Banker was a 25-year-old telephone operator from New York when she joined the U.S. Army Signal Corps in 1918. They were called the “Hello Girls,” the frivolous sobriquet belying the invaluable work these American women performed as switchboard operators near the front lines in France.

Timbie never met her grandmother, who died three years before she was born, but she feels a deep connection to her. She has spent years researching the Hello Girls and joined other families in lobbying for long-overdue recognition of their service.

The more she has learned, the more amazed she is at the courage and patriotism of these young women from the prior century, Timbie said in a phone interview.

“Think about it,” she said. “These women did not have the right to vote.

“They all volunteered. They all wanted to be a part of the Signal Corps and they wanted to do their bit to win the war.”

Inside a steamer trunk stored for decades in her parents’ basement, Timbie found a treasure trove: her grandmother’s dog tags, gas mask, mess kit and uniform, and the letters she sent home.

Timbie also found Grace’s wartime diary. It’s a rare and rich window into the service and sacrifice of these American women.

On March 6, 1918, Banker wrote about departing for France from New York Harbor, on an ocean liner converted into a troop ship, with 32 other women in her charge. “I have crossed the Rubicon now,” she wrote. “There can be no turning back.”

“With faces glued to portholes and doors, watched the Statue of Liberty fade from sight. For the first time, suddenly realized what a responsibility I have on my young shoulders.”

A perfect fit

Banker grew up in Passaic, N.J., and went to Barnard College in New York City, where she double-majored in French and history. She was working as a switchboard trainer for AT&T when she answered Gen. John Pershing’s call for operators who spoke French and English “equally well.”

America had declared war on Germany in 1917. Communications among the French and American troops were challenging, and it was taking too long for messages to get through. Pershing knew he needed to improve the efficiency of critical communications, Timbie said.

“The telephone was the new technology at the time,” she said. “They needed to get the best equipment, which was supplied by AT&T, and the best operators, who were American women operators. So they put out the word.”

And Grace Banker, she said, “was just exactly the person they were looking for — right place, right time.”

More than 7,600 women volunteered for the first 100 positions. Banker was chosen to be chief operator.

Her team was first stationed at Pershing’s headquarters in Chaumont, France, where at first, some of the male officers were a bit dismissive of the women, Timbie said. But that soon changed, as the women proved much quicker and more efficient at handling communications than the American “doughboys” who previously struggled to do the job, she said.

To the front

The women lived in a home with meals provided by volunteers from the YWCA. From what Timbie has read, “They were not at risk and it actually was a very pleasant time,” she said.

That soon changed.

On Aug. 26, 1918, the orders came down: The Signal Corps women were needed at the front.

Seven women were transferred to the First Army, and Banker was their chief operator. They served first during the Battle of Saint-Mihiel and later at Meuse-Argonne. “It was a stark contrast to the comforts of their home in Chaumont,” Timbie said.

Their barracks were dilapidated, cold enough to freeze water overnight, and the roof leaked when it rained. They ate in the mess hall with the officers.

“They were involved in relaying troop movements, helping to coordinate infantry, and to help call in artillery barrages,” Timbie said. “All while translating French and English and memorizing code words.”

An entry from Banker’s diary on Oct. 3, 1918, reveals the peril: “Several heavy explosions heard today. Not particularly good news from the front ... The resistance is very strong. It makes you sick to think of this struggle going on and on and so many boys dying.”

The operators worked long days, getting by on just a few hours of sleep, Banker’s diary entries reveal. “It was exhausting work, but my grandmother was just so proud of the work that they all did,” Timbie said. “She was so proud of the women she called ‘her girls,’ but she also spoke highly of the mutual respect and the code of loyalty that the 1st Army officers and the women had.”

After the war

When Banker returned home, she got married and had four children, three boys and a girl — Timbie’s mother. The family spent summer vacations on Squirrel Island in Lake Winnipesaukee.

Her grandmother didn’t often talk about the war, Timbie’s parents, now deceased, told her. But in 1974, writing under her married name, Grace Banker Paddock, she recalled her Signal Corps service in an essay published in Yankee magazine.

“The night before the actual signing of the Armistice, I was on duty in the office,” she wrote. “Suddenly the door opened. Half skipping, in a sort of lockstep formation, in came all the French boys from their office beyond. In answer to my expressed amazement, le Sergent Alexandre said, ‘La guerre est finie.”

The war was over.

After the 1918 Armistice, Grace Banker worked in the residence where President Woodrow Wilson lived during the Paris peace conference. But she missed the action, so she transferred to serve with the Army of Occupation at Koblenz, Germany.

And that’s where her wartime service was finally recognized with the Distinguished Service Medal. The commendation read in part: “By untiring devotion to her exacting duties under trying conditions, she did much to assure the success of the telephone service during the operations of the First Army against the Saint Mihiel salient (battlefield) and the operations to the north of Verdun.”

After the war, American soldiers got war bonuses, medals, and veteran benefits. But the women from the Signal Corps they served with “got none of those things,” Timbie said.

“The women took the Army oath — some of them twice. They wore Army regulation uniforms. They followed orders.”

But back home, “They were not considered veterans and it was just such a disappointment,” Timbie said. “And it’s such an injustice.”

Long-delayed honors

In 1977, then-President Jimmy Carter signed legislation retroactively recognizing the military service of the women who served in the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) during World War II, and other groups that had “rendered service to the Armed Forces of the United States ….”

Two years later, the Signal Corps operators were granted status as veterans. Only 33 of the 233 women who served were still alive to receive their Victory Medals and official discharge papers.

From what relatives have told her, her grandmother was never enamored with the nickname given these women operators — the Hello Girls, Timbie said. “I was a Signal Corps girl,” she used to say.

But the name stuck — and their story has been gaining attention in recent years, memorialized in books, a documentary film and even a musical, “The Hello Girls,” which was performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., earlier this year.

Earlier this year, Rep. Pappas and his staff helped Timbie submit the required documentation for Grace Banker to receive the WWI Victory Medal. At Thursday’s ceremony, Pappas said Banker’s story “is a powerful one, and it’s uniquely American.”

Timbie and other relatives are now pushing for one final recognition for the Signal Corps women: The Congressional Gold Medal.

A measure to award them the medal has passed the Senate, and has 276 co-sponsors in the House, Timbie said. All four members of New Hampshire’s Congressional delegation have signed on.

“We are so very close,” Timbie said.

Grace Banker Paddock is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, N.Y.; her simple headstone bears no mark of her military service. But later this month, a bronze plaque will be installed that commemorates her wartime contributions, and her New Hampshire relatives plan to be there.

Working for recognition for Banker and the other women with whom she served has been a “labor of love,” Timbie said.

“I’m so proud of my grandmother and her service,” she said. “She was a leader. And she basically got the job done.”

swickham@unionleader.com