Read In-N-Out Burger for Free Online

Sorento High School, she was an honor student as well as a member of the glee club, the school chorus, and the commercial club. She was also class president and assistant editor of the Sho-La-Hi . With characteristic modesty, Esther once described her school days by saying that “I had a good time in school.”
    Like many graduates of Sorento High School in the late 1930s who wished to attend their fourth and final year of school (Sorento only offered three years), Esther had to continue at one of the high schools in either Hillsboro or Greenville for a fee. Although it’s not clear how she managed it or who paid the bill at the time, Esther did go on to finish and graduate from Greenville High School in 1937, commuting sixteen miles every day. Esther’s Greenville yearbook inscription reads, “If it takes brains, she’ll get along.”
    Esther’s desire to attend college was stalled when her grandmother suffered a stroke and was left unable to walk. Esther remained in Sorento in order to take care of her grandmother, putting off her studies until 1939, when she enrolled in Greenville College (part ofthe Free Methodist Church). An aunt paid for her first two years of tuition. “She thought I deserved it,” Esther later explained. But her grandfather and uncles seemed perplexed as to why a young lady like Esther wanted to pursue a college education. “Don’t you want to get married?” they regularly asked her. To which she replied: “I like to learn.” During the mornings, Esther cared for her grandmother. In the afternoons, she studied elementary school education at Greenville; upon returning home in the evenings, she took care of the household chores.
    In November 1940, Esther’s grandmother sickened; Esther quit college altogether to look after her grandmother full-time. Four months later, after the death of her grandmother, Esther spent the summer in Sorento working a few jobs, including one at the post office. She borrowed $150 and returned to Greenville College. After earning the equivalent of a teaching certificate, Esther began teaching second grade at Sorento’s primary school.
    It was while Esther was working as a schoolteacher in her hometown that the United States entered World War II. In 1943, Esther joined the war effort, signing up as one of the navy’s newly created WAVES (Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service) at the recruitment office down in St. Louis. It was a bold move for a shy girl from rural Illinois. The WAVES were designated by special order of President Franklin D. Roosevelt to fill the vacancies created by the tens of thousands of men who had been sent to the battlefront. While not eligible for combat duty, WAVES performed a number of jobs previously uncharacteristic for women in the military. In explaining her reasons for joining the navy, Esther remarked, “I thought I might enjoy radio or hospital work. My parents didn’t really comment on it. But my sisters thought it was wonderful.”
    Esther—who had very little experience outside of Sorento before enlisting—was sent to New York City, where she attended boot camp at Hunter College in the Bronx. By special war decree, Hunter was transformed from a college to a naval training ground. Once there, the new recruits spent several weeks immersed in naval organization, administration, and history. In addition, the women were subjected toan intensive program of marching drills and medical exams as well as a battery of aptitude tests. Following boot camp, they were dispatched to their duty stations. Esther was sent to the San Diego Naval Hospital; the navy proved to be her ticket out of the farms and coal mines and the chronic privations of Bond County, Illinois—just as it was for the many young men across the country that had enlisted in droves.
    For the first time, the war put women on an equal footing with men, if only temporarily. WAVES recruiting