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>> Yeah. Okay, we're going to start off and you're going to say, I'm -- do your whole name and I was born -- >> Somewhere. >> Somewhere in the date.

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>> When do you want me to start? >> When they tell us to roll. >> Okay. >> Oh, today is what, 17th?

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>> Today's St. Patrick's Day. >> March. [ Whistling ] No, I'll start off and tell who we are.

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>> All righty. I'm Deanie Parish. Today is the 17th of March, 2001. We're in the studios of KWBU on the campus of Baylor University in Waco, Texas.

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Today we're interviewing Schutze Reynolds, a WASC member, Class 44W5. Schutze, you tell us your name, where and when you were born. You want the whole name, I assume. Florence Genevieve Schutze Reynolds, born in Connersville, Pennsylvania on the 4th of

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March 1923. Okay. She has to tell me about your family. Tell me about your dad.

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There was a guy that I really idolized. My dad was an amputee. He was a result of the coal mines in his period of time where they hired boys seven and eight years old to work in the coal mines and as a result of an accident he lost his left leg.

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So he had a lot of, he had this disability and the first thing I learned from him as I had grown up was pity does not belong in our vocabulary, something we never had, self-pity. My mother was a strong, very courageous woman who wanted us all to succeed. There was four of us.

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I was the youngest of the four. I had two brothers and a sister. My mother was to be greatly admired. Both my parents treated us as equals.

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We were never, the girls were never considered as second-class citizens. We were all treated the same. We were all offered the same opportunity. There was a lot of harmony.

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And somebody asked me not too long ago, they said, did your brothers resent your flying? And I said, it never dawned on me that they would. I mean, we supported one another.

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We just felt that each individual, as they went through life and was accomplishing different things, we supported them. And they supported me.

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Tell me about growing up. Where did you live? Did you live in a city? Or what was your home like?

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>> Well, I was born in the city, and then when I was six, we moved out of the city, out of the limits. My dad worked as a CPA with the local utility company, but at the same time, he went into different businesses.

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He all once said, "We went into every business but the Turkish bath." But we ended up raising poultry and we would supply the hotels in Pittsburgh with the young broilers, that was chickens

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that were about 14 weeks old. And my job was to, at that age I was what, about 8, 9? My job was to take care of the young chicks for the first two weeks.

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That was my prime responsibility, which as I look back was quite a responsibility for a kid that young because many a time I cut school so that I could take care of them.

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>> How many chickens did you have? >> Well, lots. We raised around about 6,000 at a time. Then, of course, they rotated.

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I mean, we'd have one batch coming in. As they moved to another section, we'd bring in another batch. So I know all about chickens.

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>> Right. Tell me about going to school. Where did you start school? >> Well, the first year was in town. An old school, a matter of fact, I went back there not too long ago

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for a computer class and it was interesting to go up the same steps and remember that's 50 some years ago I walked those same steps as a first grader. Then from the second grade on I went to a township school

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and it was within walking distance until I went to high school and then I went by bus. >> Okay. How much older were your siblings? >> We were two years apart.

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>> Okay. When you were going to elementary school, do you remember any specific teachers that might have influenced you? >> Yeah, the writing teacher.

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She said I never would learn how to write, and she was correct. I can't read my own writing. >> In the summertime, when you were a young child, what did you do for vacations?

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I remember going to the Chicago World's Fair. That was a big deal for us. Levy: How old were you? Lowdermilk Honstein: I was about ten.

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We didn't go off on vacations as such. I mean, there was— Levy: Tell us about that trip. Lowdermilk Honstein: What, to Chicago?

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Oh, everyone said, "You'll be shot because there's a lot of gangsters in Chicago." We hooked up an old truck and my brothers, my two brothers, my sister and my mother and myself, we took off for Chicago. Stayed in these little cabins along the way.

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Met a group one time from the south. They had watermelons and we were going to teach them how these northerners ate watermelons, but we got sick of them. We ate too many.

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But it was interesting. I enjoyed it. I think the thing that impressed me the most was the futuristic concepts that they had, the highways that we have today were already outlined in scale form.

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The mass production that they were getting into, you know, like Henry Ford was already starting the assembly lines. And I remember this one woman, and I don't know why it impressed me, but she was ironing shirts and how they would iron and fold a shirt and pin it and have it ready to sell. I thought that was pretty

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good. I thought that was fantastic. What year was this? That was 1940, I think, '40. '36, '40. I mean, you're going back a long way. I had never thought about that.

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Tell me about your grandparents. Well, let's see. On my father's side, he was a big, tall Austrian guy. I never knew my grandmother on my father's side, but I was always impressed by the fact that they came from Europe, that she could read and write. And for a woman at that period of time,

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I never could figure out how she did that. She was an invalid. She died before I was born. On my mother's side, they came from Russia, and my grandfather spoke five different languages. I think he was disappointed that we butchered English. As bad as we did, that was the only language we could speak. My grandmother was a great baker. She loved to bake, and

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so do I. But I don't tell too many people that because they expect results. But I do love to bake. Did they live close? Fairly close, within a mile.

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So what influence did they have on you as you grew up? Other than respect for the elderly, I think that would be about the extent of it. We had a language barrier. Right.

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Describe for me what a Christmas was like at your house. Oh, we had Christmases because we had Christmas. Christmas Eve was always a big thing. We would go to church, come back from church, open the presents, and have a big breakfast,

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and then we were free for Christmas Day to go where we wanted. But then my grandparents, being Russian, they did not celebrate Christmas on the 25th. They celebrated it on the 7th of December. So on the 7th of December, we would go up to my grandparents' place, and they lived

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in what we called a patch. I don't know whether you're familiar with what a patch is. The coal mines would build these houses that are all alike, and this is where the immigrants came and they rented and they worked in the mines and bought from the company store.

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You remember the songs at 16 tons. Well, that's pretty true. But we would go out there and they were in this patch and my grandfather was very religious. Both of them were.

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And they followed the law of the old customs. They would bring straw in and put it on the floor and put it on the table. My grandmother would be busy baking and they would go through this ritual of knocking on the door and saying who is there and the Christ child comes and letting me know there's no

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room. I mean this was a ritual. I enjoyed it as a kid. I just loved every minute of it.

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Of course, like I said, there was a language barrier but my mother would translate for me so I had no problem. And the seven different dishes that we had to eat, some of them I hated but you had to eat them.

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We always waited for the last one, and it is interesting to know that the last dish is very popular today. I don't know about here in Texas, but it is back east, the pierogies. Are you familiar with those?

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Well, it's a pasta dish, but we always waited for that one. But that was Christmas. I mean, gifts, my grandparents, I don't recall ever getting any gifts. It was the family celebration, the observance of the holiday.

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Was it all strictly religious or did they have a Christmas tree? No, there was no tree in my grandparents'. We did, but they didn't. See they followed a different rite.

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They followed the Orthodox rite, which is now known as the Byzantine rite. I have quite a religious background. Not too much rubbed off. When you were in elementary school, were you interested in anything outside of school?

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Were you into sports? What did you do for fun? Sandlot baseball, but I had a job. The chickens were my responsibility.

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When school was over, I was expected to be home and to do the chores. I liked the outdoors. All my jobs were outside. My sister did the inside jobs.

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She hated the outdoors. She didn't hate them. She just didn't like being with the poultry and all that. I think it's because one time a rat ran over her hand

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and that sort of turned her off. But that was her problem, not mine. >> When you finished elementary and then went on into -- did you have a junior high school?

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>> No. Went directly into high school. high school. What was your favorite subject in high school? Science. Okay. And what was your, what did you, what were your dreams?

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To fly. Why, what got you interested in flying? I don't know. I think I was always interested. Now going back, when I was seven years old, we were a family that did everything together. And I, one evening we were sitting around

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the table and the evening meal was always something where we didn't eat and run, we sat and talked. And I remember my father saying, "I think it's time you children decide what you're going to do with your life, you know, what are your dreams, what are you reaching for?" And he looked at me and he said, "You're a little too young, we'll skip you." And I

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said, "I'm going to learn how to fly." Well, they all laughed. Well, I laugh at them today. I said, "I don't remember what you said, but you all remember what I said." And I did exactly what I was going to do. But luck was with me. I mean the CPT program, it came along. If it hadn't been for that, I probably would have never flown.

