Front Porch Podcast – Episode 7: Commander Beth Coye: A Warrior for Equality

Anna Hall: Welcome to The Front Porch Podcast. Join us as we uncover the extraordinary stories of people who are part of Front Porch Communities and Services, young professionals just starting their journeys, lifelong learners pursuing new passions and seasoned storytellers sharing the wisdom they’ve gained along the way.

Together, we’ll explore how purpose and community shape us with stories that will inspire you to discover your own unique contribution.

Views expressed by guests on this podcast are the opinion of the speaker, and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of Front Porch Communities and Services. Please see our show notes for more details.

I’m your host, Anna Hall. So, community can fill this basic human psychological need that we all have to feel a sense of belonging. Sometimes we need to stand up and be brave and risk losing that community, or risk losing that sense of belonging, or stand up to community. In that light, I still feel like people who stand up and are brave usually do it in the context of wanting to make things better for people beyond themselves.

I can’t wait for you to hear from our guest, and to see how for her bravery is not separate from but part of her sense of community, her sense of duty and her innate drive to make a difference and stand up for others.

Our guest today is Beth F. Coye a retired U.S. Navy Commander. She had two subspecialties on active duty: intelligence, national security and human resource management, and was one of the first women to command ashore activity. A graduate of Wellesley College, the American University School of International Service, and the School of Naval Warfare, Beth taught international relations, sea power, and organizational development at the Naval War College and political science at Mesa Community College, University of San Diego and San Diego State. A freelance writer and activist, she lives in Pacific Beach, California. Since 2019, Beth has called Wesley Palms home.

Beth Coye, you were in the military for 21 years. Why did you retire early?

Beth Coye: I retired early because my boss put a tail on me. Put a tail on me for… see if he could prove I was a lesbian. It was a knock at the door by a senior chief who worked for him, and he said, “Skipper, I have to tell you this. Our boss told me to go out and see if he… I can prove that you’re a lesbian.” And my heart dropped. I was betrayed by the Navy. Big Daddy Navy I called him. So, it was the hardest decision I ever made. But it was pretty clear to me I could no longer stay in the Navy.

Anna Hall: You were a top performer. And you had to leave a place that you loved, where you had achieved and were achieving. Did you ever feel like you completely belonged in the military because you weren’t out yet? What was that like to compartmentalize?

Beth Coye: Yes I did. Because I was fortunate to not do the typical path for women officers then, and that was administration and communications. About 80% were in that field. And I had gone into intelligence and also national security. And those were just terrific jobs.

One of my favorite commands was SACLANT, Supreme Allied Command Atlantic, and… in Norfolk. And I was the first woman to be on the staff there, as other than personnel. And it was just… I belonged there. They took me in. I was the first woman and they loved me. And, I loved them. And I learned a lot. And I believe in NATO, by the way, very, very much. This is an important,  alliance that we have and had. My last year, I was editor of the Brosio Study. Secretary Brosio was, at the time, the secretary general of NATO. And he had asked for a study on the comparison of the Soviet Bloc then and NATO. And I was the editor and reporting directly to the big guy, the admiral, and I belonged there. Yes, it was definitely a “B,” a belonging for sure.

Anna Hall: Let’s talk about another “B,” though. What…. Bravery. What’s the bravest thing you did during your time in the Navy? I think it was when I was at the Naval War College. I thought, yeah, this is the time I need to use my power or use my background to say, “Hey, it’s time for a study on women in the Navy and where we are, status report.” That was the beginning of the Coye study, which is a very important study. It’s online if you ever want to read it.

Anna Hall: Named after you, clearly. Right?

Beth Coye: Yes. Right. Because I was the main author and it took a lot of work. But it used all of my education and all of my passion for doing something about equality for women. And so to make a long story short; we ended it and it sat for a while in the Pentagon, as those things do. And then admiral Chick Rowe, he said, “Admiral Zumwalt wants more ammunition.” And I realized that the study that I just wrote, I had summarized into the Naval War College Review coming out in March and next month. And so I said, “I know what we can do. We’ve just have women write to me or to the editor of the review and whatever they want to say.” And so he, he got those letters and they wrote in… about 37. They’re very powerful.

