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Andree Fifield Collection

 Collection
Identifier: WV 0070

Content Description

The collection includes various military papers from Fifield’s WAVES service, 1943-1945; various photographs of her service and wedding, 1944-1945; an oral history transcript, 26 April 1999.

Dates

  • circa 1943-1999

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

Copyright is retained by the creators of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information. Please see our Sensitive Materials Statement.

Biographical / Historical

Andrée B. Fifield (1921-2011) was a secretary for the Office of Naval Intelligence and Joint Chiefs of Staff as a member of the United States Navy WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service) from 1943 to 1945.

Andrée B. Wetzler Fifield was born in New York City and raised in Michigan, France, and New York by adoptive parents. She attended Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn, but graduated from a high school in Sayville, Long Island, in 1940. She went on to attend Bryant College, a two-year business school in Providence, Rhode Island, where she met her future husband.

After graduation, Fifield moved to York, Pennsylvania, with her family and worked as a secretary at York Safe and Lock Company. She later moved with them to Chicago and worked for the government at the Salary Stabilization Unit.

On 13 March 1943, Fifield enlisted in the WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service). She was in one of the first classes assigned to basic training at Cedar Falls, Iowa. After basic training, she was sent to Washington, D.C., where she briefly worked in the National Archives (NARA) while waiting for security clearance to become a secretary in the Office of Naval Intelligence. Fifield went on to work for the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the Pentagon Building and briefly for the Office of the President. She was discharged from the WAVES in October 1945. Andr'e Fifield married Donald Fifield in 1945.

After the war they lived in Chicago while he attended school and then worked for Campbell Soup Company. They moved to Boston in 1948 and then to Albany, New York in 1955. Three years later the Fifields moved to Syracuse, New York, where they remained for twenty-two years. During this time Fifield worked as a decorator for Sears Roebuck and gave birth to two children. The Fifields went on to live in New Hampshire and Pinehurst, North Carolina. She died on 18 May, 2011.

Extent

0.21 Linear Feet (3 folders )

Language of Materials

English

Metadata Rights Declarations

  • License: This record is made available under an Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International Creative Commons license.

Condition Description

The condition is good.

Offensive Language Statement

The UNC Greensboro University Libraries collects, preserves, and makes accessible unique and historical materials for learning and research. The nature of historical materials is such that some material may represent positions, norms, and values that are offensive and objectionable. These materials represent the opinions and actions of their creators. By providing access to these records in our reading room and through our digital collections, we recognize that archives and rare books can play a vital role in holding those creators accountable and in helping us learn from the past.

Our finding aids and other collection descriptions may occasionally re-use language provided by creators or former holders of the materials, but we strive to place outdated or offensive terminology in context. That said, we recognize that we may not always make the right decision and welcome feedback from all sources so we can learn and adjust our practices. Please contact us at scua@uncg.edu if you encounter problematic language in our finding aids or other collection description. We will review the language and, as appropriate, update it in a way that balances preservation of the original context with our ongoing commitment to describing materials with respectful and inclusive language.

Processing Information

Processed by Matthew McCarthy.

Title
Andree Fifield Collection
Status
In Progress
Author
Matthew McCarthy
Date
2022 September
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin
Language of description note
eng

Repository Details

Part of the Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives Repository

Contact:
P.O. Box 26170
320 College Ave.
Greensboro NC 27402-6170 US
336-334-5246