This pho­to­graph hung for decades in the Nation­al War Muse­um in Ottawa with its sub­jects labeled “uniden­ti­fied”, until Mary’s daugh­ter-in-law learned of its exis­tence in 1995. The pho­to was tak­en to encour­age more women to join the army, and its staged “Indi­an bless­ing” prov­ing pop­u­lar, it was wide­ly reprint­ed dur­ing the war, then forgotten.

Mary Greyeyes was from Muskeg Lake Cree Nation in Saskatchewan. This tiny com­mu­ni­ty (only 367 peo­ple live on the reserve) has a remark­able mil­i­tary his­to­ry. 56 of its youth served in the armed forces, includ­ing sev­en women, most of them named Greyeyes, Arcand or Lafond. Mary Greyeyes joined about the same time that my moth­er joined the Air Force. Muskeg Lake Cree have fought in Europe, Korea, and Afghanistan. Muskeg Lake is also the birth­place of the bal­let dancer, chore­o­g­ra­ph­er and film actor Michael Greyeyes.

Mary returned to Cana­da after fin­ish­ing her ser­vice in 1946, mar­ried, and made a career as an indus­tri­al seam­stress in Van­cou­ver. She died in 2011. The oth­er par­tic­i­pant in the staged pho­to was Har­ry Ball, a Cree from Piapot First Nation, who was a World War I vet­er­an. His Plains Chief regalia was scrounged up on that reserve, where the pho­to was taken.

Pho­tos of CWACS in action. Many were involved in dan­ger­ous work. They were not just clerk-typ­ists and tea-brewers: