Congress to honor Danbury-trained war pilot

By Eileen FitzGerald
Staff writer

Updated: 08/07/2009 12:28:51 AM EDT

Eleanor Feeney Lawry as a Women Airforce Service Pilot, posing in front of the Avenger Field WASP...

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Eleanor Feeley Lawry was about 5 years old when she set her heart on flying.

Two years after graduation from Danbury High School, she earned her private pilot's license, the first woman to do so at Danbury Airport.

In 1943, she was 21 and a Danbury State Teachers College graduate when she paid her way to Texas to train with about 1,000 other female pilots to help the war effort.

The Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II were the first women ever to fly American military aircraft. They logged more than 60 million miles on noncombat military assignments in the U.S. so male pilots were freed for overseas combat missions.

Now, more than 65 years later, Lawry and her peers will receive the country's highest civilian honor for their war service, the Congressional Gold Medal.

"It's a very special honor," Lawry said from her Pennsylvania home. She left Danbury six years ago. "It's kind of late, but our grandchildren will have something special about their grandmothers."

President Barack Obama signed a bill July 1 at the White House to award the Gold Medal to the 1,114 women, including 11 who died in training before receiving their wings and 38 who were killed during duty.

About 305 of the women are alive. All are 85 or older.

"Every American should be grateful for their service, and I am honored to sign this bill to finally give them some of the hard-earned recognition they deserve," Obama said at the signing, according to the U.S. Air Force Web site.

The Congressional Gold Medal is the highest and most distinguished award Congress can give a civilian. Since the American Revolution, Congress has commissioned gold medals as its highest expression of national appreciation for exceptional achievements and contributions.

In 2000 and 2006, Congress awarded the Gold Medal to the Navajo Code Talkers and the Tuskegee Airmen, respectively.

During their time in the war, the women pilots held civilian status. But in 1977, President Jimmy Carter signed a bill giving the WASPs veterans benefits.

"I paid my own way to Sweetwater, Texas, (Avenger Field) in April 1943," Lawry said. "We had no uniforms and paid our own way to everything. We had no insurance, but we did it anyway.

"When they said they didn't need us, we bought our tickets to our homes. They never promised us anything."

Lawry was raised in Danbury, the hometown of both her father and husband. She graduated from Danbury High School in 1938 and Danbury State Teachers College in 1942.

"Danbury was an excellent place for children to grow up," she said. "If you had any special talents, the whole town was behind you."

Still, it was hard to convince people that as a woman she should take flying lessons. But she persisted. She was the only woman in the Civilian Pilot Training Course, a course co-sponsored by the college and Sadler Aviation at Danbury Airport to give preliminary training to future military pilots.

Brandes Meeker was Lawry's flying instructor, and in 1940 she was the first woman to receive her private pilot's license at the airport. She learned at the time she was also the 100th woman pilot in Connecticut and the 1,000th in the country.

The WASP mission was terminated Dec. 20, 1944, and Lawry returned to Danbury and took a job as an airline hostess for TransWorld Airlines. She married Cas Lawry, an Air Force officer, in 1946, and they raised two sons and a daughter.

Nancy Parrish, who 13 years ago started a Web site for the WASPs called Wings Across America, was thrilled about the awarding of the medal, which still has to be designed.

"Every WASP knows it will happen and that the country is saying thank you," Parrish said. "Their job was to take over every kind of mission in the United States, from flying materials to administrative flights and towing gliders. It was an extraordinarily grand experiment."

She's found the WASPs to be special women.

"It's not just what they did, but the kind of people they are," Parrish said. "There is something about them that is larger than life. It lifts you up a little higher than you were before.

"It has to do with the honor and integrity of these women."

Their story has been hidden for 65 years, Parrish said. "Now it's on the national stage and it will go into the history books that they were awarded this honor."

Lawry said she had a great time as a WASP.

"We were different women from different parts of the country, but we all loved flying," Lawry said. "We thought it was a great opportunity. We just went about our business and loved every minute."

Contact Eileen FitzGerald

at eileenf@newstimes.com

or at 203-731-3333.

About Eleanor Lawry n Age 88. n Will receive Congressional Gold Medal from Congress for her service in the Women Airforce Service Pilots during World War II. n Danbury High School graduate, 1938. n Danbury State Teachers College graduate, 1942. n Served as a member of the WASPs from April 1943 to December 1944

Aviation pioneer recognized in Warren

Committeeman Gary DiNardo presents a certificate of recognition to Carol Roberts, niece of pioneering aviator Aline Rhonie Hofheimer, whose family once owned the land that is now the municipal complex, the Elks Lodge, and the area around the Mountain Boulevard and Mount Bethel Road intersection.

