served in Hawaii, doing roughly the same kind of work, and holding the same ratings, that they would have held in the United States. About an equal number of women served in Alaska as well. A select group of SPAR officers and enlisted personnel were assigned to work with the Long Range Aid to Navigation at monitoring stations in the Continental United States. Better known under the acronym LORAN, it was a top-secret radio navigation system developed for ships at sea, and long-range aircraft. The first monitoring station staffed by SPARS was at Chatham, Massachusetts, after they had received two months of instructions at M.I.T. on the operation and maintenance of LORAN. The unit at Chatham is believed to have been (at the time) the only all-female staffed one of its kind in the world. The SPARS was inactivated on July 25, 1947, but was reestablished on a much smaller scale in 1949. Approximately 200 women who had been in the SPARS reenlisted and served during the Korean War. They mostly served at the Coast Guard Headquarters in Washington, D.C. In 1973 women were integrated into the active-duty Coast Guard and the Coast Guard Reserve. The SPARS ended and those in it were sent to the Coast Guard Reserve. Women of the SPARS The average SPAR officer was 29 years old, single, a college graduate, and had worked seven years in a professional or managerial position (in education or government) before entering the service. The average enlisted SPAR was 24 years old, single, a high school graduate, and had worked for over three years in a clerical or sales job before joining the service. The likelihood was that she came from the state of Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, or California. The reasons for becoming a SPAR differed, but most likely it was patriotism, self-advancement, desire for travel and adventure, or the loss of a loved one in the war. In their off-duty hours, SPARS contributed time and effort to many community and wartime causes. Some became active nurse's aides, some rolled bandages for the Red Cross, others donated blood to blood banks, some visited service men in convalescent hospitals, and others collected gifts for the men overseas. Many of them were also involved in the March of Dimes campaigns, and war chest and war bond drives. Both officers and enlisted were awarded ribbons and medals based on their