In 2015, Kimble found a copy of the photo of Parker Fraley in the Naval Air Station workshop, this time with an original caption featuring the subject’s real name, a date, and a location. The photo had been featured in many magazines and newspapers shortly before Miller created his poster, including in a paper in Miller’s hometown of Pittsburgh.

Convinced that he had found the real Rosie the Riveter, Kimble tracked Parker Fraley – by now in her 90s – down to her home in Almeda, where she still lived. She revealed that she had known she was the real inspiration for the poster for years after she saw her photograph (wrongly credited as a photo of Doyle) placed alongside the poster at an exhibition.

Describing his first meeting with Parker Fraley, Kimble told the BBC: “She was just so excited and thrilled that someone was there to listen to her story.

“By that point it was three or four years she had been aware that her photo was out there under someone else’s name. No matter how hard she tried, no-one would listen to her.”

After the war, Parker Fraley and Ada Fraley worked at a restaurant in Palm Springs. She married three times, divorcing twice, and she and Ada moved in together after her third husband died in 1998. She is survived by a son from her first marriage, and four stepsons and two stepdaughters from her marriage to her third husband, Charles Fraley.

In 2016, People magazine asked Parker Fraley how she felt about being the likely inspiration for the most famous Rosie the Riveter image.

“The women of this country these days need some icons,” she replied. “If they think I’m one, I’m happy.”

Throughout 2018, Stylist is raising the profiles of brilliant women past and present – and empowering future generations to follow their lead – with our Visible Women campaign. See more from Visible Women here.

Woman who inspired famous Rosie the Riveter poster dies aged 96