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As a young child, was there an airport near Collinsville where you lived? No, there was a landing strip. And they used to pick up the mail. And there was a barnstormer who would come in on weekends. And I wanted, I saved my nickels, but I never had enough money to go up.

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Would you go out and watch them fly? Oh, yes. And especially when they picked up the mail. That's when they picked up the mail on the run.

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Remember when they have the--I forget the terminology now, but they would have that hook and they would hook the mail bag. Describe that for us. They had two poles with a rope in between,

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and the bag was down below, and he hooked it. As he came in, he hooked it and wheeled it in. Of course, they lost a lot of pilots and a lot of airplanes doing that But he would never land, he would just hook the mail in.

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He would just hook the mail in and the mail he was delivering he just threw out the plane. Oh, okay. Yeah, well that's being primitive, I mean we're going back way. But I was always interested in that.

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I built models, hundreds of models. And that's when you had to cut them out with a razor blade and all that. In high school, what teacher impressed you the most? Lowdermilk Honstein The science teacher.

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What about that teacher impressed you? Lowdermilk Honstein He made you think. At that time, I do not think we had the most sophisticated education system there, but he tried to pique your curiosity so that you would go further.

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I remember going into his classes and he would give an assignment and then he would call on, you know, what they do in school, call on for the, give a summary. But every time I got up, he says, "I don't call on you because you forget what the assignment is.

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You're way back in the book somewhere else where nobody else has read yet." But I was fascinated with science. I should have followed it up more. And looking back during your educational days, who was your role model?

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My dad. Tell me why your dad was your role model. Well I don't know, I guess I just admired him. I mean he was smart, he was intelligent.

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He wanted his children to succeed, but he wanted them to succeed on their own. If you needed help, he would tell you first, "You try it. If you can't do it, then I'll help you." He was always steadying.

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He was—he always tried to better himself. He was self-taught. He was an electrical engineer. By the time he died, he ran himself a successful business.

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Once he left the accounting, he did what he wanted. He pursued his dreams once we all left home. Tell me about graduation from high school. Not too spectacular.

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The prompting ceremony, the black gowns and the black caps. I was seventh in my class, which I thought was not too shabby. How large a class did you have? About 110.

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And what did you intend to do or what did you do after you graduated from high school? My thought was to go to college and I had that all picked out. The thinking was that my two brothers were going at that time and I had to wait my turn. Well, in the meantime, the war came by and then all of those plans were scrapped.

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Tell me what you remember about Pearl Harbor. My brother had just graduated from college and had got his first teaching assignment, and he was taking us through his school. One of his students ran down and said Pearl Harbor had been attacked, and my dad says

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we were at war. We all went, and we all left, more or less left home about the same time. I had another brother who was going to the Merchant Marine Academy, and he had just graduated. It was three-year course, and he immediately sailed for Australia.

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Both my brothers went into the merchant service. >> Okay. Then what did you do after you got out of high school? Did you go immediately into college or? >> Well, no, I had to wait.

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So I took a job -- I went to Pittsburgh on a daily basis and to the business school to learn contometry. They placed me in the American locomotive -- >> Let me ask you what contometry is.

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>> Well, it was sort of like a precomputer. It was just a fancy way of -- of an adding machine where shortcuts for computing rates, times, so on. Well used in payroll where these men worked different shifts.

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They worked different jobs. they got a different rate. If they worked overtime, they got a different rate. All this had to be computed out.

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And that's what I was doing when I went there. And I was real ambitious. And before I knew it, I was at the top of the ladder in payroll. I was head of payroll.

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Now, I was only 19 or 19, 20. And I had all these people under me. I thought that was quite an accomplishment. But they wouldn't give me the raise because they said,

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you keep talking about going into the service. because if I didn't go into the wasp, I was going to go into something. So I quit. Q. Okay.

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Describe to me how Pearl Harbor affected your family and your neighborhood, your city, or the people of the city. How did things change? Well, the first thing I noticed was that the young kids were going off to war.

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They were pulling them out of high school in their last year to go. They encouraged them to enlist. Everybody left. Anybody that, I don't know, it was, the issues were well defined.

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Everybody was going to go. was going to do their bit, there was this surge of patriotism. I mean, I grew up learning to, by the time I was five years old, I learned how to salute. We all did.

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We put the gold star out for my uncle that was killed in World War I. We had the old uniforms. We read the old letters. I grew up on patriotism.

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Tell me about when you first heard about women learning how to fly. Lowdermilk Honstein Well, that came—well, of course, there was Earhart. If you are thinking I modeled after them, that is not true.

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I was interested in flying. I did not care who flew. I did save my pennies and buy the book on aerobatics by Colonel Roscoe Turner.

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You remember him? No, he flew with a little lion cub with him and I thought he was the most dashing, handsome man in the world. I didn't know anything about aeronautics, but I bought this book

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on aerobatics and I studied it from front to back. I heard about the CPT program when they announced it in the paper said they were having registrations for the class. - What is a CPT program?

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- Civilian Pilot Training Program, initiated by the military, but camouflaged as a civilian training. And this happened to be the last class,

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and this was the non-college group, which seems to be little known. I signed up with a lot of others who were just as anxious as I was.

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There was about, I think, about 35 in the class. We took ground school, the meteorology, the navigation, the aerodynamics, the whole bundle. At the end of the time, you took the private pilots written,

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and then the first five highest were promised the scholarship, but only one girl in the five. And I was second, so, in the class, so the scholarship was mine. But then they said they wouldn't give it

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to me because I was a girl and that the war was coming. And I had to write quite a few letters. I remember my dad saying, "You write the letters and if you're in trouble, come and see me."

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But they finally did give me the scholarship, but by the time I got it, the other four had already finished. So I was all by myself in this group. And I remember getting into this J3 Cub,

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First time I've ever crawled into an airplane, I thought it was going to shake itself apart. I loved every minute of it. My first flight was my first lesson.

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And I still have the logbook where he checked off my attitude, my coordination, my eagerness. I go through it every now and then to see just how eager I was. Eagerness was always got to homework.

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What did your mom think about your flying? - Well, that's hard to tell. I never could read her too well on that. She was proud of me, but she worried.

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She knew that there was danger involved. My dad always wanted to fly. Of course, being an amputee, he couldn't, although he did manage to get some time in an old Jenny.

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I ran across pictures of that. He encouraged me quite a bit. When you began flying, were your two brothers still at home or had they already gone? Lane: They were both gone.

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They weren't in service. They were both away at school. Levy: Were there other girls learning to fly at the same time you were learning? Lane: No.

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I was the only one. As a matter of fact, I was the first one to get a license out of the Console Airport. There were no other girls up there. describe your first solo? I'd rather describe the first landing I did that

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was so great because I came in and he said you know you know it comes down you know ease it off I did a beautiful three-point landing only one problem was it missed the entire runway. It was all off into the grass. My solo time was on a Sunday. The guy at the bank used to tell me that him and his wife would go out on

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Sunday to watch me fly. The word got around, well it was in the paper that I got scholarship and I was flying. And they would come out on Sunday and watch me. Well, they were there, my folks were there. And he got out and I think my mother could have had a heart attack and he let me go. I was in 7th Heaven. I sang all the way around. If I didn't know in the

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There's things I was saying, one of those. But I remember I was saying, "My darling Clementine all the way around the pattern made three nice landings." This scholarship, did it pay for your CPT time?

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And then when you finished the CPT program, how many hours did you have? I had 35. And then what did you do? Now you're off scholarship.

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I'm off scholarship. Well, I was trying to build up my time. My dad would go up with me every Sunday. My sister would save her money.

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I took everybody up and they had to pay for it. But I kept trying to build it up. By this time I knew about the WASP and I started to write letters. your one solo that you did when everybody was going to wave at you. Tell us about that.

