Evelyn J. Fields
Evelyn J. Fields (born 1949) is a former officer of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Commissioned Officer Corps, who served as the director of the Commissioned Officer Corps and director of NOAA's Office of Marine and Aviation Operations, from 1999 until her retirement in 2003. Fields was the first woman, and first African American to head the NOAA Corps. Earlier in her career, in 1989, Fields was given command of the research vessel, NOAAS McArthur, thus becoming the first woman and first African American to command a NOAA ship, and the first woman to command a ship in the United States uniformed services for an extended assignment. Early life and education Evelyn Juanita Fields was born in Norfolk, Virginia on 29 January 1949, the oldest of five children (two girls and three boys). Her father was a civilian employee at the Naval Shipyard in Norfolk, and her mother was a teacher. She attended Liberty Park Elementary School, crediting her fourth and fifth grade teacher with sparking her interest in math and science. She then attended Booker T. Washington High School. Fields graduated from Norfolk State University in 1971 with a BS degree in mathematics, starting out in her freshman year as one of only four or five female math majors. Career National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fields began her career with NOAA in 1972 as a civilian cartographer at NOAA's Atlantic Marine Center in Norfolk, Virginia. At that time, females were not allowed on NOAA's ships, but she did participate in shore-based parties for data collection. She worked in this position less than a year, when NOAA Corps Director Rear Admiral Harley Nygren started recruiting women for the first time as commissioned officers. Fields was commissioned an ensign in the NOAA Corps in 1973 and was the first African-American woman to join the Corps. She was then selected for and attended the Armed Forces Staff College to study hydrography. Fields served as an operations officer on the NOAA Ships Mount Mitchell (S 222) and Peirce (S 328) and executive officer of the survey vessel NOAA Ship Rainier (S 221). In January 1989, Fields was chosen by NOAA's Selection Board to serve as commanding officer of the NOAA ship McArthur (S330), an oceanographic and fisheries research vessel based in Seattle, Washington. Fields was the first female officer to command a NOAA ship and the first African-American. She was also the first woman to command a ship for an extended assignment (18 months) within all of the nation's uniformed services. In July 1990, Fields was selected to take part in the U.S. Department of Commerce Science and Technology Fellowship Program, where she spent 10 months in a policy-making office in the federal government. Field's hydrographic knowledge and skills contributed to preparing nautical charts for the U.S. Navy to use during the 1991 Gulf War. In 1995, Fields became Director of the Commissioned Personnel Center (CPC), which is responsible for all aspects of a uniformed service personnel system in support of the