Monday, May 19, 2025
Throughout history, countless unsung heroes have made lasting contributions, only to be forgotten over time. Social studies teacher Howard Rosenberg wants to change that.
For the past three years, Rosenberg, 50, of East Meadow, has presented a lecture series on lesser-known historical figures at libraries across Nassau County, including the Merrick and Freeport public libraries.
Rosenberg made his most recent presentation, on women of World War II, on April 16, at a League of Women Voters of East Nassau meeting at the Levittown Public Library.
Rosenberg, a social studies teacher at Gordon Parks Middle School, in Queens, said he is passionate about bringing attention to individuals who are often overlooked in history books.
“It means a lot to present,” he said. “I think sometimes people like to hear these stories told in a public forum.”
The league is a nonpartisan, grass-roots organization that works to protect and expand voting rights throughout the country while empowering voters through education. The East Nassau chapter encompasses Wantagh, Seaford, Levittown, Merrick, Bellmore and East Meadow.
For East Nassau member Barbara Epstein, educating others about brave historical figures, especially women, is essential.
“Any additional knowledge that we gain, particularly on women, is a golden opportunity for us to realize how many different ways women affected our lives,” Epstein said.
Rosenberg’s lecture in Levittown highlighted three women who were involved in World War II: Virginia Hall, an American who served as a spy for the United Kingdom; Carolyn Ferriday, a New York City philanthropist who aided Holocaust survivors; and Ruby Bradley, a U.S. Army Nurse Corps officer who was held as a prisoner of war.
Hall, born in Maryland in 1906, became one of the most effective Allied spies during World War II. After Nazi Germany invaded France in 1940, Hall, who was traveling Europe as she finished her college studies, joined the French resistance by volunteering as an ambulance driver.
As the occupation intensified, Hall fled to Spain, where she was recruited by the United Kingdom’s Special Operations Executive, a covert agency founded by Winston Churchill. Posing as a journalist, she built a resistance network across France and recruited nearly 90 civilians to assist the Allied cause. In 1942, she led a successful mission to help captured agents escape from Mauzac Prison in France.
Her work made her a target of the Gestapo, who dubbed her “the limping lady,” a reference to her prosthetic leg, the result of an earlier hunting accident. Despite the danger, Hall continued to operate in France under disguise, even posing as a milkmaid to transmit intelligence. Her bravery earned her numerous honors, including the Distinguished Service Cross, the U.S. Army’s second-highest award for soldiers who displayed extraordinary heroism.
Ferriday, a New York City socialite and philanthropist, devoted herself to helping Polish women who survived medical experiments in Ravensbrück, a Nazi concentration camp in Germany. Known as “the rabbits” because their injuries caused them to hop, the women had endured forced infections and bone surgeries, leaving them disfigured and without support after the war.
“They did terrible things to these prisoners,” Rosenberg said. “After the fight was done, they were sick, they were maimed. They needed help.”
Ferriday traveled to Europe to meet the survivors and brought attention to their stories through news outlets. At the time, many doubted the extent of the atrocities that had taken place at the camp, Rosenberg said, but her advocacy helped shine a light on their suffering, and she pushed for their recognition.
The third woman Rosenberg highlighted was Bradley, a U.S. Army nurse who was born in Virginia. After high school, she joined the military, and she was captured by Japanese forces shortly after they attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, and she spent more than three years in a prisoner of war camp in the Philippines. Despite the extreme conditions, which included scarce food and rampant disease, Bradley used her medical training to treat fellow prisoners, performing more than 230 operations, delivering 13 babies, and even smuggling food to feed starving children. When the camp was liberated in 1945, Bradley weighed just 86 pounds.
She continued to serve after the war, Rosenberg noted, working in evacuation hospitals during the Korean War. She retired from the Army in 1963, having received a total of 34 medals throughout her service, but remained a nurse for the rest of her life.
Epstein said it was “mind-boggling” how many women remain unknown despite their contributions not only to the United States, but to the world. League Treasurer Peggy Stein said she appreciated the presentation’s focus on courageous women during the war, and hoped that more of their stories would be brought to light.
“It’s unfortunate that a lot of contributions people make, you just don’t hear about them,” Stein said. “They’re just not the ones that are highlighted.”
Rosenberg said he hoped to one day turn his presentations on unsung heroes into a book. Until then, he planned to continue sharing stories of bravery, especially those of Hall, Ferriday and Bradley.
“All three women were cut from the same cloth,” he said. “They made their lives better while helping people along the way, and that’s what life’s all about.”
