Fly Girls – Part 2 – Two Women.

Link to Part 1 – Fly Girls – The Old Woman

-Someplace in the Northern Atlantic.

“Verdammt, diese Kälte.” the captain thought. He didn’t realize it, but he’d said it out loud. If the Lookouts or officers in the conning tower heard it, out of respect they said nothing.

He was a German submariner and so of course he thought in German. Like soldiers and sailors all over the world he hated the cold. He was probably grateful that the cold didn’t come with a storm that caused rolling waves. U-boats aren’t made to ride rolling waves on the surface. U-boats were made to cruise deep like the sharks they were. They came only to the surface to hunt.

But there wasn’t much hunting right now. The cold fog had settled down on the ocean. There could have been a big fat merchant ship half a mile away. They couldn’t see it if it were.

He rubbed his hands together. It was the closest he’d come to allowing the crew to see he was miserable as well.

“Aircraft engines,” a lookout cried.

“Where?”

The lookout was point off the port. He was peering through the fog with powerful binoculars. He was hoping maybe to see the airplanes making the sound through a break. “Coming this way, but I can’t see them.”

He looked in the direction the lookout had indicated.

The big bombers came out of the fog like a movie ghost slipping through a wall. The thunder of their engines was now loud as the aircraft bore down on them. This close they looked huge to the captain.

And menacing!

American B-17s he thought. Then the airplanes were passing over. The sound of the engines seemed to fill the world. The steel of his submarine vibrated from the pounding of the prop wash.

One of the B-17s dipped a wing slightly and the captain looked straight into the eyes of the pilot. They were beautiful eyes in a beautiful face.

It took him a second to realize the pilot was a woman. And the look in her eyes was unmistakable.

She had that same steel look he had when looking through a periscope. He knew she was thinking, “My, what an easy target.”

Then the planes were gone, swallowed up into the fog. The drone of their engines faded away.

Years later, an old woman sitting on a bar stool in a museum would tell children that story.

-Two Women

Let’s flash back to the dark days of World War II. While America was on the sidelines until 1941, it was obvious that soon we’d be sucked into it.

American industry was starting to ramp up. Tanks and airplanes were beginning to roll more and more out of factories. Improvements were being made to the existing weapons of war. And new one’s were coming off the draft boards.

Men were being called up to fill the ranks of the military services. With men leaving the factories and shipyards, the jobs would eventually got to women. we’ve all seen the pictures. A woman with riveting gun or a wrench building an airplane. A welder sparks and a tank or ship forms under the hands of young woman.

Because of the shortage of men, we got one of the most iconic pictures of all times. The picture of Rosie the Riveter. She has her sleeve rolled up, her arm flexed and the declaration that “We Can do it.”

America would never be the same again.

But there was one group of ladies that took the idea of Rosie and put her on steroids.

What’s interesting is the idea came from two separate women but at almost the same time. Both women were pilots and they saw a need no one else had expected.

The men were needed in the cockpits of the fighters, bombers, and transports fighting the war. that meant someone had to test new machines. Someone had to fly new aircraft out to the guys or to shipping points.

Enter two remarkable women, Jacqueline “Jackie” Cochran and Nancy Harkness Love.

Both women were pilots and very good one’s at that. But that’s where the similarity ended.

Nancy was the daughter of wealthy doctor in Houghton, Michigan. Airplanes fascinated her and she got her pilots license when she was 16. She went to all the right schools, attended all the right functions. And the last thing one would expect from her is she’d become a test pilot and air racer. She attended Vassar where she earned the nickname “The Flying Freshman.” To earn extra money, she used to fly her classmates wherever or just for fun.

In 1936, she married Robert Love, a Major in the Air Corp reserves. Together, they formed their own aviation company. Nancy was one of the pilots. She started competing in air races in 1936 and 1937. After taking second in a race in Detroit, she stopped competing. Shortly after that, she became a test pilot and was the first pilot to test out “Tri-Cycle” landing gear. Today, that’s standard on most airplanes.

Then, there’s Jackie Cochran. Where Nancy from the north, Jackie was from the south. Pensacola Florida. Nancy came from Money. Jackie didn’t. her people were mill workers and such. Her real name was Bessie lee Pittman and if you asked, she was adopted. There seems to be no truth to that story.

The story was possibly told by her to distance herself from them despite providing for them and staying in contact. She would merry money and acquire the social status that went with it.

The man she married was Floyd Odlum, founder of the Atlas Corporation and CEO of RKO pictures. She’d been married before to a Robert Cochran. When that marriage ended, she started going my Jackie, but kept the name.

She got into flying in the 1930s when a friend took her up. She soon started taking lessons and earned her license 3 weeks later. Jackie had founded a line of cosmetics she called “Wings for Beauty.” Being a businessman, her husband realized her prowess as a pilot gave her an advantage in marketing.

She barnstormed around the country promoting her beauty products. Years later, Odlum would use his pull in Hollywood to persuade Marilyn Monroe to promote Jackie’s lipstick.

So, we’ve two women. Two visions that remarkably, were the same.

And they were both determined to make their respective visions happen.