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Bo wernccan, \ Lok eCity womart iolet Camken Bowerman does not get out much anymore. Her hace | problems — a legacy from her contributions to the Second World f War — have grown worse over the years. She may not even be able | to attend the Remembrance Day ceremony at the Belleville > | jeengte today. . Bow , 84, enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force Women’s Division in ‘ |1941, two years after the Great War began in Europe. ki 4 Recalling the war effort of the time, she explained the desperate a for new Uu ¥ recruits. 7 } “Men went to war first and they ran out of people, The war g A | they had to hire us women who were just washing dishes at hor } | The men went off to do something else and the women had to fill |Who used to pack those parachutes and all those tla Iwas 01 500 women in “YOU HAD TO LEARN HOW TO MAKE PARACHUTES. | KNEW HOW TO SEW SO! GOT THAT JOB. MAKING PARACHUTES WAS NOT THAT e EASY. THEY’RE BIG AND } SLIPPERY BECAUSE THE | FABRIC WE USED WERE | NYLON. YOU HAD TO HAVE | HELP. THERE WERE USUALLY : THREE PEOPLE — MEN AND oo es He arm nei fon wi WOMEN COMBINED.” she had lived before the war — WAR VETERAN Sete th oleae chores r d _— = fa e g the RCAF, with others, training camp | ‘in the outskirts of Terai pavine received her basic training here, Bowerman left for ‘e, Ottawa for furth er training before moving on to a tour of aay ing D: and gre duated to the ng them. ~ Ie arn how to make eS I knew how to sew so I got that not that easy. They're big and slippery because the You had to ha’ ‘Ip. There were usually three peo- combined,” said chuckling at the thought. utes was imported from Europe but that was unim- ‘0 Bowerman. — “The only bse ee thing was pe make tiie parachutes right because if you someone ‘because all, the ‘parachutes:have the names of e who had made them, you could be held responsible,” she said. HrAtebuac nce { Wor