Published: Aug 7th, 7:06 AM

WARREN TWP. – The 100th anniversary of the birth of Aline Rhonie Hofheimer, a pioneering female aviator with roots in Warren Township, and the contributions of Ernie Cottrill, founder and developer of the Giving Garden Project at the community garden at Wagner Farm Arboretum were celebrated with the awarding certificates of recognition at the Thursday, July 23, Township Committee meeting.

Hofheimer’s niece, Carol Roberts, accepted the certificate on behalf of her aunt who was a contemporary of Amelia Earhardt and who helped advance the world of aviation and helped show the world that women belonged in the sky, too.

Pioneering Aviator

The Hofheimer family once owned the huge swath of land that is the main business district of Warren Township. The Hofheimer estate included what is now the entire municipal complex, the property where the Elks Lodge is, the Warrenville Golf Course, and across Warrenville and Mount Bethel roads all the way down to the Bardy Farms greenhouses and fresh produce center.

The Town Hall and the Elks Lodge were once residences of members of the Hofheimer family.

Aline Rhonie Hofheimer was one of the granddaughters of the original Hofheimer family.

According to Warren history, Aline Rhonie Hoifheimer was born on Aug. 16, 1909 in York, Pa., the daughter of Arthur and Helen Milius Hofheimer. She, her parents and her siblings returned to live in Warren Township in 1912.

“She grew up on Long Acre Farms, the family’s luxurious country estate in Washington Valley, where the Pheasant Run Shopping Center is now, with her sisters,” according to the history.

She married twice, first in the late 1920s to L. Richard Bamberger, a New York stockbroker, then after her divorce in 1930, to Reginald L. Brooks in 1933. He was the nephew of Lady Astor, and an amateur aviator.

Hofheimer had learned to fly gliders, seaplanes and twin-engine craft before she was 20-years-old, and in 1930, earned her pilot’s license.

She was the first woman to fly solo from New York to Mexico in 1934.

Hofheimer earned a British flying license in 1936, worked with the Red Cross during World War II, and flew solo across the United States in 1940, raising funds for aviator canteens in England and France.

During the war, she became the fourth woman to join the Woman’s Auxiliary Flying Squadron in 1942, and in 1943, she went to England and served as the first officer in the British Air Transport Auxiliary, where she received various medals and awards.

Her solo flight to Mexico was stimulated by her other passion, painting. According to news reports at the time, she did it “because she wanted to talk murals with Diego Rivera.”

She studied for several months with Rivera, learning the art of fresco painting, and as a young teen, she had taken lessons from noted American painter, John Sloan.

Hofheimer’s most noted work is a fresco mural that measures 106 feet by 12.5 feet, which was painted on the north wall of Hanger F at Roosevelt Field, Long Island. That is the same airport from which Charles Lindbergh left on his historic solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean.

The fresco depicts 500 air notables, including many of the early female aviators, 200 lesser-known personalities, and 268 planes and hangers from the pre-Lindbergh era of American aviation.

In 1960, the hanger was demolished along with the Roosevelt Field airport to make way for the Roosevelt Field shopping mall. Hofheimer spent $20,000 of her own money to have the mural removed, and placed in storage.

Susan Loricchio of the North Jersey chapter of The Ninety-Nines, the international organization of women pilots, and Esta-Ann Schapiro of Warren Township, wife of noted Warren Township author Jack Elliott, have tracked the history of Hofheimer’s fresco, which remains in storage. They have been keen to see that the fresco, by an historic female aviator about historic female aviation pioneers, be properly displayed.

Loricchio said that the fresco is currently stored at Vaughn College of Aeronautics, Queens, not far from Laguardia Airport.

After the war, Hofheimer co-founded the Luscombe Airplane Company, Kansas City, Mo., and served as president and chairman of the board at Allison Radar Corporation.

She died in Palm Beach, Fla., on Jan. 7, 1963.

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All proceeds from the luncheon will be donated back to the causes of the award winners.

WASP of Maine

Women pilots from WWII now getting their due

BY LARRY GRARD
Staff Writer08/03/2009

Skowhegan--following World War II, they waited for 34 years for military recognition and veteran status.