“I don’t want to be a mascot.” “That’s the way I’m treated.”

That kind of letter.

And so, the panel met. It’s a career panel in Washington. And sure enough, Z116. It’s online too. A very powerful… kind of like the, the Navy’s ERA amendment.

Anna Hall: So what did that look like, the result of your work?

Beth Coye: What it looked like… wow. We opened up the ranks. We no longer had one captain. Gradually we have lots of captains, lots of admirals, until they began to get cut out by the current administration. And we opened up the ROTC. Naval Academy held back a little bit. They didn’t… my dad didn’t like this. He didn’t want women going to the Naval Academy. He was a class of ‘33. And also for the enlisted too. There were openings. And nurses. Right away, we had quite a few nurse captains and then an admiral. And so it was beginning to be equality, egalitarian.

Anna Hall: And your own father didn’t want you to join the Navy? Is that true?

Beth Coye: Not quite. Actually it was my mother.

Anna Hall: Interesting.

Beth Coye: My mother knew me very well. I was very close to a wonderful mother. And she said, “Beth, I think you’re too independent. And, I don’t know if you can go along with all those rules and regulations.” and my dad said, “Well, the only WAVES I know…” And we were WAVES then “were the waves in front of my bow.” So…

Anna Hall: What does WAVES stand for?

Beth Coye: Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service.

Anna Hall: Okay.

Beth Coye: Way back when… and I’m proud to say ‘cause I’m a Wellesley grad, Mildred MacAfee Horton was our first director of the WAVES and she was absolutely wonderful. And, and we had a lot of WAVES, actually, from Wellesley, get out during World War II. Many were code breakers. And you can tell I’m proud of being a Wellesley girl. Class of ‘59!

Anna Hall: Yes, indeed. Woo hoo!

Beth Coye: Yeah.

Anna Hall: So what drew you to the Navy?Your mother was warning you that you were too independent. What is it about the Navy that pulled you in?

Beth Coye: Well, I believe it was the the feeling of being in a family. Really, I do. My dad was a submariner, And the submariners were very close, and we would have lots of social events, and… And I always loved being with the other children. You know, and…. But to go back, during the war, I remember I was, what was I? Four years old…four to eight or so, and, my dad was gone the whole time.

Anna Hall: Oh, my goodness.

Beth Coye: And I remember drawing submarines and airplanes and…I think I had it in me to be, a warrior. And there’s a book called The Military Brat by Mary Wertsch. I’m in it as one of the interviewees. Some of us military brats or Navy juniors not all, but some get that same wanting to be a warrior. And I got that in my genes.

Anna Hall: Clearly, clearly.

Beth Coye: So then I walked down to the K Street and walked down there and went into the recruiting office. And there was this very attractive recruiter, Jean. And she told me she’d just come from Naples, Italy. And that was exciting. The whole thing sounded exciting. I was 22.

Anna Hall: Did you ever fall in love during your time in the Navy?

Beth Coye: Oh… yes I did, yes I did. I fell in love with a… I fell in love. Actually, this is… I wrote a book, as you know, My Navy Too, and I. And I’ve had some time to reflect since I’ve been at Wesley Palms.  And during all that reflection, I realized I fell in love with the Navy. And my mother would always say, “Dad is really married… his first love is the ocean and the sea.” And I never realized that. But she said, “and I’m second.” And the Navy really was my first love. And the second love was a very special woman, still alive who’s, down the street from me, has dementia pretty badly. And I talk to her every night, on the phone, and she still, a very special mentor to me. And I love her dearly. So. But it was hard, very, very hard to be closeted.

I know of one woman officer and I thought, oh my gosh, who committed suicide because she could not put up with being a lesbian as well as in the Navy.

Anna Hall: I can only imagine because you’re, you’re, you’re stifling or holding back a part of who you are naturally.

Beth Coye: Yes, yes. And when I had this VA disability deal that I went through for a year and a half, I had to have a civilian psychologist. She did a write up on me and she included medical references and several… One of them said, in particular, that to be… not have your identity, such as you can’t have in the military is almost worse or worse than PTSD. Really. It’s very hard on you because you’re always looking behind you. And I was in the intelligence business for three tours.

