This Day in Women's Aviation

Today is Thursday, March 11, 2010 5:26 AM

1944 - After several months of wrangling, Jacqueline Cochran secured Santiago blue uniforms for the WASP, the only blue uniforms serving the U.S. military during World War II. Up to this point, the women pilots wore uniforms of their own creation: khaki pants, white blouse, and a khaki overseas cap. Their new blue uniforms helped them gain legitimacy as a part of the Army Air Force, even though they were officially a civilian force.

1968 - Actress Maureen O'Hara married her third husband, Charles Blair, a pioneer of transatlantic aviation. She would be happily married until 1978, when her husband, a former USAF Brigadier General and former Chief Pilot at Pan Am, died after the engine of the Grumman Goose he was flying in the Caribbean exploded. In the aftermath of his death, she was elected CEO and President of Antilles Airboats with the added distinction of being the first woman president of a scheduled airline in the USA.

1980 - U.S. glider pilot Doris Grove soared over the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians for 621 miles, becoming the first woman to earn the FAI 1000 km Diploma. She would perform as a stunt copilot in the 1999 film The Thomas Crown Affair.

2001 - Susan Jane Helms, a member of the first coed graduating class of the U.S. Air Force Academy, set a space walk endurance record (with Jim Voss) of 8 hours, 56 minutes as a crew member on her fourth and final space shuttle mission. On that same mission, she resided on the International Space Station for over 5 months. Helms would become a USAF brigadier general.

2004 - A biography by Ann Lewis Cooper, “Nothing Stood in Her Way, Captain Julie Clark,” was officially released at the Women in Aviation Conference in Reno, Nevada. Just months earlier, Julie retired from Northwest Airlines after a 27-year career as an airline pilot. She would continue her other career as an award-winning air show performer, flying her Mopar-sponsored T-34 all over North America, Bermuda, and Mexico.

2008 - The General Federation of Women's Clubs recognized Brig. Gen. Vaught for her more than 20 years of work "as the driving force behind the Women In Military Service For America Memorial Foundation's continual dedication to recognizing, recording, and honoring women's contributions" in service to the U.S. Armed Forces.

2008 - Seaplane and glider pilot Rhea Hurrle Allison Woltman was inducted in the Colorado Women's Hall of Fame in Denver. Working as a charter pilot in Houston with almost 2,000 flight hours, she was tapped to undergo testing as part of the secret women's astronaut project, submitting to the same rigorous medical and physical tests as her male counterparts. Woltman and 12 other women pilots became the First Lady Astronaut Trainees (FLATS), later known as the Mercury 13.

2009 - The Soaring Society of America announced that Doris Grove received the Pelagia Majewska Medal, given to “a woman for an outstanding gliding achievement or eminent services to the sport over a long period of time.” Doris qualified on both counts, having flown the first 1000-km flight by a woman, and serving as a lecturer, author, flight instructor, and mentor to women pilots.