Staff photo by David Leaming

LIVING HISTORY: Betty Brown, of Skowhegan, speaks recently about serving as a WASP (Women Airforce Service Pilot) during World War ll. Brown and surviving members of the division will be awarded a Congressional Gold Medal. A wall of photos and service memorablia is behind her.

Now, the Women Airforce Service Pilots have won another accolade that might be considered overdue. President Obama on July 1 signed a bill that awards the Congressional Gold Medal to the women who flew noncombat military missions in this country, which allowed men to conduct the overseas combat missions.

About 300 of the 1,102 women who served as WASPs remain. Three are from Maine. The ceremony could take place before the year's end.

"We're hopeful it won't be that long," former WASP Betty Brown said last week from her Skowhegan home. "We did a great job, and we're glad that we're being recognized for such an important role in World War II."

Whenever the Washington, D.C., award ceremony will be held, Brown, 86, and her husband, Ron, will make the trip down. Phyllis Paradis, also to receive the medal, might go with them.

"I would love to go with Betty," said Paradis, 90, from her Bass Harbor home. "As long as I'm on my feet, I'll go."

The two have not met.

Edith Beal, 93, of Bridgton was a classmate of Brown when they trained at Sweetwater, Tex. Beal and Brown haven't seen each other since graduation day, when they earned their wings.

"I think (the medal) is great, but I just hope I live long enough to see it," Beal said. "I think we were due it, really. But I can't make it to Washington."

A group known as Wings Across America is dedicated to preserving the history of the WASP program, and its members are just as eager to get word of a ceremony date.

"My mother is a WASP," Wings Across America director Nancy Parrish said from her Baylor University office, "so I know. We're all chomping at the bit."

Parrish said Congress passed the Gold Medal bill "in record time." But the medal must be designed and minted before Congress can schedule a ceremony, she said.

In addition to towing targets fired on by ground troops, WASP ferried thousands of new aircraft from the factories to points of embarkation to the battlefront. They also flew missions for aerial-gunnery practice, and tested aircraft.

They trained in Sweetwater, Tex.

At her home in Skowhegan, Brown displayed a photo, showing her flying a plane towing gunnery targets 75 feet behind it.

"Our purpose," she said, "was to take the place of the men, so that they could go overseas. I towed targets for aerial gunnery practice, for the cadets in Texas."

Born in Iowa and raised in Michigan, Brown was working at a General Motors diesel office in a Detroit suburb when the flight bug hit her, in 1941. Her office was close to a grass-strip airport.

"I wondered what in the world the world looked like from up there," she recalled. "I got a ride, liked what I saw and began training. I got the required hours to enter training with the WASP training group."

At the age of 19, Brown began training in Sweetwater.

"I wanted to contribute to the war effort," she recalled.

Brown was on duty for about four months when the WASP program closed on Dec. 20, 1944. By that time, male pilots began returning home in increasing numbers.

"We had accomplished what we set out to do," Brown said.

"Now, the award brings to light that we were indeed a great help in World War II."

On her piano, Brown displayed a copy of a book called "Yankee Doodle Gals: Women Pilots of World War II," by Amy Nathan.

"WASPs weren't allowed to fly in combat, but they put their lives on the line every day," Nathan writes on the book's sleeve.

Brown has several copies of the book, and hopes to get some out to libraries -- and to "school-aged young ladies, to show them how to make up their minds to do something, and go for it."

Larry Grard -- 861-9239 lgrard@centralmaine.com

Photos added by Wings Across America

1. Betty June Overman Brown 2.Phyllis Johnson Paradis 3. Edith Smith Beal

WASP Henrietta Sproat, WASP

Gold medal for service: Oroville woman among wartime pilots to receive congressional medals

By HEATHER HACKING - Staff Writer

Posted: 08/02/2009 10:28:01 PM PDT

Click photo to enlarge

Henrietta Sproat, 90, a former Womens Airforce Service Pilot, looks at a picture of herself...

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OROVILLE -- More than 60 years ago, Henrietta Sproat earned her wings. This summer, she was told she earned a Congressional Gold Medal, the highest award Congress can award a civilian.

The Oroville resident, now 90, was one of a select group of women who served the United States during World War II by training to be a Women's Airforce Service Pilot (WASP).

The group was needed during the war to fly non-combat military missions, to free male pilots for combat overseas.

