Lietuenant Colonel Brehon “Bill” Somervell

When we meet Bill Somervell in Girl in the Glass, he is currently running the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in New York City. As part of the WPA’s mission, combating high unemployment during the Great Depression, Somervell supervised the construction of LaGuardia Airport in Queens, NYC.

In Girl in the Glass, Somervell works with Leslie Groves to decipher the second half of Declan’s prophecy. As a reward for his efforts, in 1941 Somervell gets promoted to brigadier general and becomes head of the Construction Division of the military’s Quartermaster Corps.

In this role, Somervell is placed in charge of constructing the U.S. War Department’s new headquarters across the Potomac River in Arlington, Virginia, the five-sided building best known as the Pentagon.