Syri just met Erlinda, 102 years old. She’s an original Rosie the Riveter.
I first met her daughter-in-law Lisa while at Walgreens photo center picking up our poster. This just happened in Walgreens. What a blessing!
What Erlinda shared:
She said she went to enlist in the military when her brother was drafted in World War II. They refused, telling her, “We don’t take women.”
She said, “I’m not a woman, I’m a girl.”
She said she wanted to tell him to go to hell, but that stayed internal.
She grew up in Flagstaff, and as a teenager her parents moved the family to Phoenix. When they arrived, she said if she had been 18 she would’ve turned around back to Flagstaff because of the horrendous heat. But she was still under her parents’ wing, and she couldn’t fly by herself yet.
She worked inside the wings of the planes because she was so tiny and could crawl inside the wing with room to maneuver.
She wanted to serve, but they told her she was good enough to stay home, cook, clean, and have kids. She thought, “I’m not having kids.” Lol, thank goodness she did.
— As told to Syri, October 18, 2026.
Leave a Reply