Retired Navy nurse still answers call to duty
By Linda McIntosh

CHARLIE NEUMAN / Union-TribuneRetired Navy nurse Carol Grice (above) displayed a photo of herself that appears in "Dressed for Duty: America's Women in Uniform, 1898-1973."

CAMP PENDLETON – Carol Grice changed Marine Corps history. But she never thought of it that way.
Grice, a retired lieutenant commander, served as a Navy nurse from 1954 to 1974.

These days, she volunteers as area manager for Operation Interdependence, a civilian-to-military delivery system for Americans to show their support to deployed military.
As a Navy nurse, she was stationed across the country, from Virginia to Hawaii, and spent two years in Japan, becoming the chief nurse of several wards.

But that's not why her picture is in "Dressed for Duty: America's Women in Uniform, 1898-1973" (Vol. I) by Jill Halcomb Smith. A photograph shows Grice smoking a cigar at Mess Night in 1966.

Until then, female officers had not been invited to the formal dinner. The rule was that all officers were required to attend and women must be content to stay home, Grice recalled. "I thought, if it said all officers, that should include female officers," said Grice, 73.

So she asked the general. At the time, Grice was on the board of governors of the officer's club at the Barstow base.

"I went to Maj. Gen. Masters and said, 'I am requesting an invitation to Mess Night.' He almost fell out of his chair," she recalled.
The answer was, "No."

But Grice asked, "Do you mean I'm a woman first and officer second?" As she recalled, he said, "I guess so."

The following year, Grice and fellow nurses received invitations to Mess Night.
That was one way Grice made her mark.
When she arrived at one of her stations of duty at the Oakland Naval Hospital, she was asked to wash windows.

Grice questioned if that was the best use of her time and it didn't take long before she proved that it wasn't. After a few months, she was asked to take over the ward.
At Camp Lejeune, N.C., Grice was called on to run the emergency room, a job which traditionally was done by corpsmen and doctors.

"I took pride in being able to adapt to any situation," she said.

At Camp Pendleton in the early 1960s, Grice helped set up the intensive care ward. It was before the present Camp Pendleton Naval Hospital was built and she recalled working in temporary wooden buildings called ramps.

"My patients referred to me fondly as Gunny. I guess I was pretty tough and reminded them of their gunnery sergeant," Grice said.

Now 30 years after retiring from the Navy, and working as a civilian nurse, Grice is back serving the country through Operation Interdependence.
"She sets an example for us all and keeps us in line," said Albert Renteria, a retired Marine who started the nationwide program. "She has catapulted our efforts."

Last year, the Oceanside operation sent out about 140,000 goodie bags, known as c-rats, short for civilian rations.
"It wouldn't have been possible without Carol," Renteria said.