The WASPs transported planes overseas, tested military aircraft, taught aerial navigation, provided target towing and transported personnel and cargo.

On July 1, President Barack Obama signed a bill awarding the women the Congressional Gold Medal. The WASP women were also awarded veteran status in 1977.

During their brief existence, the WASPs delivered approximately 12,650 planes and flew more than 60 million miles. They were stationed at 120 Army bases across the United States.

One story in the WASP legacy was in 1943, when male pilots refused to fly the B-26 Martin Marauder, which was nicknamed "the Widowmaker, because it was difficult to fly.

Twenty-five WASPs trained to fly the plane. When the men saw the women master the machine, their attitude changed.

Sproat (born Henrietta Speckels) said she remembers seeing planes as a child and being interested in them. Then, as a young woman, she was able to fly.

In her mid-20s and not yet married, Sproat was living in San Antonio, Texas,

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which was surrounded by air bases.

In 1942 she worked in the hospital lab at Kelly Field, an advanced flight training base. Later she moved to the San Antonio Aviation Cadet Center, where men were tested and classified for training as pilots, navigators and bombardiers. It was there she worked with her future husband.

She had heard about the a group, the Texas Wing of Women Fliers, and joined the class, attending after work.

While at that training, Jackie Cochran — later the first woman to break the sound barrier — came and gave a talk about the Army Air Corps training program for women. Cochran was the director.

Sproat applied, passed the Army physical exam and aviation cadet qualifying exam, and was accepted to class 44-10 at Sweetwater, Texas.

Of 25,000 applicants, she was one of 1,830 accepted and 1,074 who earned her wings.

During that time, the war was in full swing, and Sproat lived among the other female fliers, six to a bay, sleeping on cots and doing laundry in a tub. Although they were civilians, they had military inspections including open lockers and bed inspections. The women marched to meals, did calisthenics and studied War Department manuals on flight theory, flight instruments, radio telephone procedures, physics, air navigation, meteorology and more.

"Our 50 hours of primary flying was in the PT-17 Stearman," Sproat wrote for a talk she gave some time ago. "We were taught spins, stalls, forced landings."

She recalled that an old Army truck took them to the field to practice take-offs and landings. It was so dry and dusty that at the end of the day when they took off their goggles, the women had "raccoon" faces.

After the first solo flight, other classmates would throw the flier in a small fountain pool.

They were tested by a civilian instructors. Those who failed were given an Army test drive, and those who "washed" left the program.

Basic training was in a BT-13, which was called the "baby carriage" because it was easy to land. One flight student was in the rear cockpit, flying by instruments, while the other was in the cockpit, watching for other planes. They flew by radio signals.

After mastering that plane, they moved to the AT-6, an advanced training plane, in which the women learned to fly cross country, night flying and aerobatics.

Sproat recalled the training was rigorous and the women were expected to master their tasks perfectly.

During a recent interview at her daughter Debby Henderson's home in Oroville, Sproat recalled that it was the friendships that were the most important at that time in her life.

The women trained during the day, then spent the evening studying, and sharing stories from their day.

She remembers the women as "young, daring and dedicated — women of honor."

About a third of the women did not complete training, and were missed by the others.

While Sproat earned her wings, the program was only active for about 16 months, and was deactivated by the time she would have been ready to fully join the program.

The loss of male combat pilots overseas was less than expected, and combat pilots were returning to the United States.

But receiving her wings from Jackie Cochran and Gen. "Hap" Arnold of the Army Air Corps was one of the highlights of her young life.

Sproat was assigned to other air bases for two weeks before the program was deactivated in late 1944.

She said it was very difficult to say good-bye to the other female fliers.

Over the years, Sproat has kept in contact with many of the women who also served in the program. There was a 25th anniversary, and a 50th anniversary celebration. There was another reunion in Dallas last fall.

As for the Congressional Gold Medal, Sproat said it is much more than she expected. But most of all, she is excited for the celebration, which has yet to be announced, in hope of seeing other women from the program.

Her daughter said the government will be minting the medals and announcing a ceremony, likely in the fall or later.

The medals will be given in Washington, D.C.

Staff writer Heather Hacking can be reached at 896-7758 or hhacking@chicoer.com.

Her story is WWII history

Former Bradley teacher who flew B-26 bombers during war will receive Congressional Gold Medal of Honor

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RON JOHNSON/JOURNAL STAR

Peorian Duke Caldwell, 91, will receive the Congressional Gold Medal of Honor for her service years with the WASP program during WWII.

