institutional change – A Grain of Salt

The Decision

Published October 12, 2026

50 Stories for 50 Years | Post 39 Debbie, my USNA roommate, had moved back to Annapolis. That fact alone set something in motion. We fell into a rhythm of lunch every couple of weeks, the kind that stretches past two hours without noticing. We were also approaching the 50th anniversary of women at the service academies, which had a way of pulling the past into the present conversation whether you invited it or not.…

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Those Who Came Before

Published October 5, 2026

50 Stories for 50 Years | Post 38 I was an ignorant, self-important mid. I can say that now, almost fifty years later. I thought our burden as early women at the Academy was the heaviest one anyone had carried. I was a teenager. Teenagers think that. The law changed in 1975. Women could enter the Naval Academy in 1976. The Academy knew what that meant, and it began stationing naval officers with strong records…

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Well, Bless Me

Published September 28, 2026

50 Stories for 50 Years — Post 37 It’s football season, and Navy football holds many memories for me. One of them involves a president. In the early 1950s, my father, Frank Andrews, was the commissioning commanding officer of the USS Barracuda (SSK-1), a small experimental anti-submarine warfare submarine. His engineering officer was a young Jimmy Carter. They shared a wardroom. In 1976, the bicentennial year, I campaigned for Carter while still in high school. I…

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The Women One Year Ahead

Published September 14, 2026

50 Stories for 50 Years — Post 35 Recently, at my 45th reunion, we were standing in line to get into the football stadium talking with my classmates when one of my male classmates asked me a question: “Did any of the women ahead of you help you out?” A simple question. It didn’t have a fast answer. For the first women at USNA, every step meant figuring out how to be a new first,…

Dogged Determination – Celebrating a 45th reunion

Published September 7, 2026

50 Stories for 50 Years — Post 34 My roommate and I didn’t become close to our male companymates at the Academy. That sounds strange to say. We lived together, trained together, survived Plebe Summer together. But the pressure of being among the first women midshipmen didn’t leave much room for the kind of friendship that deepens slowly. You were managing too much to be fully present to each other. The guys themselves were finding…

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Underway

Published August 31, 2026

50 Stories for 50 Years — Post 33 After plebe summer, after a full academic year of being told exactly where to be and exactly what to do, and after climbing Herndon, the Navy hands you a ship and says, “Run it.” Not entirely. Not alone. But it felt close enough. A tension is worth naming before this story starts. Throughout the academic year, we trained alongside our male classmates: same classes, same formations, same…

Tag: institutional change