Anna Hall: Oh my goodness. A little bit ironic.

Beth Coye: So I had top secret…oh yeah.

Anna Hall: So Beth what was it like coming out then?

Beth Coye: Well, coming out comes out slowly, as you know. You come out… you don’t just all of a sudden until I got out of the Navy. And then I would I would tell everybody I’m a lesbian. I still do. Because I believe in that, by the way, I believe the more individuals come out and say, “I’m a lesbian, I’m comfortable with it.” And so forth, that the country and the, the, citizenry will will say, I got it and, and take off their blindfolds.

So coming out to me… the biggest coming out was to my parents and I I’m very, very close to my mother. I was. And I didn’t know how she’d take it, except she’s, she loves me very much. But, it was kind of funny. We were in our house and I told dad I needed something fixed in the… in my closet. So, he was working in the closet while mother and I were talking.

Anna Hall: You’re clever, Beth.

Beth Coye: It’s true!

Anna Hall: He was in the closet while you were coming out of it.

Beth Coye: Right, right! And yeah…

And my mother said when she listened to me… She said, “It’s not as if you didn’t try.” I said, “That’s right, mother, I believe it’s in my genes for sure.” It’s… there’s nature and nurture, but for me it was all nature. And it… I just know what you know, when you’re in love. And I had been in love and it wasn’t with a man. And then also, I think I’ve told you that I…I really wanted to be bisexual. In those days, that was the thing, and I tried. I dated. I dated in college, I dated in the Navy, a lot of really fine Naval officers. And at the War College I was asked to be, you know,  proposed to, and…

Anna Hall: Wow. You really tried.

Beth Coye: I said “Yes,” and then, yeah and then… I tried. And so then I went…I just can’t do this. So I told them, “I can’t do this.” And I wanted to be also,  devoted to my career, the Navy. And that would not happen in those days. You really kind of went…. Your job went wherever your husband’s did. So, does that answer your question?

Anna Hall: Yeah, it answers my question. Incredible. Yes, love.

Beth Coye: As far as in love. Yeah. My dad finally came around. He was not very happy. He had always wanted me to marry and marry a Naval officer. But that didn’t work out for us. And so…. But he’s, he’s very proud of me now. He, he was. He’s gone now. But he was very proud.

And by the way, I when I wrote that book, he did not want me to write that book. He wanted to write a book about the Silversides, his boat, submarine. And I said, “Dad, I’m 58 and it’s time for me to write this and I hope you’ll be okay with it.” The reason he didn’t want me to, I think, was he didn’t want to be known as,  a father of a lesbian. You know, he lived in Coronado, which is a lot of military. And in those days, this was 94 to 97. You know, it’s changing. Hopefully better, for the better. Right now, it’s moving back. But I think that will come forth. It’s going to come forth

Anna Hall: And tell us the name of the book. We want to make sure we get that for you.

Beth Coye: My Navy Too, T-O-O. It’s an epistolary, in the form of letters and about six or seven authors. And particularly for those who want to know the inside story of women in the Navy then. And we do address, coming, coming out and being a lesbian in the Navy.

Anna Hall: Thank you for your contribution. Thank you. You’ve made such a difference everywhere that you go.

So, Beth, let’s talk now about about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell  the policy that was in place from 1994 to 2011 that barred openly gay, lesbian or bisexual individuals from military service. You were very involved in that repeal, Beth. Could you tell us about that?

Beth Coye: As far as doing something for Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell… Because I wasn’t going to go to Washington and lobby for the group. But my sister and mother both said, “Beth, that’s just what you are and who you are.” Go do it.” Which I love.

Anna Hall: They saw you.  They truly saw who you are: an activist, a brave, loyal, loving activist.

Beth Coye: Yes, they did. And I went twice, two years and we made a big difference. 

Anna Hall: What did you do? Tell us more about that.