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By SCOTT HILYARD(shilyard@pjstar.com)

OF THE JOURNAL STAR

Posted Aug 01, 2009 @ 09:51 PM

Last update Aug 01, 2009 @ 10:32 PM

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PEORIA —

Mildred "Duke" Caldwell hasn't piloted an airplane since the early 1940s when she flew a Martin B-26 Marauder twin-engine bomber every day for work, but the idea of flying a plane thrills her to this day.

"It was delightful. I loved flying," Caldwell said. "Loved it!"

Caldwell, who is 91, is one of about 300 surviving Women's Airforce Service Pilots, an exclusive club known better by its acronym, WASP. And while the World War II-era group of women never totaled much more than 1,100 members and lasted only 28 months, it left a lasting imprint on American history as the first group of women to fly the country's military aircraft.

The WASP program was in the news recently when President Barack Obama on July 1 signed legislation that awarded the survivors with the Congressional Gold Medal of Honor. It's the highest civilian honor that can be bestowed on an individual, and it puts Duke Caldwell in the company of the medal's first recipient, George Washington.

"Not bad for an old gym teacher," said Caldwell, who retired from Bradley University 26 years ago after a long career in the physical education department and is a professor emeritus.

Caldwell was born and raised in Connecticut. As a girl she spent $2.50 of her newspaper route money to buy a short airplane ride when a small air show flew into her town.

"I caught the flying bug long before I ever got in a plane," she said. "I always wanted to get my pilot's license."

She graduated from a college in Troy, N.Y., in 1939 and took a teaching job in the area. But she had her eye on another job in another state.

"I knew that the Piper (airplane) company (in Lock Haven, Pa.) had three or four flight instructors on their payroll and gave flying lessons to employees," Caldwell said. "So I got a job there working second shift in the first aid room and then going department to department taking inventory. And that's where I learned how to fly."

Her timing was perfect. The WASP program, designed to have women fly planes in the United States in varying capacities so that men pilots would be free to fly combat missions in the war, started up in September 1942. Caldwell, a freshly licensed airplane pilot, couldn't sign up fast enough. On April 25, 1943, Caldwell reported for training along with 121 other women in Sweetwater, Texas, for primary, basic and then advanced training. By graduation day, Oct. 9, 1943, 37 women in her group had dropped out of training. Soon after, she was specially selected and soon learning to fly the B-26 in the skies above a military base in Dodge City, Kan. Once trained on the bomber, she was sent to Laredo, Texas, with a specific mission in her near future.

Caldwell shrugs when asked if her WASP duty was dangerous. It sure sounds dangerous. The B-26s she flew had the bomber racks removed and a tow reel that dragged something that resembled a wind sock behind the plane on a long cable. She flew the plane with a crew chief and a co-pilot as other planes - with bomber racks very much attached and loaded with live ammunition - maneuvered in the vicinity of her plane firing away at the target she trailed.

"We were the target for the soldiers getting their combat training," she said.

The end came suddenly and without warning. On Dec. 7, 1944, the last WASP class graduated from training. Less than two weeks later, WASP was finished. Here's how a timeline on the WASP Web site, www.wingsacrossamerica.com, describes the end:

"December 20, 1944. One minute after midnight of preceding day, WASP cease to exist as a quasi-military unit. Hung up their parachutes and paid their own way back home. No benefits, no honors, no veteran status. Official WASP military records sealed, stamped 'classified' and sent for storage to the government archives. History of WASP not recorded by historians in official historical accounts of World War II. Reason: records not available."

Caldwell doesn't have specific memories of the shutdown of WASP almost 65 years ago. She paid some attention when in 1977 the Air Force poked the WASP nest when it issued a news release claiming that, for the first time in history, it was graduating 10 women pilots from flight training, making them the first women in history to fly American military aircraft. An aggressive campaign brought the WASP story into the light, and on Nov. 3, 1977, Congress passed a law giving WASP veteran status.

"I understood why people fought hard for that," Caldwell said. "But I didn't care that much, I'd been a civilian so long."

A WASP World War II Museum opened at Avenger Field in Sweetwater in 2005, and now the entire operation has been rewarded with the Congressional Gold Medal. Details are still being worked out how the medals will be conferred on the WASP recipients, most likely at a special event in Washington, D.C. Caldwell doesn't plan to be there.

