After spending 21 years in the U.S. Air Force, Erin Rose has her share of stories about serving in the military.
Rose knows many other women across the state have them, too, but that they’re often not told. She’s hoping to change that.
Rose, who lives in Weatherford in Parker County, is looking for female veterans or family members of female veterans who have died to talk about their military service for a documentary film she is producing.
While Rose’s goal is to tell the stories of female veterans from all over the state, she’s beginning her search in North Texas and hopes to find individuals in Waxahachie and Ellis County. Rose said so far the farthest south she has found a volunteer is Mansfield.
“I’m trying to get folks who are farther south,” Rose said. “Waxahachie, Corsicana and all of those different towns because I know there are women veterans all over just waiting to be discovered, whether they’re living or they’ve passed away.”
Untold stories
Rose served in the Air Force from 1998 to 2019. She retired from the security forces career field and also worked in professional military education.
Since retirement she has helped veterans in different ways, including assisting them at memory care facilities.
She said being around many of the female veterans made her realize that they had interesting backgrounds but that few people talked about them.
One person who helped inspire the project was Nikki Anderson, who served in the Air Force during the Korean War. Rose said Anderson would often talk to her about her time in the Air Force and her career as a cryptologist.
“I want them to share their stories because I come from a long line of military men and we know all their stories,” Rose said. “I go all over Texas and look at veteran memorial walls with men’s and women’s names. I can Google and more often than not I’m finding the obituaries of the men that talk about their military service. And very rarely am I finding a woman’s service story being mentioned. It will say she served in the Navy, but it won’t tell me anything more. So I’m really encouraging women who are alive to share their stories now before they’re passed on. Like my aunt, who I’m researching her story doing this and other people’s family members who might not have known the true story of them.”
Rose said she was originally going to write about women veterans, but then she met a filmmaker who encouraged her to make a film documentary instead.
She began going to filmmaking classes in Mineral Wells, where Rose learned to use an iPhone to create short films. Once she got enough footage from female veterans in the area, she produced “Women Veterans of Texas,” a 15-minute film featuring female veterans who talk about enlisting in the military, their service time and life after the military.
Next she wants to expand that into a full two-hour film that takes a deeper look at the service of female veterans. The goal is to start in Texas since Texas has more female veterans (approximately 200,000) and more total veterans than any other state in the country.
Rose said in two years she wants to interview female veterans from across the United States.
Rose said she already has 60 women from across the state who have expressed interest in participating, and she has conducted 20 interviews.
“I know I can’t use all of them for a two-hour film,” Rose said. “But I’m setting up a website and teaming up with the Library of Congress. They have their veteran history project. So any woman veteran or their family who does the release to turn over the footage to the Library of Congress will also have it preserved there.”
Rose said during her interviews she has already heard common stories of female veterans getting overlooked.
“Of the stories I’ve done so far, every one of them is like, ‘Our husbands get thanked for their service, even if they never served,’” Rose said. “We don’t get bitter about it. Most of these husbands say, ‘No, no, no. She served. She did 20 years, so you need to ask her.’”
Rose said she can relate.
“All of us as women veterans we feel that nobody asks us about our service,” Rose said. “If we share it, people say, ‘Woah, you did what?’ I get that from some of the male veterans in my own family.”
Rose said she hopes the film will not only educate people about the military service of women but also encourage female veterans to speak freely about how they served the country.
“It’s really to inspire women to tell our story,” Rose said. “At the end of the day I want us to all feel that we are worthy to share our story of service, whether we went to combat or not. I have had women veterans who have let me write down their stories but don’t want to be on film because of things they went through.”
Rose encourages any female veteran who is interested in being interviewed for the film to contact her at womenveteransoftxfilm@gmail.com. She also urges family members of female veterans who have died to contact her as well, even if all they have is a name and a photo but no information on her service. Rose said with her history as a police officer and a genealogist she can find out more information about the veteran.
“I really want any woman or family member of a woman who has passed away that says, ‘I have this woman veteran in my family I don’t know anything about,’” Rose said, “I want to get those stories told both from the women who are still alive and who want to volunteer.”
