Although the USCG officially opened its doors to African-American women in October 1944, it was not until March 1945 that the first five women were accepted; they were the only African-American women to serve in the SPARS. Although the Women's Army Corps (WAC) accepted African-American women from its inception, the U.S. Navy's Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES) only began accepting African-American women in October 1944, with fewer than 100 of them serving in the WAVES, and the U.S. Marine Corps Women's Reserve never opened its ranks to African-American women. The five African-American women who served in the SPARS were: Olivia Hooker, D. Winifred Byrd, Julia Mosley, Yvonne Cumberbatch, and Aileen Cooke. Olivia Hooker was the first of them and thus the first African-American woman to enter the Coast Guard.