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posters from the period promoted the idea of women contributing to the war effort as central players and not merely as support staff to the men. They depicted females with expressions of serious purpose. They had carefully coiffed hair, wore smart uniforms, and performed such roles as air traffic controllers and parachute riggers. Underscoring the posters’ imagery were their taglines. “Share the Deed of Victory,” said one. “Don’t Miss Your Great Opportunity,” implored another.
    In her official navy portrait, Esther appears transformed from the mousy, shy girl of her student years to a picture of 1940s glamour and sophistication—not unlike one of the WAVES in those navy recruitment posters. Gone are the glasses and the slumped shoulders of her high school yearbook. Instead, Esther wears an expression of self-assuredness. She is smiling brightly and her lips are painted a dark shade of crimson. Under Esther’s smart navy cap, her face is framed by a short, stylish bob of curls. It seems that in the navy, Esther blossomed.
    Esther Johnson spent the next three years (until November 1945) in the navy. Among her duties, she served as a surgical nurse and a pharmacist’s mate. Her time visiting with burn victims left a lasting impression—it was the reason that Esther became a lifelong supporter of veterans’ causes. When the war ended and Esther left the navy, she had earned the rank of pharmacist’s mate second class.
    Following the war and her discharge, Esther returned briefly to Sorento to visit with her family. During her service, Esther had become enchanted by the West Coast, and following the war it was her desire to resume her college studies. A like-minded girlfriend had some friends in Seattle, and the pair decided to head to Washington.Esther enrolled at Seattle Pacific University, earning a degree in zoology while working the night shift at a laundry and later becoming a manager at the restaurant at Fort Lawton.
    One day in September 1947, while working her shift at the restaurant, she caught the eye of Harry Snyder. “He just came in to deliver sandwich boxes,” she remembered. “Boxes and boxes of sandwiches.” At thirty-four, Harry was seven years Esther’s senior and a head taller than her. He was a sturdy man with a long face, a broad nose, and large basset hound eyes. A no-nonsense kind of fellow, he was not a particularly tall man or classically handsome, but he carried himself well. “He had real friendly eyes,” Esther later recalled, “full of energy.” Although she found him “nosey” at first—“he was asking all these questions and found out about your life history in no time,” she said—Esther soon warmed to him.
    The pair seemed to complement each other perfectly. While Harry was tough and could be demanding, Esther, widely regarded as a gentle soul, did much to soften Harry’s rougher edges. He had street sense; she was book smart. Where he was a maverick, a visionary, she was grounded, practical. Harry was hard-nosed; Esther was sentimental. He was a forceful presence, while she preferred to get things done quietly, behind the scenes. They were both kindhearted souls who shared a generosity of spirit. Harry believed in his ability to create his own opportunities—and Esther believed in Harry.
    After a brief courtship, the pair married in 1948. They decided to leave Seattle and start their life together in Southern California. Harry, who grew up there and whose family now owned a bakery, arrived first; Esther joined him a few months later. At Fort Lawton, Harry had developed take-out bagged lunches to serve the scores of soldiers passing through and he had come up with an idea for a new kind of restaurant. America was on the verge of entering a new age, and Southern California was lighting the way. And so, just as several previous generations of the Johnson and Snyder families had