Ottawa woman returns inspired from Operation HerStory Honor Flight

Ottawa Navy veteran Charlotte McGrath had a difficult time deciding which part of her participation in Operation HerStory was her favorite, Chicago Honor Flight’s first women-only trip.

She decided, though, her favorite part was the trip to the Korean War Memorial and the powerful presentation participants saw alongside it. Her late husband, Jim, served in the Korean War and it was her hope he would get to go on an Honor Flight with her.

“[The Korean War Memorial] has a dozen or so men in full combat gear, life size and made of steel, and the expressions on their faces are just unreal,” McGrath said. “I mean, it’s just so emotional and they’re depicted like they’re in a rice paddy normal to what it was like in Korea. It was just so inspiring.”

The World War II Memorial also was special to McGrath, especially since she witnessed two women older than 100 honored.

“One of them was 103-turning-104 and I’m telling you, she could run circles around me. She’s a spry one,” McGrath said.

McGrath, a Vietnam veteran, said the trip was a wonderful feeling and all 93 veterans that traveled were treated like queens for the day. Included in the trip were two World War II veterans, seven Korean War veterans and 84 Vietnam War veterans.

McGrath and all the veterans were taken to the Women in Military Service for American Memorial before seeing a Changing of the Guard at Arlington National Cemetery. Afterward, they visited the memorials on the National Mall, which included a special moment at the Vietnam Women’s Memorial.

The return home was just as memorable for McGrath as the trip out there, even if she didn’t get much in the way of opportunity for sleep.

“It’s the number of people that we saw when we flew into Washington D.C. and when we came back to Chicago,” McGrath said. “Oh my gosh, it was just unreal. I bet there were probably 400 or 500 people welcoming us back.”

Of these people welcoming the veterans home were McGrath’s family, her grandson and his wife and their children.

McGrath said she felt lost by the time she got to see them: She had been up for nearly 40 hours as she’d traveled into Arlington Heights the night before her flight and then stayed there to visit.

“There were so many volunteers in between Chicago and D.C. and they just treated us like queens,” McGrath said. “It was phenomenal, and they’re really hoping we can come back and be ambassadors for them.”

McGrath said there’s about 7,300 women veterans in Illinois and of the ones that are eligible, 3% have taken an Honor Flight trip.

“They’re really hoping we can share our time and experiences to get the word out more,” McGrath said. “It didn’t cost us anything. Everything was paid for and it was just great.”