profeminist: SHE DID IT THANKS FOR THE INSPIRATION MARY DOYLE KEEFE, AKA "ROSIE THE RIVETER" Model for Norman Rockwell's 'Rosie the...
SHE DID IT
THANKS FOR THE INSPIRATION MARY DOYLE KEEFE, AKA “ROSIE THE RIVETER”
Model for Norman Rockwell’s ‘Rosie the Riveter’ dies at 92
“You know Mary Doyle Keefe, but maybe not by that name. In 1943, the then-19-year-old telephone operator had been called upon to provide a unique kind of service during the war effort: Become the face of dedicated patriotism from the home front.
Norman Rockwell painted Keefe as “Rosie the Riveter,” an image that graced an iconic Saturday Evening Post cover and “became a symbol for millions of American women who went to work during World War II,” according to the Norman Rockwell Museum.
Keefe, 92, died in Connecticut this week after a brief illness, her family told the Associated Press on Wednesday.
How Keefe’s likeness came to be immortalized — and turned into a symbol of female independence — happened rather serendipitously. Rockwell and Keefe were neighbors in Arlington, Vt., and he often asked folks in the community to pose for his work.
[Real-life ‘Rosie the Riveter’ women share their stories and philosophy]
The resulting image — of “Rosie” with a rivet gun on her lap, sandwich in hand and “Mein Kempf” beneath her feet — didn’t quite resemble the 19-year-old. Keefe, who told the Courant she had never even seen a rivet gun before, was petite, contrasting with Rosie’s large biceps, broad shoulders and large hands.
“Other than the red hair and my face, Norman Rockwell embellished Rosie’s body,” Keefe told the Courtant. “I was much smaller than that and did not know how he was going to make me look like that until I saw the finished painting.”
Rockwell sent Keefe a letter 24 years after completing the painting, apologizing for bulking her in size “and calling her the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen,” the AP reported. “I did have to make you into a sort of a giant,” he wrote.
A popular song, “Rosie the Riveter,” predated the painting, as did J. Howard Miller’s motivational “We can do it!” poster. But the Rockwell work, which includes a lunch pail emblazoned with the name “Rosie,” received wide distribution via the Saturday Evening Post.
In an obituary written by Keefe’s family, the painting is described as “a nationally known icon of American resolve for women assisting in the war effort during World War II.” Keefe, the obituary said, earned “much appreciation and acclaim over the years” for it.”
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