Lieutenant, US Army, Jeanne Estelle Frost Roth

Born: July 15, 1919, Broad Ford, Pennsylvania

Died: June 24, 2013, Albuquerque, New Mexico

Lieutenant Jeanne Estelle Frost Roth joined the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) of the US Army. The exact date is unknown, but it must have been after September of 1942 when she was a civilian defense messenger.¹ From the caption on her photograph, she served at Camp McCoy in Wisconsin in 1944.² She was a unique member of the Wacs, being a dietician, but she was stationed at a unique camp.³ Not only was it a training camp, designed to house, train, and feed 35,000 US soldiers, it was the largest camp for housing Japanese POWs in the continental US.⁴ It housed POWs from North Africa and Europe as well. Sadly, it was also one of the Japanese Internment Camps that housed Americans of Japanese descent. Conversely, it was also the training ground for the 442^nd Infantry Regimental Combat Team, the most famous and most decorated unit in US Army History whose members were all second-generation Americans of Japanese descent.⁵

When Lt. Frost left the Army is unknown, but it appears likely she left in early 1945.⁶

Jeanne Estelle was the first child born to George and Frances Frost on July 15, 1919, in Broad Ford, Pennsylvania.^7,8 Her only sibling, a brother, was born before the family moved to Willard Ohio, but there would be step-brothers and step-sisters after her parents divorced.^9,10,11 Frost Roth graduated from Willard High School, doing well enough academically to be chosen as the representative for the local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution in a national competition.^12,13 After high school, she went on to attend Wittenberg College and join the Alpha Xi Delta women’s fraternity.¹⁴ She probably took her degree in either 1941 or 1942, then joined the WAC.

In January 1945, she married Captain John Y.C. Roth of the US Army Air Force.^15,16 This marriage made Frost Roth a military wife, so her service to her country was not over when she left the WAC. The family would move around as Frost Roth’s husband was reassigned. By 1950, the Roth family was living in Arlington, Virginia after living in Delaware, Ohio, and the Panama Canal Zone, the locations where her children were born.¹⁷

Nor were they finished, as her husband was transferred to Texas, where Frost Roth would take an advanced degree from Texas Tech, and to Michigan before being sent to Colorado Springs, Colorado in 1958.^18,19,20 In 1961, her husband was transferred again, but as he was stationed in Greenland for a time, the rest of the family stayed in Colorado Springs until his return as the Director of Air Defense Command at Ent Air Force Base.^21,22,23,24 While in Colorado Springs, Frost Roth worked as a dietician at Penrose Hospital.²⁵

Frost Roth settled down in Albuquerque, New Mexico when her husband retired in 1970.²⁶ But sitting idle was not for Frost Roth, who was hired to supervise the New Mexico Commission on Aging.²⁷ She lost her husband of forty-eight years in 1993.²⁸ Having served her country, first in the Army, then as an Air Force wife, Jeanne Estelle Frost Roth passed away in Albuquerque, New Mexico on June 24, 2013.

Images & Documents

Notes:

1. “Civilian Defense Service on Friday. New Castle News. New Castle, Pennsylvania. 17 September 1942. p. 19.
2. “Lt. Jeanne Frost, Camp McCoy, Wis. 1944.” US Department of Veterans Affairs: Veterans Legacy Memorial. The writing is hard to read, but this is the only camp that fits the blurred writing.
3. Frost Roth’s degree was likely in diet and nutrition since she appears to have had no other rank and had a career in that field after the war. Since there is no evidence she was promoted from some lower rank, she must have started as a lieutenant, so she must have served in a medical capacity.
4. “US Army Fort McCoy: History.” US Army at army.mil. Site Last Modified: 26 May 2022. Copyright 2023. paragraphs 21 & 22.
5. “Fort McCoy, WI: History.” Fort McCoy Housing. Copyright Post Housing 2023. All the information since the previous footnote comes from this site.
6. Frost married in January of 1945 and her first child was 5 in the 1950 census. Please see notes 16 & 17 below.
7. “Jeanne F. Roth.” Ancestry.com. U.S., Cemetery and Funeral Home Collection, 1847-Current [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2011. Publication Date: 27/ Jun/ 2013; Publication Place: Albuquerque, New Mexico.
8. “Frost.” Year: 1920; Census Place: Dunbar, Fayette, Pennsylvania; Roll: T625_1568; Page: 4B; Enumeration District: 21.
9. “Frost.” Year: 1930; Census Place: Willard, Huron, Ohio; Page: 4A; Enumeration District: 0034; FHL microfilm: 2341557. (pp 1 & 2)
10. “Frost.” Year: 1940; Census Place: Willard, Huron, Ohio; Roll: m-t0627-03088; Page: 16A; Enumeration District: 39-14.
11. “Frances Coburn.” Mansfield News-Journal. Mansfield, Ohio. 22 February 1989. p. 4.
12. “58 to Graduate.” Mansfield News-Journal. Mansfield, Ohio. 2 April 1937. p. 8.
13. “Willard Briefs.” Mansfield News-Journal. Mansfield, Ohio. 19 January 1937. p. 5.
14. “Five Local Members of Wittenberg Chapter Alpha Xi Delta.” Springfield Daily News. Springfield Ohio. 14 August 1940. p. 6.
15. “Roth, John Y. C.” United States Military Registers, 1902–1985. Salem, Oregon: Oregon State Library. 1948.
16. “Marriage Licenses: Granted.” Lancaster New Era. Lancaster, Pennsylvania. 12 January 1945. p. 3.
17. “Roth.” National Archives at Washington, DC; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Year: 1950; Census Place: All Places, Arlington, Virginia; Roll: 732; Page: 79; Enumeration District: 7-9.
18. “Kinross AFB is Commended.” Sault Daily Star. Sault St. Marie, Ontario, Canada. 25 October 1957. p. 13.
19. “Nutrition Program.” Santa Fe New Mexican. Santa Fe, New Mexico. 7 October 1974. sec. B p. 1.

20 & 21. “Fran Roth Named Editor of GT Women’s Section.” Colorado Springs Gazette-Telegraph. Colorado Springs, Colorado. 6 February 1966. p. 8.

22. “Courier Scribe Finds the Arctic A Hostile and Dangerous County.” Pittsburgh Courier. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 28 September 1963. p. 5.
23. “AF Evacuation Draws Plaudits.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Fort Worth, Texas. 18 November 1963. p. 6 sec. 3.
24. “Col. J Roth New Director ADC Section.” Colorado Springs Gazette-Telegraph. Colorado Springs, Colorado. 21 October 1966. p. 2.
25. See note 20.
26. “Roth, John Y. C.” Beneficiary Identification Records Locator Subsystem (BIRLS) Death File. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
27. “Nutrition Program.” Santa Fe New Mexican. Santa Fe, New Mexico. 7 October 1974. sec. B p. 1.
28. “Roth, John Y. C. Roth.” Albuquerque Journal: Obituaries. Albuquerque, New Mexico. 2 December 1993. sec. D p. 19.

Compiled by: A. D. McLean, MA, MLIS. Central New Mexico Community College, retired 2022.

Featured Image:

“Lt. Jeanne Frost, Camp McCoy, Wis. 1944.” US Department of Veterans Affairs: Veterans Legacy Memorial. Retrieved: 13 September 2023. https://www.vlm.cem.va.gov/JEANNEFROTH/15287B9