Female blast furnace worker Bernice Daunora at the Carnegie-Illinois Steel Works in Gary Indiana making steel for the war effort, she is wearing a personal protective breathing apparatus - 1943

Bernice Elizabeth Kenstaites was born in Glasgow, Scotland on November 11, 1911 to Lithuanian parents. She immigrated to the USA in 1920, in 1930, she was living with cousins in Chicago and working as a laborer at a can factory.

In 1933, she married William Daunora, a Lithuanian immigrant and they had a son the next year. In 1940 Bernice was naturalized as a US citizen and they were living in Gary, Husband William was a crane operator at the steel works.

Evidently they were both working at the steel works when this picture was taken. William passed in 1960 and Bernice passed at the age of 82 on June 21, 1994, they are buried together at the Calumet Park Cemetery, Merrillville, Indiana.

Many thanks to John Klear for the research

LIFE Magazine Archives - Margaret Bourke-White Photographer