"Why the hell would I go all the way out there," said Caldwell, adding she doesn't travel much anymore. "My nephew will go for me. He'll pick up my medal and get it to me."

Caldwell keeps a scrapbook with yellowed press clippings and memorabilia from her WASP days in a permanent spot on a table in her front room. The cover of the scrapbook remains wrapped in its original plastic packaging. She flipped through the book recently and stopped on a page in the middle.

On it was a photo scissored from a Life magazine story about the WASP program published in 1943. The photo showed a young woman in an open-cockpit Fairchild PT-19 airplane, presumably taken from an airplane flying alongside. The co-pilot's open cockpit behind her is empty. The woman, who is staring intently straight forward, is shown from about the shoulders up. Her hair streams behind her in the wind.

Caldwell tapped the photo with an index finger.

"Moi," she said.

Scott Hilyard can be reached at 686-3244 or at shilyard@pjstar.com.

Vandeventer Awarded Life Membership to American Legion

Post Commander David Olson presents Lifetime Memership to WASP Mary Alice Vandeventer

During WWII 1,102 women (out of 25,000 who applied) became heroes, pilots, pioneers, and leaders--these women were known as the WASP (Women Airforce Service Pilots). Mrs. Mary Alice Vandeventer of Lueders, Texas was one of the women who graduated from training at Avenger Field during WWII.

WASP were established during World War II with the main mission of women flying non-combat military missions in the United States hence freeing their male counterparts for combat missions. These pilots were the first women ever to fly American military aircraft. Thirty eight of them gave the ultimate sacrifice.

After training, the WASP were stationed at 120 air bases throughout the U.S. taking on numerous flight missions. They flew sixty million miles of operational flights from aircraft factories to ports of embarkation and military training bases, towed targets for live anti-aircraft artillery practice,flew virtual strafing missions, and transported troops and cargo. Every type of aircraft flown by the USAAF during WWII, including the early J.S. jet aircraft, were also flown by women in these roles. Between September 1942 and December 1944, the WASP delivered 12,650 aircraft.

These women were considered civilian service workers; therefore, did not receive any military honors. In June of 1944 a Bill went before U.S. House of Representatives to give these women military status, but after over a thousand male pilots lobbied against the idea and the Bill failed. The WASP were ordered in December 1944 to disband.

Mrs. Vandeventer was recently awarded a life membership it the American Legion, Clearfork Post #661 by Post Commander, David Olson. She was recognized due to her long time service to her post, her active years as Post Adjutant and her dedication to her country.

It is for her service that Mrs. Vandeventer will receive the Congressional Gold Medal which President Obama recently signed into law on July 1, 2009.

Mrs. Vandeventer is one of approximately 300 surviving WASP.

by Chuck Prewitt and Tiffany Waddell

Reprinted from p. 10 "THE WESTERN OBSERVER"

July 29, 2009

(edited for accuracy)

Proud Pilot--Westboro woman, former pilot

Mrs. Bent (T&G STAFF/JIM COLLINS)

WESTBORO WOMAN, FORMER PILOT, GETS MEDAL
By Priyanka Dayal TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF



WESTBORO — June E. Bent's cousin happened to owe her some money. He also happened to work at a flight school. So he paid the debt by setting her up with flying lessons.

“They called me the flying secretary,” she said, for she was, at the time, a secretary for a lawyer in her hometown of Des Moines, Iowa.

That was 66 years ago, when it was unusual for a woman to be in the cockpit. But rude comments from doubtful men didn't deter Mrs. Bent or the 1,101 other women who decided to use their piloting skills to help their country win World War II. They became the Women Airforce Service Pilots, women who were trained to fly non-combat missions in 1943 and 1944. They didn't fight, but their work freed male pilots for overseas combat. Thirty-eight WASPs were killed in service.They were underappreciated, overlooked and the first women ever to fly U.S. military aircraft. For that they will receive the Congressional Gold Medal. President Barack Obama signed a bill July 1 that gives each WASP or her family the highest honor a civilian can receive.

“Nobody thought about awards when we were doing this, we just thought about the feeling of being able to fly those great airplanes,” said Mrs. Bent, who lives at The Willows at Westborough, a complex for independent seniors.

But she is proud to receive the much-awaited recognition and talks fondly about the girls she served with.

About 300 of the female pilots from World War II are living. All of them are older than 85. Mrs. Bent is 96.

