Corteville always seems to know someone. On the steps of Springfield City Hall, she greets acquaintances who are walking into work. At a coffee shop in Eugene, she chats about lobbying with a friend who walks into the shop shortly after Corteville ends a phone call about organizing the first Egan Warming Center activation of the season.

Corteville has traveled around the country screening the award-winning investigative documentary “The Invisible War,” which showcases veterans’ narratives about their sexual assaults. She showed it 26 times and spoke 52 times. She has written letters to officials about these issues. After lobbying in D.C., she is toying with the idea of running for public office.

Although she always intended the memorial to have an impact on others, she was surprised at the impact it had on her, more than any other piece of art she has seen. It allowed her to feel proud of her service, despite the traumas she faced. She joined out of an urge to serve her country and her community. Now, she sees the many ways she can serve beyond her time in the military.

Since the unveiling, she has visited the memorial at least every other day.

“In the memorial, I can see myself,” she says.

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