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Oh, you mean my mother who was, like I said, I wasn't sure how she felt about this, but she was having company that morning and she said, "I know you're going to fly, would you mind flying over and wave your wings?" Nothing too radical now, just wave your wings a little bit and I can point and say there's my daughter, you know, whether that was proud or not I

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don't know, but she says so I, she wanted to show me off. Well the assignment that morning was to practice spins, so, but I did, I flew over and I waved and they waved and I thought, gee, this is kind of tame, I'll do a spin, I'm going to do spins anyway. I do it here near the airport. So I brought it up and I went

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into a left spin and the no more got into it and the engine quit. And there was that wooden prop at a 45 degree angle and I talked to it. I pleaded with it and then I went back to my ground school and I said, "Now if I dive it may start, but if If it don't start, I've lost all that altitude and I'm 15 miles from the field.

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So I made the decision to glide back, and I did. I got the field in sight, I flew the pattern, came over a busy highway, came in and landed on the runway, the correct runway, and I felt real proud of myself. I got out of that airplane and it was, I know now what people say when they're on a high,

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I knew this is what I wanted. I knew that I could do it. So the mechanic didn't say, he wasn't too impressed. He said, "You should give it a little more throttle."

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And I didn't even know what I was doing, let alone more throttle. He had to go out and bring the airplane back in to get it started. But I knew from that point, I loved that rush, that feeling of being on the edge. I mean, maybe it wasn't that dangerous, but maybe it was.

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What did your mom say to you? I never told her. She never knew. I never told her.

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I told my dad, but I never told her. At this point, had the WASP program already started? There was rumor of it. There was word of it.

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That was in '41. There was word that they were thinking about it. I was getting into it. I knew Cochran was in Europe.

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I wrote to the Canadian Air Force, the Royal Air Force. I was willing to come up and fly their SNJs. I mean, they're -- what do they call them? The Howard.

00:28:15.100 - 00:28:30.860

I didn't know nothing about an HD6, but I figured if that's what it took, it can't be that hard. You learn as you go along as -- that the HD6 isn't that forgiving. But they kept turning me down because of my age.

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You see, I lied to get in. Well, I didn't lie. In the civilian pilot training program, you had to be 18. So when I filled out the application,

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and the medical doctor was filling it out, and he said, "You realize you have to be 18 for this?" And I said, "Yes, sir, I do." So he kept on going.

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He didn't ask me if I was 18. He just said that I know you had to be 18. So that when I did get my license, I went back and said, "You know, there's an error on my license."

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And they said, "So then they were going to make me pay for the course." And I said, "Well, I don't have a job. I don't have any money. You're just going to have to wait."

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But I think that was just something to -- somebody wanted to rattle my cage because I never did pay for it. >> Describe for me when you found out that you had been accepted as a WASP.

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How did you find out? >> Well, I kept writing every week. I had this job. I'd come home and I'd write to Cochran.

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When I found out that the WACs had lowered -- and she always came back with the same thing. She always acknowledged every letter that I wrote, you're too young.

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So when I found out the WACs had lowered their age limit to 18 or 18 and a half, it was one or the other, I wrote and said to her, the WACs have lowered it, has the WASP lowered it, And right away she sent me this telegram and said, "Report to Harrisburg for a physical

00:29:56.520 - 00:30:09.660

and then if you pass that, then you'll hear from us." So I got on a train, went to Harrisburg, got to physical, and then I got the telegram that told me to report to Sweetwater. I was in 7th Heaven, yeah.

00:30:10.510 - 00:30:14.720

Did you know any other girls who were going to be with? No. Going to training? No.

00:30:16.360 - 00:30:28.700

And how did your mom and dad feel about your leaving to go into training? Well, my mother wasn't too happy about it. She already had sent two sons off to war. She wasn't about to send another.

00:30:30.020 - 00:30:42.320

But she didn't hold me back either, and she didn't discourage me. But I knew she was concerned. Tell me about the trip to Avenger Field. Well, I thought it was going to take five days.

00:30:42.320 - 00:30:58.740

It took six days. was a lot of troops on board. For the first four days I sat on my suitcase and felt lucky to have a place to put it down. When we got to Texas, the border of Texas, I thought would be in Sweetwater in the next couple hours. I didn't know

00:30:58.820 - 00:31:19.700

Texas was so big. I found that out in a hurry. I had allowed myself, I thought, a day leeway. Found out I just got in under the wire. I come in that night and we We were cattle truck pulled up to the Blue Bonnet the next morning. Q. Tell me what your expectations were for this program.

00:31:23.010 - 00:31:39.180

A. I really am not sure. I knew that I was going to learn to fly. When I went down to the hangar the first time, the first day, they issue you your zoot suit and the jacket, and that stearman was there, and I looked at that stearman and I thought,

00:31:39.400 - 00:32:02.280

I mean, that was my first impression of there. I was highly introverted, so I kept—I try even today to keep a very low profile. I mixed in with my bay mates because actually, where else were you to go? But I did a lot of listening.

00:32:03.340 - 00:32:20.460

I listened and tried to learn from each one. What did you expect if you were fortunate and got through that training program? What were your expectations after graduation? Lowry Well, everything changed as I went further

00:32:20.630 - 00:32:26.420

into it. Vicki Now, I'm talking about when you first went into training. Lowry Oh, I was concentrating only on getting through.

00:32:27.360 - 00:32:38.360

I mean, that was my prime thing, to earn those silver wings. I didn't think about it. Sure, out in the field. I figured my dream was to fly the P-51.

00:32:40.120 - 00:32:59.180

Let me go back to when you arrived at the Blue Bonnet Hotel and you said a cattle truck. Describe this truck that you went on. Well, let's see. It was sort of like an open bus, which they put us all in.

00:32:59.220 - 00:33:14.180

I remember it was camouflaged. It was that camouflaged gray or whatever they used. It was open. It was dusty, rattly, but it was chariot to heaven as far as I was concerned.

00:33:14.820 - 00:33:27.800

Okay. Describe what it looked like when you arrived at the gate at Avenger. Wow, where are we? You can see two days ahead, it's dusty and it's hot.

00:33:29.940 - 00:33:39.500

This is Texas? That was my first impression. Where is the field? I mean, as you know, the gate was quite away from the barracks and all.

00:33:40.820 - 00:33:53.660

I don't even remember. They herded us into some room, and I remember writing, addressing an envelope back to my folks, and I guess this was the Army way of telling your folks, "You did arrive," because that's the first they had heard from me.

00:33:54.980 - 00:34:12.720

Describe for me some of the other girls that you met that first day when you arrived. Well, I knew it was quite obvious, you know, there are going to be six to a bay and these are your bay mates. And what is a bay?

00:34:12.940 - 00:34:29.840

Well, a bay is just an official way of calling it a room. There were six of us, six cots, six lockers. You put your footlocker or your suitcase under the bed. The footlocker went to the bottom of the bed, the suitcases went underneath.

00:34:30.920 - 00:34:45.060

You shared a common bath and shower. I looked my baymates over pretty good, because I figured I'd be living with them for the next six months. I didn't know that every month we were going to move up and some of them would be leaving.

00:34:45.960 - 00:35:04.440

The schoolteacher was the first to leave. I mean, she washed out. No, I'll take that back. The blackjack dealer was the first to leave. She never soloed. I lost three out of that bay the first month. By that time, I was making friends and fitting

00:35:04.620 - 00:35:14.420

in. How did that affect you when one would wash out? Thank God it wasn't me. It wasn't the first thing you think of. I mean, I felt sorry for him.

00:35:15.980 - 00:35:24.200

Tell me how. I think you sort of had an idea. Now, the first one that worked out, I think including herself, she knew she wasn't going to make it.

00:35:24.940 - 00:35:37.520

She just didn't have what it took. She showed up with a whole bunch of Army manuals and she said, "You can read them." I said, "How many have you read?" "Well, she never read one."

00:35:37.520 - 00:36:01.360

I thought, "Well, if you haven't gone that far, you're just not interested in them enough." would wash out, what would happen to them? Well, I knew they had to leave the base before the day was over. Usually you got up in the morning, you had breakfast formation, you either went to ground

00:36:01.500 - 00:36:13.200

school in the morning or flight school. But when you came back in the afternoon, when you saw the mattress was rolled, you knew that somebody had washed out and they were gone. You never said goodbye.

00:36:13.260 - 00:36:21.360

I never said goodbye to any of them. I never saw them. They just disappeared. I never heard from them even after they left.

00:36:21.770 - 00:36:36.940

Levy: What was the biggest adjustment that you had to make in training? Lowdermilk Honstein I had to adjust to the water. The water had a reaction to me.

