The carrier spent a year preparing for the women, who by this fall will make up 10 percent of the some 5,000 crew members when the ship likely deploys off the coast of the former Yugoslavia. More than $1 million was spent ripping out urinals, installing sanitary-napkin dispensers and erecting walls for more privacy in sleeping quarters (small change compared with the tens of millions of dollars carriers normally spend on repairs). Seminars on sexual harassment were held for crewmen and wives who worried about hanky-panky at sea.
Not everyone has adjusted fully to the changes. Enlisted men still trip up and call Lt. Cmdr. Jan Hamby “sir.” She usually jokes back, “I knew I should have shaved my legs today.” Opposition to women in combat still runs deep among male aviators. “The good-ole-boy network will continue, except you won’t see it,” says a West Coast navy pilot. “It will be like the Klan in the Deep South.” It’ll take more than gynecologists to change the U.S. Navy.