She was sharp and chatty and wearing a colorful sweater as she turned the pages of a decades-old photo album in her apartment this week.

Black-and-white shots of her from the 1940s show a dark-haired young woman with a defined brow and a big smile. Newspaper clips from the time describe her as one of the “attractive girls” who left home to fly bombers and fighters.

She trained in Sweetwater, Texas, and served for about a year, doing engineering test flights on various planes. When a new aircraft was tested, or an older one had to be checked after repairs, that was a job for the WASPs. They tested the planes to make sure they were safe for male pilots to use in combat.

It was like being a guinea pig, but Mrs. Bent says that was part of the fun.

“You did it every day, like pounding a typewriter,” she said. “You just took your turn and tested the plane. We were always scared before check rides. … But immediately, the adrenaline sets in. So you just do it.”

How female pilots were treated by their male counterparts differed from base to base; it depended on the commanding officer. “Some of them thought women shouldn't be flying, others thought it was fine,” Mrs. Bent said. Sometimes, junior male officers weren't sure whether to salute the women. Sometimes they said unkind things. Mrs. Bent says she was too busy to care.

“We proved women could be taught to fly the same as men,” she said.

Women pilots who served in World War II were considered civilians, even though they had almost the same training as male cadets and served alongside military officers. They didn't get any benefits: if a WASP died in service, her family had to pay to bring her body home. They weren't recognized as veterans until 1977.

“They performed these magnificent things because they were asked to, but they had to do it better, because they had to prove themselves,” said Nancy A. Parrish, whose mother flew twin-engine bombers in World War II. “They really had to prove every time they got into a plane that they could fly it. They proved airplanes don't know the difference between a man and a woman.”

Ms. Parrish, of Waco, Texas, is executive director of Wings Across America, which teaches the history of the WASPs. She spent three years trying to get Congress to notice their accomplishments. With the help of Maj. Nicole Malachowski, a famed fighter pilot in today's Air Force, a bill was passed this year.

The Congressional Gold Medal also has been awarded to two other historically marginalized groups: the Navajo Code Talkers and the Tuskegee Airmen. The WASP medal will be specially designed by the U.S. Mint, and an award ceremony in Washington, D.C., will follow, but a date has not been set. Mrs. Bent is hoping she can attend.

Many women lost their husbands in the war; Mrs. Bent found hers. She was June Braun when she met a fighter pilot who had just returned from combat in North Africa. He was John T. Bent, known to friends as Jack, and he noticed her while she was sitting with a friend at the Air Force base in Merced, Calif.

“He asked, ‘May I sit with you?' He did, and two and a half months later, we were married,” Mrs. Bent said.

They were married at the chapel on base, in their uniforms, in July 1944. “I didn't have any civilian clothes with me,” Mrs. Bent said. So the first thing she did on her honeymoon was buy a purple suit, a matching hat and black suede sandals.

After the war, the couple lived in Kingsport, Tenn., Chicago and Rochester, N.Y. They had two daughters. Mr. Bent worked for Kodak and Mrs. Bent designed jewelry for fun — she was wearing a sparkling mineral cast in silver around her neck this week, a pendant she made herself. Neither of them flew planes again, but they took up gliding as a hobby. And they traveled around the world.

They moved to Massachusetts about six years ago to be close to their daughter, who lives in Hopedale. Mr. Bent died four years ago.

“We didn't have any plans to retire,” Mrs. Bent recalled. “We were having too much fun.”

She has lost many of her pilot friends and looks forward to reunions where she can meet others who lived the life she did. She is one of seven WASPs living in Massachusetts.

There were more than 600 WASPs living across the country in 1998, according to Ms. Parrish, and now the number is half that.

“They're losing a lot of people,” she said. “We are trying really hard to get the medal designed and get that presentation done before we lose any more.”

Contact reporter Priyanka Dayal by e-mail at pdayal@telegram.com.

JUST PLANE EXCITING--WASP Lois Nash

The Storyteller: Woman finds aviation just plane exciting

By Charmaine Smith-Miles (Contact)
Sunday, July 19, 2009

Photo by Nathan Gray

Lois Nash is pictured here on an AT-6 airplane in 1943 after her training in Sweetwater, TX.

Photo by Nathan Gray

Lois Nash stands in front a poster of a B-26 airplane which was one of the many planes Nash piloted as a Womens Airforce Service Pilot (WASP) during World War II. She will be receiving a congressional medal for her service.