00:36:37.630 - 00:36:52.840

I broke out in big blotches. One of my baymates thought I had some mysterious contagious disease and she would not even get near me until I went to the flight surgeon. But that was my biggest problem, was the water. I was allergic to it.

00:36:53.420 - 00:37:19.460

Q. Describe for me ground school. A. Ground school. It was rough. Physics was the hardest part, but by this time I made friends was my bay mates and we helped each other. So I think I got through on physics because of them. The rest of it was a pretty much of a breeze.

00:37:21.460 - 00:37:44.300

Morris Codes? No problem. I didn't even have to take the final exam. Describe for me a typical day in training. Well we alternated between flying in the morning and flying in the afternoon, which is at flight one. I not only adjusted real well, I over-adjusted.

00:37:44.480 - 00:37:57.860

I found out that if I could get up, I hated breakfast, and if I stood at the end of the line, they would march off and I could get back to bed. So I goofed off there. Then I found out that PT would follow breakfast, and I couldn't see that either.

00:37:58.940 - 00:38:14.600

But they caught up with me after a while, and I got a couple of demerits for that. But it was usually breakfast with their—I believe it was powdered eggs, which I never ate. I would stop by—when I had to go to breakfast, I would stop by and get a Coke and a candy

00:38:14.760 - 00:38:28.460

bar. You would go—breakfast was fast because you had a schedule to meet. We went to the flight line. I mean, you met a formation and you marched down there and got a briefing.

00:38:28.570 - 00:38:42.400

I remember they would synchronize your watches. They would give the assignments for the day, where you would go, what the auxiliary fields we would be using. And of course, 20 hours into the course, check writes.

00:38:44.720 - 00:38:58.180

In the afternoon, we went to ground school. Ground school wasn't that hard except for physics. I mean, Link was a problem, mostly because the GI instructors, I think the one I had, he kind of resented being there.

00:38:59.000 - 00:39:10.580

I could not hear him half the time. He would be talking outside of his mouth. Kelly: Tell us what a LINC is. Lowry: A LINC is a flight simulator that was invented by a man named LINC.

00:39:11.740 - 00:39:29.920

It had the wings and it was boxed in. It would move somewhat like an aircraft. It had the instruments in it and the radios, which he could control. Needleball and airspeed, altitude, altimeter, you have all that in there.

00:39:30.360 - 00:39:41.380

She could crank in. You learned to fly the range. You learned the dit-dot and the dot-dats, whether you were going towards or away from it, how you circled around and found the field.

00:39:42.780 - 00:39:51.280

It was a hot box. Levy: And it was specifically for instrument training, is that right? Lowdermilk Honstein Yes. Yeah, it didn't fly like an airplane.

00:39:51.400 - 00:40:02.940

I mean, it simulated it, but it didn't fly like it. And its purpose? It was to teach you how to fly by instruments. Tell me about your first solo at Avenger.

00:40:05.100 - 00:40:20.760

Oh that would be in the Stearman, of course. It was from the auxiliary field. I don't know, I was one of the first in my group to solo. There was nothing particularly outstanding except that feeling of freedom.

00:40:22.800 - 00:40:35.620

I was glad he was gone from out of the front seats. It was mine, all mine. - Did anything exciting happen during the time you were in primary training? - Oh, no. No. We can't talk about that until we change tapes.

00:40:35.900 - 00:41:21.220

- Uh-oh. Uh- oh. - I doní Checkride. Now, 20 hours into the program, the Army came in and gave checkrides. So we knew they were coming up. So we reported that morning, and the listing was there, and I was number one. Oh, boy. And the flight commander said, "Now, Chief, don't worry. We've left you a good stearman.

00:41:21.460 - 00:41:41.380

It's in good shape, and we're going to take the others, and we'll see you over at the auxiliary field." I think it was Auxiliary Field 2 or 3. So I'm left there all alone, wondering what my fate would be. And this young Army Captain came in, a little short guy, and he looked at me, and the first

00:41:41.400 - 00:41:53.420

thing he said to me was, I said, "Good morning, sir." And he said, "I'll tell you right off. I don't like women, and I don't like women pilots in particular." Well, there goes my checkride.

00:41:53.500 - 00:41:57.740

I stay home. "Yes, sir." So, we walked out. I did the pre-flight.

00:41:59.560 - 00:42:11.440

And they didn't leave a crank boy. So, this little guy had to stretch to the max, get up there, and crank that son of a gun. And he wasn't too happy about that, I can tell you.

00:42:11.960 - 00:42:23.700

So, we took off. I went through the maneuvers. I thought, based on 20 hours' experience that I had in the aircraft, that I thought, "I I think I did passable.

00:42:24.440 - 00:42:32.740

I thought I did pretty good. Not good enough for him, but I thought I was good enough. So he said, "Take it in." So I went in, made a crosswind landing.

00:42:33.260 - 00:42:44.200

No more touching the wheels down, and as he speaks through the gusts, these tubes, he said, "You landed at the wrong field, and I just sunk. I didn't even look."

00:42:44.200 - 00:43:00.340

I thought, "Oh, everything I could have done, I've erased." But I finally figured, well, I better get my head out, you know, taxi this thing in. "No, sir." There's my instructor, there's my classmates, there's another classmate.

00:43:00.460 - 00:43:12.600

"No, sir, I'm at the right field." So he gets out and he said to me, "What do you know about a flat crab?" And I thought to myself, other than you, nobody. And he said, "You didn't do a flat crab on the landing."

00:43:12.600 - 00:43:36.480

And I said, "I never heard the term. I don't know what you're talking about." civilian check pilot come over and my instructor come over and the three of them got into a big argument and I left, but I did pass. And what he wanted was freedom of the flat crab was to come in and head into the wind and then

00:43:36.520 - 00:43:58.940

on the last second as you lost speed to flip it back into the direction and drop it, whereas I was taught to lower the wing into the wind and the law speed to land. So he didn't agree with the other pilots. But I did, and I remember that, and you know, I have never remembered any of the other check rides. I mean, I know

00:43:59.020 - 00:44:11.400

I took them, but that one, that impressed me. He just didn't like women pilots. Tell us about your uniforms. What did you wear? You mean an Avenger? Mm-hmm.

00:44:11.900 - 00:44:21.500

Zoot suits. What's a zoot suit? Well, the Zoot Suit is a cast-off GI mechanics coveralls. They came in three sizes, large, large, and way too large.

00:44:21.680 - 00:44:32.780

I think it was 42 and 44 was the size. I rolled up the -- we rolled up the pants leg, rolled up the sleeves, took the belt around. We got two pair.

00:44:34.720 - 00:44:49.820

Wore them into the showers, at least I did, to wash them off, hang them up. We always wore a white blouse under it, which surprises me because today when I see these reactors they forget about the white blouse.

00:44:50.860 - 00:45:06.720

Most of the girls wore a little decorative pin on it. Varney: And for your dress uniform, what did you wear? Lowdermilk Honstein: Well, we were at Avenger. We wore what they called General's Pants, which was khakis, a white shirt.

00:45:07.180 - 00:45:29.680

They issued us an overseas cap and khaki, brown shoes, white socks. At the end of when a class would graduate, what would happen? Would have a review. The graduating class went into uniforms, which I think in December of '43 they were issued

00:45:29.760 - 00:45:44.120

the uniforms. So while I was on base, the graduating class was always in uniform. The rest of us were in generals. We vied for the prize to see who would be the best marching class at the review.

00:45:46.140 - 00:46:01.260

We would march past the hangar, hangar one, all the dignitaries there. Tell me about some of the dignitaries that came in. Well, Cochran came quite often, even for just graduation or just now and then. Well, for graduation, she would come in on some of them.

00:46:03.260 - 00:46:16.140

While I was there, I do not remember General Arnold being there. I remember General Mitchell, General Smith, the band from Big Spring would come over. The aircraft were all lined up. It was very impressive.

00:46:16.540 - 00:46:26.760

Kelly: Okay. Once you finished primary, did you have some time off? Lowdermilk Honstein No, because we were behind schedule. So we went right into the 86.

