It was quite a ride

[Hondo]

'It was quite a ride'

Warplane exhibit recalls the contributions of female WWII aviators

Dozens of people lined up Thursday at the former McClellan Air Force Base for a living history lesson.
Three World War II-era airplanes landed and opened their doors to give visitors a glimpse into the past.

The B-24 bomber carried special passengers: two veterans of the Women Airforce Service Pilots, who flew domestic missions on the homefront to free up male pilots for combat.
Former WASP Mary Jane Meikle enjoyed the jaunt from Napa to Sacramento on the B-24.

"It was quite a ride, and quite an experience," said the 85-year-old Meikle, who lives in Roseville.

Meikle volunteered for the WASP for one simple reason: She wanted to fly.

But it wasn't as simple as it sounds, at least not for a woman in the 1940s.

"My mother wasn't too happy about it at first, but she accepted it," Meikle said. "I remember running into a pilot who said, 'Women don't fly airplanes!' But we showed that we could do it."

Ferrying PT-19s from her base in Delaware to bases across the country, Meikle was one of 1,074 women who graduated from the WASP training program. The training was identical to the primary, basic and advanced training required of every male cadet in the U.S. Army Air Forces.

Considered civil service employees, the WASP were ineligible for military benefits, according to WASP on the WEB, a Web site dedicated to the group's history.

A bid to militarize the the group failed when male pilots campaigned against it; the unit was disbanded in December 1944, and all its records were classified for the next 30 years.

It wasn't until 1977 that President Carter signed legislation granting the pilots military status, and their contributions became more widely known and celebrated.

Meikle says the belated recognition is well-deserved.

"It's about time that they honor us," she said. "It's long overdue. The politicians at the time just didn't believe that women should do this, but we relieved so many men so they could go into combat and win the war."

Fellow WASP Frances Pullen of Sacramento recalled flying on C-60s, B-24s and B-29s. Her mission: to evaluate the skies and predict the weather for B-29s flying at night.

"I served for 18 months before we were deactivated," she said. "My brother was killed in the South Pacific, and I went home because my dad needed help with the family business. I got married and had four children."

Flying in the noisy B-24 brought back memories of the those she used to fly with. The 84-year-old Pullen recalled cruising over a bombing range and dropping a sack of flour on a target.

"I was just trying to help in the war effort, but I had a lot of fun," she said. "They gave us a job to do, and we got it done. I never have felt it was anything special. We just did our part."

The WASP veterans, who posed for pictures and signed a few autographs, were at McClellan Park as part of the Wings of Freedom Tour.

Organized by the nonprofit Collings Foundation, the tour is in its 16th year. The traveling show has stopped in the Sacramento region each of those years, thanks to local military history maven Iris Taggart, who tirelessly promotes the annual event.

Taggart's late husband Robert was a veteran of 32 missions in a B-17 during World War II as part of the 8th Air Force, 390th Bomb Group.

"I just have a love affair with the B-17," said Taggart as she gazed up at the old warbird. "If I see one, I start to cry. I even love to listen to the engines."

The immaculate old aircraft inspired memories and awe among spectators.

Ken Shrewsbury's memories are spine-tingling in more ways than one.

As a navigator in the "Bloody 100th" during World War II, Shrewsbury flew 35 missions over Germany in a B-17.

"Flying at 25,000 feet, it was pretty cold," he remembered. "We crashed a few times and got shot up a bunch. But the big bird brought us home. We made it. The Bloody 100th lost more airplanes than anyone else, so I'm lucky to be here."

Clara Flynn was awash in romantic memories as she gazed at a B-25, so similar to the B-26 her husband Owen used to fly.

"We met in France. I was a flight nurse," she said. "He used to give me rides in the nose of the plane and we would go to Spain, Portugal, Denmark … until the colonel found out and put a stop to it."

Tour organizers hope young and old alike will leave the display with warm memories.

"This flying memorial for World War II veterans is a hands-on learning experience," said Caroline Lindgren-Collings of the Collings Foundation.

For a small fee, visitors can clamber aboard the planes and inspect the nose, turrets and engines up close.