On a table in Lois Nash’s living room at Lake Keowee in is a brown metal plane, a B-26 plane. It is the only thing, besides a lamp, that sits on the small stand. And in her hands are pictures of the same plane. And two posters stand up on the floor — at least one of them is another B-26.

It’s her favorite plane. But her story doesn’t start with that plane.

Instead, it begins with another aircraft, a Ford tri-motor, a much smaller plane that had three engines and was made of corrugated metal. She was 5.

Nash, her parents and her sister were at place they often went on Sunday afternoons: an airport in Dearborn, Mich., near her hometown of Ferndale. The skies were clear. Planes were taking off and landing like usual. But this day, they did something different.

They went up in one. That was the day she fell in love.

“They were offering a special that day on plane rides,” Nash said. “I can still see the Rogue River, the Detroit River, Dale Department store and looking into Canada. It’s still as clear as can be. That gave me the idea that I wanted to learn how to fly.”

Twelve years later, in the seat of an open-cockpit plane, Nash knew. Flying was her love, and she wasn’t content to just sit in the passenger seat.

As a woman living in the midst of World War II, she never really thought about flying commercially. But she knew she could fly as a hobby, as a private pilot. It would just take a lot of money for lessons.

So she headed to Eastern Michigan University. A degree and a position as a teacher may give her the money she would need to take those lessons. Nash had no idea then that a president and war would give her an opportunity she’d never thought of.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt put the Civilian Pilot Training program into place.

“It was a wonderful opportunity. When I called, it was full of young men already,” Nash said. “Three weeks later, a fella dropped out. So they called me.”

It was a $25 course and a window to her passion. Two years later, Nash received a call from the government. They needed pilots to train the men so they could go overseas and fight. At the time, she said no. She had to finish school. In June, she graduated. By July she was headed on a plane to Sweetwater, Texas.

Some of the pictures she shows off today are of those days. A younger Lois Nash smiles from the photo wearing a “zoot suit.” She and a half-dozen other women are all smiling, wearing belts around the baggy suits to hold them up. The suits were made for the men. But they had to make do. They had a mission to accomplish.

They were there to train men to fly so they could fight in the war.

“We would tow these targets for the B-24 gunners to shoot at,” Nash said. “They would have us go up to 10,000 feet, put on oxygen masks and then go up to 20,000 feet. It was OK with me. I didn’t have any incidents. But some of the other girls did. And that wasn’t good.”

In the next 18 months, Nash would serve her country while her husband was fighting in North Africa and Italy. All the women at Sweetwater had boyfriends, brothers or husbands in the war effort, Nash said. They all “wanted to do what they could to help.”

Nash flew 16 different kinds of planes in those months. She flew B-24s, B-25s and the B-26. The B-26 was her favorite.

“It was the fastest bomber that they had at the time,” Nash said. “They were so maneuverable.”

Nash said she flew every chance she had. She flew pilots in training, equipment and even two wounded soldiers one time. Here, Nash stops to take me on a journey. This is one of the flights that stands out in her mind.

She was flying from Pueblo, Colo., to Tucson, Ariz. The soldiers were in the back of the plane. About 60 minutes in the air, one of the engines quit. Luckily, she was able to turn around and head back to Pueblo. But all the way, the plane was losing altitude.

“I remember looking down at the airport runway and seeing fire trucks, ambulances, and like 100 people. I just made a nice big turn and used most of the runway to land,” Nash said, looking at me and smiling. “That was the first incident we had. At first the men weren’t sure they wanted women pilots. But they soon learned, ‘Hey, these girls can fly.’ ”

And fly they did.

More than 1,000 women trained at Sweetwater — 1,102 to be exact, Nash said. There were 10 classes of women pilots to go through the place. And before their job was done, 38 would be killed during their duty. They didn’t know it then, but they were paving the way for women today to be able to enjoy the same thrill they had in the skies.

About 30 years later, during President Jimmy Carter’s era, the women were militarized and became “Women Airforce Service Pilots.”

Now, 60 years later, there are about 300 of those original “WASPs” left. Nash is one of them. And in January, she and her fellow female pilots will go to Washington, D.C., to receive the highest honor the U.S. Congress can award a civilian — the Congressional Gold Medal.

But for Nash, it wasn’t about medals or rank or even getting paid.

She just wanted to fly and serve her country.

“It was wonderful,” she said. “I loved every minute of it. I couldn’t get enough flying.”