00:46:28.620 - 00:46:45.260

My first impression of the 6 was that it was heavy. The stick was heavy. I had the feeling that it took more pressure than the stearman. It was easier to control on the ground, except on landings with that built-in ground loop

00:46:45.360 - 00:46:59.220

tendency, but it was the sweetest sounding. I remember the first thing, Mr. Lamb was my instructor, and the first lesson I had we took off. Of course, now we had radio.

00:46:59.220 - 00:47:13.420

Oh, we were getting up in the world. I mean, the tower would clear us. We went up to, I think, a couple thousand, maybe 2,000 feet. And he says, "Now, your first maneuver will be to pull the stick back quick and as hard

00:47:13.500 - 00:47:19.240

as you can. Pull it right back in your stomach." And I did. And I did the most beautiful snap roll you ever saw.

00:47:20.280 - 00:47:27.620

And he said, "Now, this is your first lesson. Don't ever do this on a landing. Don't do it near the ground." And that has always stuck with me.

00:47:28.440 - 00:47:43.360

He was a fine instructor, never washed out a student. Of course, by the time you got there from primary, I mean, they washed out most of the ones there. Levy: As far as your bay mates, when you finished primary, had three of them washed out by that

00:47:43.560 - 00:47:52.400

time? Then what happened as far as filling up the bay? Steele: Well, every month we filled up. Every time there was graduation, we moved.

00:47:53.200 - 00:48:04.460

We moved up from the last barracks on up to the next one. I do not know, by that time you just did not miss them. I mean, they were gone. You showed up.

00:48:05.010 - 00:48:22.300

Did you make lasting friendships from some of your baymates? Some, about one or two. When you finished in the 86th, got through that phase of training, then what did you fly?

00:48:22.300 - 00:48:39.820

We flew the BT-13 for instruments. I do not remember who the instructor was. Kelly: While you were at Avenger, were any of your classmates or other of your peers were they killed?

00:48:40.700 - 00:48:52.980

If so, describe that to us and how it made you feel. Lowry: No, none of my classmates were killed while we were in training. I lost one classmate two weeks after we were assigned, after we graduated.

00:48:54.060 - 00:49:10.480

But I was on the flight line at the time of the AT-6 and the Stearman collided near Sweetwater. It was harrowing in so far as, though we knew that the one in the AT-6

00:49:10.560 - 00:49:26.900

was from, could have been from our class, it wasn't from our flight 'cause we had just come on. But by this time, you had got to know some of the ones in the flight, and it was heartbreaking to see them come down, and as you waited to see, it's just someone you know.

00:49:27.700 - 00:49:46.220

And finally, it was a matter of elimination. We knew who it was. Would you tell us about what would happen when a WASP was killed or a trainee was killed? What kind of compensation was given to the family or describe that for us?

00:49:46.540 - 00:49:57.500

Well, I know the family was notified. I was no more on base. A short time, maybe two weeks, and this girl on cross country was killed.

00:49:59.080 - 00:50:07.160

Her mother came. She wanted to talk to the trainees. And she says, "I want to talk to you." So we gathered.

00:50:07.420 - 00:50:23.360

It wasn't mandatory to go, but she said she wanted to explain to us what we should tell our parents in the event that we were killed, what she received. So she showed us a telegram and it said,

00:50:23.420 - 00:50:31.720

"Your daughter was killed this morning. Where do we send the body?" And I thought that rather cruel. I mean, I wondered how my mother would feel

00:50:31.800 - 00:50:43.020

if she got a telegram like that. But we were civil service and I think the compensation was $155. I may be wrong. It wasn't more than that.

00:50:43.780 - 00:50:53.020

They gave you a pine box. Cochran made sure that you had an escort, and she paid for the escort. And I think the escort was used in uniform.

00:50:55.340 - 00:51:06.360

We took up a collection to ship the body home, I mean to make for -- to cover expenses. We did the same thing when Beverly Moses was killed. She was in my class.

00:51:06.660 - 00:51:24.860

It was on her first flight. Her and Mildred Taylor were assigned to Las Vegas. They flipped a coin, she won, he flew into a boxed-in canyon, and they were all killed. So when we heard about that, we took up another collection.

00:51:26.440 - 00:51:43.820

It was heartbreaking, because by this time you had close ties with these people, with these classmates. I've never forgotten Beverly. Kelly: As you were growing up, what made you believe that you could do something that women

00:51:44.560 - 00:51:57.540

had not done before, fly military aircraft? What gave you that confidence? Lowdermilk Honstein: I do not know. Anything I try, even today, from the smallest thing to the biggest thing, I know I can do

00:51:57.620 - 00:52:14.560

it until proven otherwise. There was no doubt in my mind that I could do it. As it came close to graduation time, what did you understand that the girls were doing who had already graduated?

00:52:14.800 - 00:52:31.700

What were some of their assignments? Well, I knew that the Perry Command was out, so there went my dream of the P-51. But I was also realistic enough to know that my time level was not that great, that I'd have to build up time.

00:52:32.720 - 00:52:50.460

I had hoped for an assignment in California, which I got, because I had never been there. I figured whatever job I had, I would give it my best shot. Tell me about your specific graduation. It was hot.

00:52:51.800 - 00:53:16.060

A couple of them passed out on the flight line. I think those were the ones that the uniforms were the winter uniforms. we were in June wearing winter uniforms. Nobody too important showed up to give us our wings, but that didn't count. I mean, we got them, or earned them. Right after graduation, Cochran

00:53:16.120 - 00:53:35.080

had already sent word down that she had a car there and she wanted somebody to drive it back, so I volunteered to take it back. So about four of us drove back in her car. I drove back to Pennsylvania, my sister took her on to Washington. We didn't have a map except for something about the size of your paper, an eight and

00:53:35.080 - 00:53:47.980

a half by ten map of the United States, and that's what we used to get from Texas back to Pennsylvania. Do you remember how you felt when you got back to your hometown? Did you wear your uniform?

00:53:48.580 - 00:53:55.700

Oh, you better believe it. Oh, yeah, I was real proud of that. I worked hard for it. I went back to where I had worked.

00:53:56.440 - 00:54:13.160

They treated me very royally. I mean, I milked it for all it was worth. I mean, I felt I earned it. I had lost a lot of the—I had gained, rather I should say, a lot of self-assurance, self-confidence,

00:54:14.340 - 00:54:31.700

because I went in with a very definite inferiority complex, which I had to fight. But I lost it. Now, instead of being an introvert, I was now an extrovert, and I liked it. Levy: What was the best part about training?

00:54:32.420 - 00:54:53.720

Lowdermilk Honstein: I think the camaraderie of the other WASPs, of the other trainees. Levy: And the worst part? Honstein: Gee, I didn't think there was any worst parts. I think disillusionment in some of my classmates would have been some.

00:54:55.560 - 00:55:12.640

I mean, I am a great believer in loyalty, and when I found that they would compromise it, that disturbed me quite a bit. As far as the flying goes, there was no disappointments there. I loved every minute of it, check rides and all, even with Captain Miller.

00:55:15.060 - 00:55:38.320

What was the most outstanding thing that happened while you were at Avenger? Lowry, you're going back a long time, for half a century. Well, I guess the thought that would come into mind is two, actually. One was in primary.

00:55:39.460 - 00:55:50.880

By this time, I was building up my time. I thought I was pretty high-powered. I was scheduled to go solo, and I went out, and I checked the form one. It looked pretty good to me.

00:55:52.220 - 00:56:03.920

I figured these Texans, they don't know how to write. I couldn't read what he wrote. Never read it too close. I took off, and the thing vibrated, and the stearman just vibrated around that pattern,

00:56:04.080 - 00:56:16.080

and it shook. I brought it back, and I pulled up, and he's a mechanic sitting there on his toolbox. I got out and I said, "The thing vibrates." He says, "I'm not surprised."

00:56:16.100 - 00:56:26.940

And I says, "Why?" And he says, "We just changed the engine on it "and the nuts on it are just finger tight." Oops, I'll tell you, that taught me a big lesson.

00:56:27.160 - 00:56:37.520

I read that form one like you wouldn't believe. I read every word, I made sure, and sure enough I went back and there was a red cross on it and I had missed it.

00:56:37.980 - 00:56:50.460

In my eagerness to go, I missed it. My next one was flying in cross country, and it was a cross country flight. It was around Robin. I was cleared for takeoff.

