Rosie didn’t just rivet airplanes.

During World War II, when men were called to fight, women worked in factories, laboratories, offices and farms, doing anything that needed done on the home front.

The American Rosie Movement, based in Charleston, W.Va., aims to interview as many Rosies as possible across the nation to create video and audio records of their service.

Direction Home of Eastern Ohio has issued a call to find Rosies in the Mahoning Valley area.

“Youngstown and the surrounding areas were a booming place during World War II and the movement truly believes that the Rosies were imperative to the success of our community and the country while many of the men were at war,” Cassandra Valentini, Direction Home community liaison, said.

“Through their legacy, these women have shown that there is great strength in pulling together to do quality work for freedom,” Valentini said. “In the Youngstown Area there is a strong sense of pride in our community.

Direction Home plans to honor area Rosies in a ceremony tentatively set for September, she said.

“We are looking for any female who is 92-plus that contributed in some way during the time of war. These women could have worked in many different functions and for multiple companies. We are looking for those who stepped up and stepped in to ensure our country continued to move forward while the war went on.

“Like Rosie, during the war, people today want to ‘do something’ to unite and this project and will do just that. We are eager to find our Rosies, tell their stories of strength, resilience and courage in hopes to inspire our community,” Valentini said.

FINDING ROSIE

The American Rosie Movement began interviewing Rosies in 2008.

“The simple question to any woman over 90 is, ‘What did you do in World War II?'” Rosie Movement founder Anne Montague said.

Based in Charleston, W.Va., the movement so far has established six of what it calls Model Rosie Communities. The goal for this year is to add Honolulu, the state of Utah, Greensboro, N.C., Los Angeles, Pascagoula, Miss., and Youngstown.

“I have assumed that women are still living who worked in the steel mills either on the workplace floor or in the offices,” Montague said. “Some Rosies are as young as 92 if they worked after school or dropped out of high school.

“Having said that, we find that they emerge differently than we expect. For example, some Rosies may live there who worked elsewhere. Some may have been bussed in from south.

“It’s always a surprise once the public sees that they worked on farms, prepared foods, worked in shipyards, sewed uniforms and tents, inspected machine parts and lenses. The joy is in the way people pull together to find Rosies, once they know what to look for,” Montague said.

The project works with area departments of aging, such as Direction Home, to seek out local women to share their stories, and has recorded about 200 women so far.

Valentini said, “Direction Home of Eastern Ohio believes that it is important for our area to join this movement and help our Rosies to be heard and involved in declaring that their own legacy is passed to the future.

“Currently, we have one potential Rosie that has yet to be interviewed,” Valentini said. “We know there are many others out there who we have not been in contact with yet. Our hope is that families will help tell the story if the individual cannot.

The goals are:

・ Help Rosies leave things behind that tell us about the strength and importance of these women’s contribution to the past, present and future of America;

・ Tell the valid and full story of the Rosies’ work during the war, how they pioneered the women’s movement, how they nurtured combat veterans after the war, and what oldest Americans are capable of today;

・ Help Rosies contribute today — America has done little to educate with them in 70 years since the war;

・ Help to pull America together again, with Rosies helping to guide us.

“If you or someone you know is age 92 or older and fits the description of a Rosie, please contact Direction Home of Eastern

Ohio at 330-505-2356,” Valentini said.

“During World War II, 6 million women worked on the homefront,” Valentini said. “It’s a blessing to know Rosies. It takes commitment from many to show that Americans can — and will — pull together to honor and learn from these incredible women of ‘The Greatest Generation.’ We hope this project inspires you to help us do what Rosies have done — pull America together, for us all.”

THE PROJECT

For Montague, the American Rosie Movement is a personal project. Born in 1939, she grew up in Huntington, W.Va., the daughter of a Rosie who inspected lenses for gun sights.

On her first day of school in 1945, her grandmother told 6-year-old Montague, “Anne, you are lucky. You are growing up in a free country and you are going to be able to get an education.”

“She made me promise that I would use that freedom wisely,” Montague said.

Telling the story of Rosies, riveters and otherwise, is a way to honor that promise.

“The purpose of the American Rosie Movement is to carry on the legacy and attitude of the Rosies in the world around us,” the movement website states. “We believe this can be done through hard work and creative endeavors. We want to foster a community of artists, workers, institutions and charities to make the world a place, where people carry on the Rosie spirit.”

In 2008, Montague interviewed her first “Rosie,” a woman named Garnet who riveted airplanes in California. That inspired Montague to find more Rosies across the country. In 2009, a West Virginia newspaper ran an ad: “Help us find a Rosie.” A Cincinnati woman who inspected airplane parts was the first to respond but responses kept coming in.

After 18 years in Boston in project management for international trade and technology commercialization, she moved back to West Virginia as executive director of Thanks! Plain and Simple to spearhead the American Rosie Movement in Charleston.

“We have interviewed many Rosies from Ohio, often from Akron,” she said. “But none from the Youngstown area. Whatever you can do to help us find them is most helpful. We chose Youngstown to be a model Rosie city, because we feel women are there and we need help finding them.”