Beth Coye: I went to Washington. The first year was kind of hellish. They kept saying we give… we were bad morale. But the good news was we were a family too, those of us who were advocating and lobbying, from all different places on the, on the continent here, as well as, all different military branches. And we got to know each other.

And it was very powerful as a family to work on this. And we had goals and we met them and we met some pretty fine Democrat senators who said, “Keep it up.” And the next year was also wonderful. More so because  by that time the Democrats were in and we thought we’d,  really gotten through to them. And for the… I’m a political science professor I taught and talked about lobbying and what it is. But until you’re there, Anna,  and you may have… have you lobbied at all?

Anna Hall: I haven’t. But you’re inspiring me.

Beth Coye: It’s just a wonderful experience of our democracy and getting our points across. And and we did and we felt very good. This was for Service Members Legal Defense Network, one of the top interest groups. So that was awfully fun.

Anna Hall: You’re incredible. I’ve been at Front Porch a year now, and I still remember you as one of the first people that welcomed me. I believe you told me when you moved in, you were the only lesbian at Wesley Palms. What was that like for you? Did you feel welcomed?

Beth Coye: Most of my friends were, in the LGBT community, and I, I loved it very much. And I became closer to it. So when I came here, I was shocked. We had then we had two male couples and… married and one couple left. So now we have one male couple. We have, but we just… had come in two lesbians out, out. And it makes me very happy. And we also have another one who may be coming out. And so it makes me happy. And by the way, Wesley Palms is very accepting, you know, with few exceptions, very accepting of LGBT. And so there I haven’t had any problem being— at least I know of—accepted.

Anna Hall: Have you started a club?

Beth Coye: Yes. We’re about to.

Anna Hall : Oh, tell me.

Beth Coye: Yeah, yeah. Do you know if other communities do? Do other communities…?

Anna Hall: I’m not sure but tell us about it and maybe they will.

Beth Coye: Well, it’s sort of my idea. And I’ve been talking to Cara.

Anna Hall: In marketing, okay.

Beth Coye: Cara is in marketing.

Anna Hall: Hi Cara!

Beth Coye: She’s a wonderful gal. She and I are good friends. And she, and Taunya, life enrichment, and I are going to put together a gathering. And for the first group we may just say who we are, and we’re inviting friends and allies, kind of like, PFLAG. You know, parents and…And by the way, we have quite a… we have at least three and I betcha there are more,  grandparents of trans. And I know that at least two of them are open to talking about it, and, I think it would be very important for anybody wants to come and listen. And, and I didn’t mention the staff, you know, but we have some LGBT on the staff and we’re going to invite them, of course.

Anna Hall: I think that you continued your activism when you moved into Wesley Palms.

Beth Coye: Oh, I did. Yes, I did.

Anna Hall: Tell us about that.

Beth Coye: The first year… okay, the first year I came to a patio home and I didn’t really want to leave Oregon and my second partner, but I had to come down here and… for medical reasons, And the first year, I had 32 transfusions, blood transfusions in a year. But the first year, they right away they asked me to be on the board. And I said, “Sorry about that. It’s, it’s too much for me,” you know.

Second year I kind of charged up and, and was feeling better. I said, “These are the things we’ve got to do.” and we set our goals and, re-charged the committees, And then I gave up president and was Resident Rep a total of four years. But the Resident Rep I want to talk…  could I talk about that? ‘Cause that’s important.

Anna Hall: Please.

Beth Coye:  Really.

Anna Hall: I know your voice has made such a difference.

Beth Coye: The role of the Resident Rep is to be what I call the conduit between the community—Wesley Palms, say—and Front Porch staff. And if we have… if we can’t get it solved with the ED, executive director here, Justin Weber, who’s magnificent.

Anna Hall: He’s incredible.

Beth Coye: then, he is… incredible, he’s a fantastic leader, then we take it up higher. That’s one of the main roles. And the other roles is just to talk with each other and get a sense of what are the big issues that we want to work on and or what were the issues that Front Porch want us to work on.

Anna Hall: You all bring so much life and work experience. Wouldn’t it be silly of us to not listen to your voice and ask for your help?