00:56:51.360 - 00:57:10.640

I took off, and on taking off, the cowling started to peel off on the left side. And I, you know, how you instinctively duck, but it missed the tail section. I turned, I didn't leave the pattern. I got on downwind, I contacted the tower, and they came right back at me and said, "You

00:57:10.460 - 00:57:31.040

were clear for cross-country, what are you doing returning?" And I came back and said, "Well, I lost part of the cali." "Roger that, report on base." So I turned on base and I'm just about ready to turn on final and I called them and I said, reported in that I was on, turning on final and I said, "I noticed you have a

00:57:31.760 - 00:57:49.520

emergency crews out there, do you want me to go around?" And they said, "You are the emergency, bring it in." So I did. And what annoyed me at the time, you know, there's always a pebble in your shoe somewhere along the way. I glanced outside, there was a firetruck chasing me and there was the ambulance on the other side and I

00:57:49.640 - 00:58:08.560

said, "You characters expected me to crash at the beginning. Why aren't you down at the other end where I'm going to finish my role?" But no, they figured I was, I guess they figured the tail section was gone. It annoyed me no end. But Or again, I mean, it was just another routine flight.

00:58:08.760 - 00:58:21.960

I mean, you got out, got another airplane, took off, finished the mission. Kelly: I wanted to back up and ask you to describe one of your cross-country flights that you had to take. Lowry: The long one?

00:58:22.600 - 00:58:32.820

The one in the AT-6, the 2,000-mile one, where I used the wrong map? Okay. I forget where we were. We went as far as Blythe, I know, because I flew over it.

00:58:33.760 - 00:58:45.260

And I was coming back and the map I was using had been used before and I wasn't aware of it. And I'm trying to find landmarks and I can't find any of the landmarks that match up with the line on the map.

00:58:46.640 - 00:58:59.960

By this time I'm getting a little concerned, you know, I mean I'm out here and there's nothing down here but dry gulches. So I looked up and there was an airliner. I followed him.

00:59:01.120 - 00:59:16.960

He was going to the same place I was. I never told them that I had lost my way. I'm not secretive, but I never blabbed about all my misfortunes or miscalculations. I landed, I was there, I was safe, but it was no problem.

00:59:18.200 - 00:59:37.180

But that taught me again another lesson that don't use somebody else's map or if you use it be sure you fold it correctly. On these cross-countries, how many airplanes would go on one mission? Lowdermilk Honstein Well, when I took the—with the Stearman,

00:59:37.460 - 00:59:49.980

which was a 500-mile one, there was thirteen. And that was an interesting story, I thought. We got weathered in Oklahoma. It was pouring down raining, I remember.

00:59:52.000 - 01:00:09.300

The Army captain in charge commandeered a bus, an Army bus. We all got on board. Before we disembarked at the hotel, he said, "All right now, you hutch-huts, stay together, and I'll do the registration, and you just stay together, and you'll get your room assignments,

01:00:09.660 - 01:00:17.380

you know, the usual blah, blah, blah." So we go into the lobby. Well, he said, "Stay together," so we really stayed together, you know. We jostled around.

01:00:17.380 - 01:00:36.680

Well, the word spread through the lobby that we were German prisoners of war. This proved that the Germans were using women in combat. Then they did correct it, because the next morning at breakfast this guy came over and we were told not to say who we were.

01:00:36.800 - 01:00:51.280

We wore absolutely no insignia. We were wearing the blue slacks and shirt. Our cover story was we were a baseball team. I always tell the story of this elderly gentleman, he was at least thirty-five, which at that

01:00:51.280 - 01:01:05.820

time I thought was old, come over and said, "You know, it's nice that we were enjoying ourselves as a baseball team, but didn't we know there was a war on? We never told him otherwise." I would imagine though at the time he got the word.

01:01:05.880 - 01:01:29.060

I mean, the secrets don't last forever. Do you know why cross-countries were included in your training? Lowdermilk Honstein: Sure, because they assumed we were going to go into the Ferry Command. Kelly: When you requested your assignment, what did you request?

01:01:29.500 - 01:01:40.660

Lowdermilk Honstein: California. Kelly: And what specific thing to fly? Lowdermilk Honstein: They didn't give us a choice. We knew it would be the training command.

01:01:42.170 - 01:01:53.580

When you received your orders, how many other girls out of your class were assigned to the same place? I believe there were six of us. And you were pleased with that assignment?

01:01:54.660 - 01:02:08.600

I enjoyed it. Okay. Let me take you back. When you arrived in Pennsylvania and had some leave time, what did you do?

01:02:08.720 - 01:02:22.340

How did you spend that leave time? Lowdermilk Honstein Teaching all my friends to wash songs. I kept them busy, went to umpteen parties. It didn't last long because I didn't have much time.

01:02:22.340 - 01:02:48.020

It was only two weeks and I had traveled back. What differences did you notice in your hometown when you came back, as far as your fellow students from high school? What had happened to them? Well, by that time we'd all gone our separate ways anyway. I didn't meet up with any of those.

01:02:49.180 - 01:03:01.000

When you were at Sweetwater, tell me about a tradition with something about a hat. The hat. The hat. The hat, yeah.

01:03:01.000 - 01:03:17.500

It was a big straw hat, which every class was to add something to it. I remember I got stuck with it one time and I had a picture taken, but I have no idea what happened to it. I did see a picture of it again at Sweetwater this last trip.

01:03:17.500 - 01:03:31.220

They had it up on the board. So obviously—but they told me this was big tradition, but nobody seemed to know too much about it. Kelly: Okay, now we'll go back and find out.

01:03:32.060 - 01:03:44.300

When your leave time was up and you were assigned then to California, how did you get from Pennsylvania to California? Lowry: I took an airline. Kelly: Did the Air Force pay for it?

01:03:44.590 - 01:03:55.560

Lowry: No. I paid my own way. Paid my own way to Sweetwater, too. Q. When you were flying back, how were you treated?

01:03:56.540 - 01:04:05.060

Did people know who you were, what you were doing? A. Flying back from where? Q. From Pennsylvania to go to your assignment. Did you have on a uniform?

01:04:05.230 - 01:04:21.880

A. Oh, yes, because that was part of the regulation. I mean, we were required to wear the uniform at all times. Q. Were people curious about what kind of uniform that was? Well, they thought you were an ambulance driver, they thought you flew for the RAF, everything

01:04:22.020 - 01:04:42.160

but what we were. You spent a lot of time explaining who you were and what you were going to do. When I got to the base at Merced and the first leave we had, I wanted to go to Hollywood. I was just a kid, you know, I was only, what, twenty.

01:04:43.060 - 01:04:58.780

I wanted to go to the Hollywood Canteen. So the two of us went down, and the other girl had her husband, and I had a date. The men were allowed on the floor, the women were shuttled to a balcony. Have you ever been there?

01:05:01.560 - 01:05:17.000

Betty Davis came up to explain that there wasn't enough room on the floor for women. We were up there, there was the two WASPs, some WACs, some nurses. Didn't make any of it. You were a woman, you got up, you were upstairs.

01:05:17.180 - 01:05:26.360

We had the same refreshments. But then she turned to us and said, "If we were from England," she thought too, "we were from the Royal Air Force." At least she had us flying.

01:05:27.180 - 01:05:38.440

I mean, not like the rest of us driving an ambulance. So we got to meet some of the movie stars. But I was a little disappointed that women were treated that way. I wasn't raised to be a second-class citizen.

01:05:38.870 - 01:05:51.180

I found it very hard to accept. Levy: When you arrived at Merced, to whom did you report? Lowdermilk Honstein: The operations officer. The adjutant, he didn't want to see us.

01:05:51.960 - 01:06:04.800

The operations officer said, "I asked for clerks and they sent me pilots, and I don't need you." But he gave me a real fine letter of recommendation when we left. We kept good track of his airplanes.

01:06:04.800 - 01:06:18.800

Tell me about some of your assignments at Merced. Lowdermilk Honstein Oh, the routine, flying, slow flight, maintenance flight. We ferried out some aircraft.