The display will be at McClellan Park's Coast Guard hangar at the end of Freedom Park Drive from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sunday. For more information, contact Iris Taggart at (916) 455-4412.
By Erika Chavez -- Published 12:01 am PDT Friday, May 26, 2006

 

[fortworthgal]

Neat! I do a WASP impression and I was able to meet 3 WASP veterans at the Collings Foundation "Wings of Freedom" stop here back in April. Wonderful ladies, and tremendously interesting! The Collings planes are also beautiful and very well maintained. Lots of veterans come out and so it is always a great experience.

I also had the opportunity to meet Caroline Collings, who flies for the Collings Foundation. She is currently the world's only female B-24 type rated pilot. Another fascinating lady!

 

[Story]

Posted on Thu, Jun. 01, 2006
W.W. II pilots relive glory
MEMBERS OF WASP FLY ABOARD RESTORED WARBIRD
By Renee Koury
Mercury News

They defied convention -- and defied gravity -- six decades ago when they became the first women in history to fly for the U.S. military as Women Airforce Service Pilots.

On Wednesday, three of the World War II aviation pioneers, now in their 80s and living in the Bay Area, made a short return flight.

Eleanor Wortz of Los Altos, Jean McFarland Koehler of Sunnyvale and Maggie Gee of Berkeley flew through crystal blue skies from Livermore to Moffett Field in a restored B-24 Liberator, like the ones they piloted as the unconventional flying ladies of World War II.

``It felt pretty good,'' said Wortz, 84, who emerged beaming from the plane's tiny hatch after the 23-minute hop. ``It's been so long . . . I'd forgotten how it is.''

Wortz was wearing the original skirted dress uniform with silver wings she wore as a 23-year-old flier. She lamented that at 84, she could no longer pilot the plane herself on Wednesday, just ride in the flight deck.

``Flying is what I love to do and I couldn't,'' she said. ``But it made you remember. I had two years of flying in the Air Force and it was a good life.''

Wortz was joined on the B-24 ``Witchcraft'' by her fellow WASP veterans Koehler, 87, and Gee, 82.

All three professed a love of flying as young girls during an era when few women entered a cockpit. It was only the exigencies of World War II, when pilots were growing scarce, that turned the military to women for help.

Wortz, Koehler and Gee were among exactly 1,074 women, out of 25,000 who applied, to earn their silver wings in WASP training from 1942 to 1944.

Though they were an exclusive group, the WASP were not bestowed military status, couldn't serve in combat or fly outside the United States.

Instead, they helped the male Air Force pilots mainly by ferrying fighter planes from one base to another. Some died in crashes during their domestic flights. Many, like Gee, helped stage mock dogfights in the air. Koehler's job was to tow targets behind her plane while Air Force fliers shot at the targets for practice.

``When I reported for duty the first day, the officer said, `Yeah, we need help, but we don't need women,' '' Koehler recalled. ``All I could say was, `Yes sir!' What I wanted to say was entirely different than that.''

But she and others said the women generally were treated with respect. They lived on the bases in barracks far from the men. They often dined in the officers' mess hall. They were invited to the dances.

After the war, the women said, their piloting careers ended. With hordes of male pilots returning from war, the veterans got the jobs while the women were shut out.

``In those days women weren't taken as seriously,'' Koehler recalled. ``They were considered too emotional to fly.''

Instead, Koehler went on to a series of jobs, including helping repair bush pilot planes in Alaska, and then nursing at Stanford Hospital. Gee went on to become a physicist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

Wortz hung on to aviation longer: She learned Portuguese to land a job in Brazil teaching theory of flight to Brazilian students.

Wednesday's flight was part of the Wings of Freedom Tour, arranged by the non-profit Collings Foundation of Massachusetts, which restores World War II planes.

The aging WASP members are dwindling. About 400 are still living. About two dozen so far have been tapped to take the bumpy, noisy rides aboard the restored Wings of Freedom planes, still fitted with machine guns and bomb-target sighting equipment.

The plane carrying the three Bay Area WASP members was piloted, appropriately, by a younger female pilot, Caroline Lindgren-Collings, daughter-in-law of the foundation's founder. She also is the only female pilot who's licensed to fly a B-24 Liberator. Once a common World War II aircraft, the one at Moffett this weekend is the only one left that flies.

``It's such a privilege to be the one to fly these ladies who are my heroes,'' said Lindgren-Collings. ``What they did for women in aviation was nothing less than heroic. WASP was an experiment to see if women could be pilots and they proved we could.''

In 1977, the nation officially recognized WASP's contribution in World War II and bestowed its members with full military status and benefits.