Rita Hymel was born in Killona, Louisiana. They had a little schoolhouse and went to school barefoot. They had a pot-bellied stove for heat. She was the oldest of 13 children. Her father and his brother inherited her grandfather's plantation called Landeche. They sold it and now the road is named after that. Her other grandfather had a plantation in Saint Charles Parish [Annotator's Note: Saint Charles Parish, Louisiana]. They used hired help. They had a lot of food to eat. They got one of the first washing machines that came out. Before that, clothes were boiled outside. The first washer was powered by gasoline. Everybody had their own chickens. The fed them corn before they ate them. They were good to eat, unlike today's chicken. They had to empty their pee pots every day until they finally got indoor toilets. She had a lot of friends. Her father sold milk to the locals. They were never deprived of food. On the plantation they had everything they needed. The Great Depression [Annotator's Note: the Great Depression was a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1939 in the United States] did not affect them much. She had a lot of Black [Annotator's Note: African-American] neighbors who were good people. They all slept with their windows open and were not afraid. The world has changed now, you cannot do that. You could trust people back then. All of the Black people that worked on the plantation were good. They knew them all. She and her friends could play underneath their house because it was so high off the ground. She went to high school in Hahnville [Annotator's Note: Hahnville, Louisiana]. After she graduated, she taught first through third grades. She graduated high school younger than 18 because they did not go to school as long as they do now. They had a radio in their house and they would listen to "The Squeaking Door" [Annotator's Note: radio show created by Himan Brown, American radio producer]. There was no news then like there is today. Her parents did not discuss the coming war. She does not recall if she was teaching when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941.

Rita Hymel was asked to be a teacher because she lived the closest to the schoolhouse in Killona [Annotator's Note: Killona, Louisiana]. She enjoyed it. The schoolhouse and the kids had to move to Hahnville [Annotator's Note: Hahnville, Louisiana] after about three years. She got married and moved to Biloxi [Annotator's Note: Biloxi, Mississippi]. She met her husband at a dance at a place called The Green Onion in Hahnville. He was not in the military yet. They were married in 1943. That was the only entertainment they had back then. Hymel was at home when she heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. It upset everybody. Her family just kept working the plantation. Both of her grandpas had plantations. Her ancestors came from France. Her brothers served in the war. One brother was in Japan when the war ended. Another brother was with the American Legion [Annotator's Note: nonprofit organization of American war veterans] and caught Legionnaires Disease [Annotator's Note: a type of pneumonia]. He died three days later. Hymel was the first of 13 children. Not too many people she knew died in the war. Most of the workers on her plantation were Black [Annotator's Note: African-American] folks and did not go off to the war.

Rita Hymel got married and moved to Biloxi [Annotator's Note: Biloxi, Mississippi] and went to work at the Keesler Field [Annotator's Note: now Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi] switchboard. It was rewarding as it made all the GIs [Annotator's Note: government issue; also, a slang term for an American soldier] happy. They wanted to buy her drinks, but she said it was her duty to do it. It was easy to work the switchboard and she enjoyed it. She sometimes worked late at night. One night she got off the bus around midnight and a man was following her home. She told him she felt sorry for him if he followed her home, and her husband opened the door. She did not work late too often. She was the only operator. She did not go to visit the GIs or anything like that. It was hard to be away from her family as she was the oldest of 13 children. She went home a lot to help out. Her husband was a cook at the base. He went all over the place. Life was entirely different then. She knew her husband before he enlisted. They were born and raised in the same Parish [Annotator's Note: Saint Charles Parish, Louisiana] but had not met until they were both at a dance. He was in the service when they got married. Things were rationed and they had to carry a book of rations. They said to save America and you did it to save America. They used ice boxes and after they got married, her husband bought an electric refrigerator. She still has it in her garage. She did not have strong feelings about the Nazis or Japanese. She did not hate them. She disliked them. When you do not know them, it makes a difference. She does not remember too much about what President Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] did or what she thought about him. He saved America.

When the war ended, they shot all the ammunition to celebrate. Rita Hymel thought that was stupid and told her husband that the Japanese could have gotten them all because they were out of ammo. Her husband was on Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan] then. Hymel had two children and did not celebrate. The day her husband came home, she came home after having a baby. Everybody was excited by the ending of the war. Her husband went to work. They moved to Norco [Annotator's Note: Norco, Louisiana]. She used to use the ferry every day to help her mother. Some days, they had to wait an hour to get on the ferry. Now, everything is easy and it is a big difference. She never returned to work after having children. That is a lot of work. The war separated a lot of the family. Luckily, her husband did not get killed. He stayed a lot in the United States as a cook. The war upset a lot of people's lives. Thank God we [Annotator's Note: the United States] won the war. A lot of men got killed and never came back home. Hymel thinks places like The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana] are important to make people realize how bad and serious it was. The war should continue to be taught. Her work on the switchboard was very rewarding and she enjoyed it.