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Bernice was born in the West Springfield, Massachusetts, on July 24, 1899. In 1918, she answered President Wilson’s call for women to come to the nation’s capital to assist with World War I efforts. Bernice’s father took her to New Haven, Connecticut and put her on the Federal Express, the train line that ran between Boston and Washington. Her description of the capital lit by gaslight drew a picture that illuminated an image in my mind. “They took me for a long ride that night I arrived in Washington. I saw Washington by night. Oh, the heavens opened up you know. I’d never seen anything like it,” Bernice told me. I was captivated by her story about how the Spanish flu gripped the city. “Girls were dying all around me. We all had it. We had it bad.” Bernice stayed in Washington for 90 years where she worked in the Treasury Department.
Fritz Hoffmann Wishes Bernice Madigan a Happy 115th Birthday
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