Beth Coye: Exactly, Anna. So… and isn’t that part of being  the larger family? The larger community?

Anna Hall: Yes.

Beth Coye: We have 17 communities, but then we have this large community.

Anna Hall: Yes, yes.

I think sometimes in leadership development as in human growth, it’s some of the hardest most trying times that, where we find out who we are and what matters.

Beth Coye: Exactly.

Anna Hall: So what matters to you now, Beth?

Beth Coye: What matters to me is to enjoy whatever years I have left, here at Wesley Palms. As I say, I’ve always wanted to have a partner. And it’s… you don’t have a… even though I don’t have a partner I have lots of friends. But I may have a partner pretty soon. I’m hoping I have a partner pretty soon.

Anna Hall: Oh wait. Is there someone? Maybe?

Beth Coye: I can’t say any more than that. I just…

Anna Hall: Okay.

Beth Coye: I’ll keep you… I’ll let you know.

Anna Hall: Keep me posted. Now I want to know. I’m happy for you. I’m happy for you if it all works out.

Beth Coye: Thank you.

Anna Hall: You also have a new dog. So, sadly…

Beth Coye: Oh, yes.

Anna Hall: your your dog passed away recently. But you have a new family member named CT. Can we see CT? Is Alejandro there?

Beth Coye: Can you get her? CT? Come on, baby. CT, come. Come on, baby, come on over here. There you are. Come on, over here. Oh. She’s eleven pounder.

Anna Hall: Awww. Is she camera shy?

Alejandro Ibaibarriaga: She’s hunkering down.

Beth Coye: Well, no, she’s very shy about…

Anna Hall: Oh, my goodness! Look at the cuteness!

Beth Coye: Isn’t this…is cutie pie.

Anna Hall: Hi, CT!

Beth Coye: Yeah…

Anna Hall: Now, how did CT come into your life?

Beth Coye: Well, this is part of the family, isn’t it? At Wesley Palms. It really is. And she’s been part of the family. We have 40 dogs, and, and they go to the dog park.

Anna Hall: And Beth, I understand that you adopted CT from another Wesley Palms resident who could no longer care for her.

Beth Coye: She just can’t manage anymore, a little dog. And, and, however, what’s happening is I will take her up there so she can see her. CC still loves her, obviously, her previous owner. So yes, I said yes. You know, how can I… how can I give….let go of this cute little dog?

Anna Hall: I don’t how you could say no to that face.

Beth Coye: She’s a Havanese. She’s a Havanese. She’s only three and I’m 88, so she might need another mother, but I, I’m not going to worry. You know, I’m just going to say the Wesley family, the Wesley Palms  family will rise up again and somebody would take her.

Anna Hall: But you taking her in is another indication of of what an incredible community member you are. We’re so fortunate. My life is better for knowing you.

Beth Coye: Oh, thank you Anna. And mine for knowing you.  I really hope to see more of you.

Anna Hall: You will, you will. Is there anything else that you’d like to share with our audience?

Beth Coye: I feel that I’m very lucky to have come to Front Porch and Wesley Palms. And I hope you all feel the same way. As an activist at this time, as a former political science professor, I’d like to say… I was going to read Howard Thurman, who’s a Black theologian from the last century. Let’s see if I can. I can’t quite read it here, but I’ll read… I think I know it by heart.

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it.”

Yeah. So, go do it. Whatever makes you come alive. Thank you.

Anna Hall: Thank you so much, Beth. You’ve been listening to The Front Porch Podcast. I’m your host, Anna Hall. Our theme music was composed by Geoven Snaer and Dianne Kae Enriquez. Carmen Elena Mitchell is our producer and editor. Our recording engineer is Jeff Gall. Wesley Palms tech support provided by Alejandro Ibaibarriaga. Special thanks to Laura Darling for production and marketing support. And to Joseph Escobar for our show art design.

The Front Porch Podcast is a production of Front Porch Communities and Services. If you enjoyed today’s conversation, please share it with a friend and help others find us by subscribing and leaving a review. We’ll be back soon with more stories from the fascinating folk who live and work at Front Porch. Until then, stay connected and inspired.