| Charity Edna Adams Earley | |
|---|---|
| Born | December 5, 1918 Kittrell, Vance County, North Carolina |
| Died | January 13, 2002 Dayton, Montgomery County, Ohio |
| Years of service | 1942 − 1946 |
| Rank | Lieutenant Colonel |
| Commands held | 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion |
| Other work | educator |
Charity Edna Adams Earley was the first African American woman to be an officer in the Woman’s Army Air Corps and was the commanding officer of the first battalion of African American women to serve overseas during WWII.
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Born in 1918 in Kittrell, Vance County, North Carolina, Adams' father was a minister and her mother was a teacher.[1] Adams was the oldest of four children. She graduated from Booker T. Washington High School and Wilberforce University in Ohio, majoring in math and physics.[1] After graduation she returned to Columbia, teaching school and attended graduate school at Ohio State University during the summer months.[1]
Adams enlisted in the U.S. Army's Woman’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) in July 1942.[1] She was the first African American woman to be an officer in the WAAC. Later she served as the commanding officer and battalion commander of the first battalion of African American women (6888th Central Postal Direction) to serve overseas during WWII (in England). They helped soldiers get mail during World War II.
After serving in the Army, she earned a master’s degree in psychology from Ohio State University and became an educator at Tennessee A&I College and Georgia State College.[1]
Adams married a physician, Stanley A. Earley, M.D., after the war in 1949; they had two children; a son, Stanley III; and a daughter, Judith.
Adams was listed on the Smithsonian Institution’s 110 most important historical Black women, Black Women Against the Odds, in 1982. She was inducted into the Ohio Women's Hall of Fame in 1979 and the Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame in 1993. She was inducted into the South Carolina Black Hall of Fame in 1991.[1]
Earley was included in the 1997 edition of the BellSouth African-American History Calendar.[1]