Date of Award:

5-2026

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Arts (MA)

Department:

History

Committee Chair(s)

Tammy Proctor

Committee

Tammy Proctor

Committee

Victoria Grieve

Committee

Jeannie Johnson

Abstract

United States intelligence historians have largely neglected the importance of women’s intelligence labor as well as the centralized intelligence organizations that existed from World War II to the early years of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) – including the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), Strategic Service Unit (SSU), and Central Intelligence Group (CIG). While assumptions about women in intelligence work during this period are usually drawn from stereotypical portrayals in popular media, such as books and movies, this thesis utilized statistical data and other agency sources to build a broader understanding of women’s actual labor.

This thesis demonstrates that women subverted stereotypes in many ways, including in their diverse life circumstances and in their differing strategies to remain in the U.S. intelligence community. It also illustrates how women in the early CIA (1947- 1953) used strategies learned from the transitional period, as well as those developed during the formation of the CIA, to gain and maintain positions in the agency. To do this, I examined the Panel on Career Service for Women, the CIA’s first gender discrimination panel. This evidence showed that this period (1943-1953) was significant for women in centralized intelligence because they firmly established themselves as vital employees of expanding agencies, which provided a foundation for women’s development of power in the future CIA.

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