Spec. 5 Alberta V. Marth of St. James.

For the first time in 104 years, the New Ulm unit of the National Guard has a member who is a woman.

Spec. 5 Alberta V. Marth of St. James is also the first full time technician to be hired by the local unit.

In order to get her through, the unit’s battalion had to be reorganized and receive specific authorization to hire a woman. That authorization came through May 1; earlier, the local unit wouldn’t have been able to hire a woman.

According to M. Sgt. Laverne J. Rubey ,no specific request was made by the New Ulm unit for the reorganization.

“This is something that’s happening all over the country,” he says.

That reorganization, which he describes as a formality, happened to come near the same time Spec. 5 Marth applied for a position which happened to be open, he says.

SPEC. 5 MARTH originally entered the National Guard last August, signing with a unit in St. Paul. Yet, while she was assigned to that unit (which had authorization), she was “attached”‘ to the unit in St. James, which is a member of the same battalion New Ulm is.

She had worked part time with that unit and did a little recruitment work; in New Ulm, she will be a full time administrator with personnel and records.

She had served active duty in the Air Force in the middle 1960’s. A native of Montana, she says she entered the armed forces originally in order to travel and for an education. Although the education she received was limited, she enjoyed the service so much during her active duty that she became interested in the National Guard.

“I guess I’d always liked the military,”she says.

SHE IS ONE of about 140 women in the National Guard in Minnesota. Most of those are assigned to units near the Twin Cities. But Spec. 5 Marth think many more women will be entering Guard in the future.

“More girls are becoming interested in different areas of the military branches,” she says.

For now, however, she is the woman in a New Ulm National Guard with 16 officers and 109 enlisted mebers

She is also the only member who mother-in-law of another battalion officer Spec. 5 Marth points out.

Her son-in-law, John Keech, is a lieutenant in the St. Peter unit.

New Ulm Daily Journal

May 27, 1975