The Beauty of Flight: A survey of those who flew early and often

War clouds were gathering and the first to respond with a call for pilots was England. The British were desperate for civilian pilots to ferry aircraft from factories to aerodromes to free the military pilots to fly combat. The Air Transport Auxiliary was formed. As the needs grew, so did the service, with additional women soon flying all 120 types of aircraft flown by the RAF. Hazards were very real. All aircraft observed radio silence so en route weather was not available. Dodging artillery ranges, barrage balloons and training aircraft made navigation circuitous.

At the outbreak of WWII the Tennessee Bureau of Aeronautics decided to aid the war effort by training a select group of women as flight instructors, replacing the men gone to war. They borrowed former Tennessean Phoebe Omlie from the CAA to set up and supervise the program. From 235 applicants, 10 girls were chosen, trained and graduated to teach flying.

During this time, two prominent women aviators, Jacqueline Cochran and and Nancy
Harkness Love, recognized the role that women could assume in time of war. Each pursued the military use of civilian women pilots. On Sept. 10, 1942, the Air Transport Command announced a plan to utilize women pilots would be called WAFS, Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron. Nancy Love was appointed squadron commander.

Male and female pilots from other countries flew for the ATA, and Jacqueline Cochran recruited approximately 25 American girls to serve. One of the first was Helen Richey, who later resigned, then joined the WASP. Nancy Miller (Livingston) from California flew from July 1942 - July 1945. Nancy flew 50 different types of British aircraft across England, into Europe, Scotland and Ireland. Each woman flew as captain with no co-pilot because of the pilot shortage.

In 1942 Betty Huyler became one of the original group of 25 women forming the WAFS (Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron) organized by Nancy Harkness Love. They ferried aircraft for the Army Air Corps within the continental limits of the United States. The organization later became the WASPs. During the war years, Betty ferried fighters and bombers, transports, cargo and utility aircraft.

The first group of 25 went to Wilmington, DE and consisted of experienced pilots who would need only to transition into the military airplanes they would be flying. Betty Gillies became the first WAFS member; Cornelia Fort it's second.

Cornelia had been a flight instructor teaching a student in Honolulu on Dec. 7, 1941.
She described what happened:

"Coming in just before the last landing, I looked casually around and saw a military
plane coming directly toward me. I jerked the controls away from my student and
jammed the throttle wide open to pull above the oncoming plane. He passed so close
under us that our celluloid windows rattled violently, and I looked down to see what
kind of plane it was.

"The painted red balls on the tops of the wings shone brightly in the sun. I looked
again with complete and utter disbelief. Honolulu was familiar with the emblem of the
Rising Sun on passenger ships but not on airplanes.

"I looked quickly at Pearl Harbor, and my spine tingled when I saw billowing black smoke. Still, I thought hollowly it might be some kind of coincidence or maneuvers, it might be, it must be. For surely, dear God ... Then I looked way up and saw the formations of silver bombers riding in. "

"Something detached itself from an airplane and down, down and even with knowledge pounding in my mind, my heart turned convulsively when the bomb exploded in the middle of the harbor. I knew the air was not the place for my little baby airplane, and I set about landing as quickly as ever I could. A few seconds later a shadow passed over me and simultaneously bullets all around me."

"Suddenly that little wedge of sky above Hickam Field and Pearl Harbor was the
busiest, fullest piece of sky I ever saw."

"We counted anxiously as our little civilian planes came flying home to roost. Two
never came back. They were washed ashore weeks later on the windward side of the
island, bullet-riddled. Not a pretty way for the brave little yellow Cubs and their pilots
to go down to death."

(5) Nancy Harkness Love at the controls of a B-17

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The Beauty of Flight: A survey of those who flew early and often

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