JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Tia Whittaker, 21, is stationed at Naval Station Mayport.
She has spent months out at sea and said being in the Navy gave her a confidence she didn’t know she had.
“When I joined, it wasn’t exactly what I thought it would be. But then I ended up learning to love it,” said the Navy Admin Clerk.
Whittaker said her respect for the service continues to grow three years later after one deployment and giving birth to a baby girl.
Whittaker also has a military family back in Pensacola.
Her brother serves and her father served for 22 years, but Whittaker, who is Black, didn’t always think she would follow in their footsteps.
“If I would have seen more people that have more of like a background like me, it would have been easier for me to see myself in,” Whittaker said. “I didn’t realize how much representation mattered until it was me looking for someone to look up to when I got in...I always kind of looked at it as being a Black woman is like a struggle. But then like joining and seeing that I still have a voice and that I still have like responsibilities...I feel proud. There were times that Black women, this would be like, unheard of to be in.”
In the Revolutionary War, which lasted from 1775 to 1783, Black women served as spies and nurses and documented the accounts of the war.
There were similar roles in the Civil War for Black women like Harriet Tubman, a Union spy.
In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation which allowed Black soldiers to participate in war.
Two years later, Cathay Williams became the first Black woman to enlist in the Army.
Fast forward to 1942, during World War II, Black women were enlisted in the Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps.
In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt opened the Navy to Black women.
It was this same year the G.I. Bill started providing free education, unemployment pay and home loans to millions of veterans but excluded Black veterans.
Addonica Toler, Museum Director of the Eartha M. White Historic Museum and Garden, said the impacts of Black veterans not being able to benefit from the GI Bill are still being felt. Toler said veterans can come to the museum, inside the Clara White Mission, to get assistance.
“It is affecting the community, because then there have been homes to pass down, wealth to pass down or the opportunity to go to college pass more fluently, equally easily than what has been happening in immediate the Black community,” Toler said.
“You were mentioning now, we see a lot happening in our country as it comes to civil rights and social justice movements. Are you hearing anything from veterans when it comes to what they see now in the country they served?” News4JAX asked Toler.
“Well, many of them feel, some I’ve heard say, well, I fought for you to agree, to disagree. And then others feel that we don’t get the respect that we should. And not just African Americans, just across the board, to make sure that the veterans have what they need,” Toler said.
Toler shared the history of women in Jacksonville who filled several roles in the service.
The same efforts are seen today by more Black women who are blazing a path for others.
Demika Jackson was in the US Army from 1999 to 2004. She said she was the first Black woman to open a veteran Chamber of Commerce, not only in the state but in the country.
She started in the war in Kuwait, dealt with military sexual trauma and became a sexual assault response coordinator.
She wears several hats now, helping women veterans get the services they need and said she’s proud to be a Black woman veteran in this country.
“Black women have this resilience about them since the beginning,” Jackson said. “That’s what makes us different, that regardless of when the world beats us down, we don’t let that stop us. We continue moving forward...Honestly, it started with my great-grandmother and then that built on it because I had a wonderful sergeant, female Black sergeant who took me under her wing.”
Jackson said she would encourage young Black women to serve if they have guidance.
“I went in because it helped my family,” she said. “I’m a single mother, and I just wanted to make sure that my children had what they needed.”
Jackson and Whittaker have similarities: Being guided by someone in service, wanting to help their families and the desire to continue serving their country and community.
“I found that sometimes being a woman period became kind of challenging. We’re not looked at the same, no respect of the same as some atmospheres within the military. And we’re still fighting against that to this day,” Jackson said.
“I know, before I joined, I kind of felt like I walk in the room, I feel invisible. But since I’ve been in, it kind of feels like I walk in the room now, and I set the tone. And that’s something that the military has given me,” Whittaker said.