01:06:19.080 - 01:06:36.880

They had some old ones out at the base they wanted to send into somewhere in Arizona. The WASPs were assigned to take them down, a few of the first lieutenants, first and second lieutenants. They were in the tall grass.

01:06:37.040 - 01:06:50.880

The planes had been cannibalized. Some of them didn't have compasses. We had to use a hammer to release the brakes. I said to the maintenance officer, "These things are a wreck.

01:06:51.170 - 01:07:05.400

You expect us to fly these down?" and he says, "If you don't want to fly them, you can pack your bag and go home." "Okay, give me the hammer and we'll go with it." We made a couple flights like that.

01:07:05.500 - 01:07:20.820

On this one of the flights, they brought us back by train. Well, there was quite a few went. There was quite a few of the officers went. And as we were coming back across the desert back to Merced, they had picked up a lot of

01:07:20.680 - 01:07:31.840

of booze and they were boozing it up. And the WASP wouldn't drink, I noticed. I mean, we felt we were going to fly the next day, so. But these guys were getting pretty high.

01:07:32.640 - 01:07:39.900

And they were going into the other coaches and disturbing the passengers there. So all of a sudden, the train stopped and everything got real quiet.

01:07:41.820 - 01:07:51.860

And so we went out to see what was -- what the delay was. Well, the delay was that they left us. They disconnected us and left us there all night. Well, there was no water,

01:07:52.740 - 01:08:02.300

and the hangovers were beginning to take shape. And it was a miserable night. They did come in about mid-morning and drag us back to Merced.

01:08:03.780 - 01:08:13.860

But that taught me. That was a hard one to take because these guys were getting pretty obnoxious by that time. I had another flight which we were bringing

01:08:14.020 - 01:08:26.100

in aircraft into Merced. We went down, I think, to Mines Field. And the briefing was that we would come over the pass. And there would be three to a flight.

01:08:27.120 - 01:08:38.420

The officer would fly the aircraft based at Merced, and we were the WASP were to fly the older aircraft that were coming in. I remember the one I was flying, like I said,

01:08:38.460 - 01:08:48.380

I was reading the form one. It had a cracked wings bar. So I figured, well, no aerobatics on this one. But I noticed that the other wasp was starting to drop back

01:08:48.540 - 01:08:56.220

because he had decided that he wasn't going to go through the pass. He was going to go over the mountains. It would be a shortcut, it would be shorter,

01:08:57.380 - 01:09:09.840

but she wasn't able to keep up. So I radioed her and let her know what the problem was. It didn't have any power. So I dropped back and he commanded me to return

01:09:09.920 - 01:09:22.100

to the formation and I said, you know, I'm not going to leave my classmate behind. Well, he threatened me with a court martial right up there. And as I looked down, those trees were getting pretty big.

01:09:22.140 - 01:09:34.400

You know, we were getting close down. So we peeled off, the two of us, and went back to lower altitude where she got more power. And I was looking at the maps in the attempt

01:09:34.480 - 01:09:42.980

to find an emergency field. But with her return power, then we proceeded and went through the pass. and went up to the San Joaquin Valley.

01:09:43.560 - 01:09:51.340

Of course, we were late and he was already landed and he was talking to the maintenance officer and he was mad. Maintenance officer didn't know what to think about it.

01:09:51.760 - 01:10:00.640

They didn't know what mad was until I got out of that airplane. I went up that officer one side and down the other. And I figured I blew my whole career as a WASP,

01:10:00.680 - 01:10:09.080

but I figured if I'm gonna go out, I'm gonna go out saying what I wanna say. Maintenance officer agreed with me. He got reprimanded and I don't know

01:10:08.960 - 01:10:21.600

whether you got reassigned or not. You can't follow these people blindly or they'll kill you. So that was interesting. Levy: What were your quarters like at Merced?

01:10:24.580 - 01:10:38.860

Lowdermilk Honstein Well, they housed us in with the waitresses at the cafeteria, yeah, at the dining room. They weren't all that great. We dressed them up, put curtains on, but they were very stark.

01:10:40.520 - 01:10:56.160

When you were at Merced, what was your schedule like? Oh, report in the morning, get the assignment. Usually the afternoons were free, and I spent the afternoons flying. I'd take an aircraft up.

01:10:56.470 - 01:11:05.940

I loved aerobatics. I would practice that. Levy: While you were at Merced, did you get vacation time? Did you go back home?

01:11:06.270 - 01:11:16.420

Steele: No. Levy: When did you first hear that the Watts were going to be disbanded, and how did that make you feel? Steele: Well, actually, I heard it while we were still in training.

01:11:17.440 - 01:11:33.100

I wondered whether or not we would make graduation. So the rumor was already out. The official word came down in October when Cochran sent a letter to all of us saying that it would be disbanded on the 20th of December.

01:11:35.540 - 01:11:52.740

So I remember it came to the 20th, or near the 20th, and the local radio station had a salute to the WASP and I felt real bad about it. But it came to an end. Why did you personally feel that we were disbanded?

01:11:53.460 - 01:12:17.960

Because we were women. The guys were coming back. I didn't know about the lobbying in Washington. I knew we weren't permitted to say anything. We were under a gag order. I really didn't get all the details until years later. The information just wasn't available. But if it was meaning the end of the war, I'd go for that.

01:12:19.420 - 01:12:33.800

But they had promised this would be militarized, and that was a disappointment. We were all geared to it. Levy: What is your personal opinion about Jacqueline Cochran? Lowdermilk Honstein I always had the impression that Cochran was

01:12:33.840 - 01:12:44.620

a loner. I mean, she would be in with a crowd of trainees, but I always had the feeling that she was isolated. Now, that was my personal opinion.

01:12:45.500 - 01:13:01.780

I do not think anybody may have shared that, but that was my opinion of her. Everyone talks about Amelia Earhart. She had her place in history, but she did not do anything for me, but Cochran did. So my loyalty is to Cochran.

01:13:03.680 - 01:13:11.960

Levy: Tell me about when you graduated. What did the base—how did they honor the WASP, or did they? Lowdermilk Honstein You mean the Avenger Field?

01:13:12.620 - 01:13:36.680

Merced when you were discharged? Oh you mean, well they had a review, full review of the troops. We lined up, the commanding officer combined, shook hands with all of us, gave us letters of recommendation or the awards that you get for being civilian service. There was the staff officers right behind us and when the review was over I turned around and found my high school

01:13:37.200 - 01:14:02.500

math teacher was standing right behind me. He didn't know I was assigned there and I didn't didn't know he was there. So my farewell was for someone that I knew. And I left Merced. The word came down from the Pentagon that the base commanders were authorized to provide aircraft and pilots to get the Wasp back as close to their home as they could. And that

01:14:03.560 - 01:14:18.420

is -- there was two of us going back to Pennsylvania, one to Philadelphia, and I was going back to the Pittsburgh area. They assigned two pilots, two second lieutenants, two BT-13s. We got as far as Las Vegas and they grounded both aircraft.

01:14:19.640 - 01:14:31.160

I don't know who grounded them, but I felt it was the second lieutenants. We then start hitching rides through operations. We were stuck with the parachute.

01:14:31.400 - 01:14:41.220

Well, of course, we needed that. That was no problem until the end of the trip. We lived in operations. I ate at Red Cross canteens.

01:14:42.260 - 01:14:55.640

When I cleared the base, I had 25 cents. A classmate who owed me $10 gave me $10, and now I had $10.25. And when I checked with the other WASP, I found out I had more money than she had, so I was in command.

01:14:56.510 - 01:15:10.880

I mean, the decisions were mine. I took the 25 cents and converted it into nickels. I would call home and I would say, "Mom, could you send me $50?" "Well, where are you?"

01:15:10.880 - 01:15:18.980

So I would tell her. The next day I would call her, "Mom, can you send me $50?" She says, "I sent you $50." I said, "Well, I didn't get it."

01:15:19.100 - 01:15:26.660

"Well, where are you?" And I said, "Well, we're just wherever we were." And I said, "The weather doesn't look good. We'll probably be here for a couple of days."

01:15:26.660 - 01:15:43.280

So she would send another $50. Well, by the time I got home, she had spent $300 and we had to get back the Western Union to pick it up. I never got a dime of it. We got into Akron on Christmas Eve. It was snowing. It was about 80 inches of snow on the ground. We were in summer uniforms.

