5 Rosie the Riveters honored

ELKINS -- Five new members were added to the Randolph County Rosie the Riveter Honor Roll during a ceremony Saturday at Halliehurst Mansion located on the campus of Davis & Elkins College.

Ruth Linger Bell, Wanda Laverne Pickens Bickel, Hazel Virginia Phillips Ramsey, Loretta M. Smith-Keller, and Margie Alice Cavalier Thompson were honored as family and friends gathered to celebrate their accomplishments.

The event was sponsored by Our Town Inc., Lavender Fields Assisted Living, and D&E College. The celebration included a host of guests, including Elkins Mayor Jerry Marco, the Randolph County Senior Center Dulcimer Group, Girl Scout Troop 10142, Becky Ashburn and Sandy Tice. Ashburn, who is a professional storyteller, read for those in attendance, while Tice performed "Amazing Grace" on the bagpipes.

"The feedback we received from everyone in attendance was that they were all very pleased with the entire program," Our Town volunteer Bobbi Trimboli said. "Everything went smoothly and everyone who attended really seemed to enjoy  themselves." 

Ruth Linger Bell, a 1924 graduate of Tygarts Valley High School, was born in Lewis County and was a Rosie during World War II when she assisted Eleanor Roosevelt in securing homes for people with the Homestead Project in the Valley Bend area of Randolph County. She had a masters degree from Davis & Elkins College and was a math teacher at TVHS.

She was the mother of Charles C. Shomo and mother-in-law of Linda Shomo. She was the grandmother of Charles "Todd" Shomo and Stefan Wellesley Shomo, and great grandmother of Wellesley Nolan Shomo.

Margie Alice Cavalier Thompson moved from Elkins to Akron, Ohio during World War II to bucket rivets on the tail sections of B-29s. She was fascinated by flight and it was a good fit for her. Her ability to read sewing patterns, which she learned in Home Economics class at Elkins High School, enabled her to read aircraft blueprints. This was soon recognized by management and she was promoted to inspector.

She was once flying back to Elkins when the weather turned bad and the flight she was on landed in Morgantown. The passengers were put in hotels and early the next morning she didn't hear her wake-up call and slept through and missed the flight to Elkins. Unfortunately, the plane crashed and there were no survivors. She didn't fly again until decades later when she flew to California for a wedding.

Loretta M. Smith-Keller was one of 12 children in her family. In the early 1940s she worked at the Glenn L. Martin Aircraft Factory in Baltimore, Maryland.

In 1948, she moved to Randolph County where she met her future husband Garnett "Shorty" Keller. The couple worked many years at the Elkins Laundry and had two daughters, Janice (Ben) Singleton and Cathy (David ) Moran. They also had four grandchildren and three great children.

She was also employed as a cook at Elkins First Ward School, the Maganagan Boy Scout Camp, and Evenbreth Acres in Buckhannon. 

Wanda Laverne Pickens Bickel, was born in Wildcat, and during World War II traveled to Akron, Ohio to work in a military factory making parts for B-52s. After the war she worked as a school teacher and had a long career as a medical technologist in many different hospitals throughout West Virginia. 

At the age of 65, she decided to enroll at Fairmont State College, where she received a science degree and was once named student of the year. Pickens Bickel married J.M. Bickel in 1944 and the couple had four children together. She passed away in 2022 at the age of 98.

Hazel Virginia Phillips Ramsey was born in Jimtown and traveled to Baltimore, Maryland to become an employee at the Glen Martin Plant during World War II. Her job responsibilities at the plant included welding and riveting the B-26 Bombers. She recalled shift work running 24/7, and wages were 97 cents an hour and $1.07 for night shift. Rosies at the plant purchased small tools from their wages to handle, and signed a document to use large plant tools until they were returned.

She left the war plant to be married to her husband Buck in Florida during the summer of 1944. The couple remained in Florida until they moved back to West Virginia when the war ended. She received an honorary associates degree from Pierpont Community and Technical College in Fairmont that was based on her work as a female technician during the war. She was the mother of eight children, and she had 18 grandchildren and 17 great grandchildren.

Trimboli said Saturday's event was a great success.

"Mayor Marco did our presentations for us and all together we had around 65 people attend the event," she noted. "We were really pleased with the turnout and it was a very enjoyable event for all of us. It was a great tribute to the women we were honoring."

Rosie the Rivters are women who were paid by the government to support the war effort during World War II. Trimboli said the search for next year's class will begin right away.

"There are still women out there, and now that this ceremony is over, we will begin searching for our Rosies for next year," she said.