Europa Newswire.
Photo by Sgt. Randall Clinton.
The oldest living female Marine died on Veterans Day and was buried today in the Cypress Hills National Cemetery.
Miriam Cohen was one of the oldest females to enlist in 1946, at
35-years-old, said Debra Allee, the 101-year-old's niece. Cohen
answered her nations calling twice, serving during World War II in 1946
and the Korean War in 1960.
Cohen, a graduate of the Girls High School in Brooklyn (since renamed
to Boys & Girls High School), moved to Tuscan, Ariz., when she was
92.
During their eulogy, her friends and family remembered Cohen's energetic life and attachment to the Marines.
Rabbi Deborah Hirsch told the story of the five-foot, elderly Cohen
pushing wheel chairs around the veteran's clinics after she moved to
Tuscon, Ariz, well into her 90s Cohen continued working with veterans
throughout her life, and in that her loved ones found meaning in the
timing of her passing.
"She died on Veteran's Day, that makes that day an even more sacred moment," said Hirsch.
Allee said Cohen was a vanguard for women service members. Cohen was
one of the first females to serve in a command post, along with being
in the first group of female Marine enlistees.
One of the proudest moments of Cohen's later life was her appearance as
the grand marshal for the local Tuscan, Ariz., Veteran's Day parade in
2006, said Dennis Mincieli, Allee's husband.
Apart from the friends and family gathered for the small grave-side
ceremony, a group of local Marine Corps League and Women Marine
Association members came to pay their respects and salute a fellow
Marine laid to rest.