01:15:44.580 - 01:16:07.480

There was no flights going out. You know, Christmas Eve, who's going to be flying? So I called home again, and my mother, first thing she said is, "I can't help you. You know, it's Christmas Eve. There's, you know, there's nothing we can do. Western Union is closed. She says, "Beside which your brother-in-law were on each other's

01:16:07.700 - 01:16:29.140

nerves trying to get you home, and he's trying to soothe things down. He put a candle in the window to light your way home, but he about burnt the house down." So she said, "We're not very happy here." And I said, "Well, you know, we have an aunt in Akron." I said, "Do you think maybe she would loan me the money for a bus?"

01:16:29.820 - 01:16:45.400

So sure enough, Aunt Maud came down, her and her son, and she bought the ticket for both of us, one to Philadelphia and one, me to Pittsburgh, where I could make connections in. But we had the parachutes, and we didn't have any parachute bags.

01:16:45.540 - 01:17:00.340

They didn't bother to give us that. And the bus driver, it was Christmas Eve, he wasn't happy, and he wanted to put it in with the luggage, and I said, "No, because if you pull the ripcord, we're going to have silk all over, or nylon all over the place, and I don't think the Air Force will be happy.

01:17:00.420 - 01:17:15.360

I won't be happy about it. Besides which, I said, "We might have to bail out of this thing," and that didn't go over too well, no sense of humor. So we sat on him, which put us about eight inches above everybody else on the bus, and

01:17:15.380 - 01:17:23.320

every time he looked in the rear, that's all he could see was these two heads above everybody else. But it did make it home for Christmas. Kelly: What time did you get home?

01:17:23.320 - 01:17:32.880

Around about noon. So I made it for Christmas. What was that Christmas like? Hectic.

01:17:34.380 - 01:17:44.420

The family still wasn't talking to each other. They were on edge, and I could understand it. It was hard. From the 20th to the 25th, that's five days of hell for them.

01:17:45.780 - 01:17:56.900

Were your grandparents still alive at this point? No. They were gone. Once you got home after Christmas, then what did you do?

01:17:58.100 - 01:18:11.980

Believe it or not, I turned around and went back to California. I took a train back. Transportation was still on the rough side. The classmate I was with, she lived with her mother.

01:18:12.460 - 01:18:23.880

Her husband was in service. We made contact with about five or six others. We got together. This was going to be a new lifestyle for me.

01:18:24.380 - 01:18:38.780

I sat around and played cards all day. We would draw cards or draw straws or some way to select who would go out and get a job. Whoever would get a job would work for two weeks and then somebody else's turn. Well, I went out.

01:18:39.460 - 01:19:02.560

I, about the second time around, I drew the assignments and I went out and worked for a parts factory at Adel, I believe was the name of it. I was running this big ten-ton press, stamping out little one-inch parts, rubber parts. The guy who was training me on it had already missed a couple fingers, and he said the machines

01:19:02.700 - 01:19:13.760

sometimes eat them. I figured that wasn't a job for me, so I kept it for two weeks, and then I went back home. But that was my short term as a beatnik. It wasn't my lifestyle.

01:19:14.060 - 01:19:28.520

I left that. I left there and went with Flying Safety at North Carolina. They later moved to Langley Field. I had the choice of either going in as an accident analyzer

01:19:28.680 - 01:19:37.440

or to work on operations. So I chose to work on operations. The other WASP kind of pushed me into it. We had about seven or eight working down there.

01:19:39.020 - 01:19:51.040

It seems as if this loophole in the Army regulations which entitled the WASPs to go out on the flights, even though they didn't fly the aircraft. They let us fly it, but I mean, it wasn't -- we could log it.

01:19:52.560 - 01:20:04.500

Every weekend, the officers would take trips, and whoever worked operations would get the list. Well, I was the one that got the list. So I would call up the WASP and say, "I got a trip going

01:20:04.660 - 01:20:16.660

to New York, I got a trip going to here, there. Who wants to go where?" Well, if somebody wanted to go somewhere, I changed -- By this time I was enough of a beatnik, I changed the list around a little bit on priorities.

01:20:17.400 - 01:20:33.480

And we got a lot of flying time in. What bothered me was that I was authorized to sign the clearances for anybody under a major. Now up to this time, my clearances were being signed.

01:20:34.460 - 01:20:42.220

And it dawned on me this was a lot of responsibility. I mean, what if the guy crashed? What if he ran into weather? What if his aircraft wasn't sound?

01:20:42.360 - 01:20:50.820

What if there's an investigation and my name was on there? Did I check it out thoroughly? Was he competent? Did I check his instrument rating?

01:20:52.800 - 01:21:12.640

It had its own level of stress. But then I left there and decided, after I moved to Langley, to go to Alaska. And there I got a job as a link instructor for the crew that were—the B-29s that were flying over the Aleutians doing surveillance on Russia.

01:21:18.000 - 01:21:36.800

Is that number nine? You really did, don't you? Why did you decide to go to Alaska? Well I heard that they were installing links up there.

01:21:37.040 - 01:22:04.980

needed Link instructors, and so I applied and was accepted, and two of us went. Now the interesting part about the Alaskan trip was that I went to Los Angeles to pick up a classmate who was also going to get a job, and she said to me, her husband was there, And she said, "We're going out on a double date.

01:22:06.320 - 01:22:20.840

This guy that I got for you, I went to high school with him. We grew up together. He's not your type. However, you know, well, it was love at first sight, and he was going to Panama, and of

01:22:20.840 - 01:22:35.420

course I went to Alaska, and we corresponded. And six years later, I went to Panama, and we were married. I went for two weeks and stayed sixteen years. Tell me, what attracted you to him?

01:22:35.560 - 01:22:51.860

What were the qualities that you saw in him? Well he was without a doubt the most gentle man I've ever met. Certainly a gentleman. He was one of these people that you meet and within a couple minutes you feel like you've

01:22:51.880 - 01:23:05.200

known him forever. And I think mostly he was attracted to me and I think that had a lot to do with it. I mean, because one of the first questions he asked me was, did he -- did I think I could live in the tropics?

01:23:06.520 - 01:23:13.660

Well, it was news to me. I didn't think he was -- I did think we were going in that direction, but we corresponded over the years.

01:23:14.180 - 01:23:20.420

And finally, I was -- I left Alaska. I stayed there a little over a year, and I was traveling back and forth. I was restless.

01:23:21.320 - 01:23:41.780

And finally, he decided if -- what his plan was to get married, that he just better lay it right on the line, so he asked me to come down. Of course, to go to the Canal Zone, I had to have Navy orders and a round-trip ticket, because no one stays in the Canal Zone unless you have a job.

01:23:43.020 - 01:24:08.280

And so I went down, and things worked out real well, and we got married at the Navy Chapel, and Commander Sharp was the chaplain, and he was one of the survivors of the Bataan Death March, which I thought was interesting. I always liked the chapel. And so I went to work for the Air Force because first thing he said to me, "I think you should

01:24:08.360 - 01:24:34.640

look for a job." You know, "Hey, I just got married. I'm not interested in working. I've worked all my life." And he said, "Down here, if you don't work, the wives have nothing to do. they have maids, most of them become alcoholics. And he said, "The Air Force is here, your love is aircraft, get down and try it." So I went down, there was a job opening, and

01:24:35.980 - 01:24:58.700

it was in the Panama Air Depot, it was only one girl, it was one girl with over 100 GIs and Panamanians. So I went down and I was to be interviewed by the major, and I had my resume and he was a sour apple. He started going through it and finally he said to me, "Well, do you know anything at all about airplanes?" And I said, "Sir, I was a wasp." And he slammed

01:24:58.760 - 01:25:20.600

that thing shut and I thought, "Now what did I say?" He said, "When can you start?" And I took the job, I reorganized, I loved the job, I reorganized it, I got a chance to go which put me through Central and part of South America. I found out that I had an hour and a half for lunch.

01:25:21.500 - 01:25:37.180

I mean, everybody took all that time, and there was no place to go. So I started visiting the different shops, and they had a shop for everything. They had the paint shop, the upholstery shop, the cable shop, the machine shop. You name it, they had it.

01:25:37.180 - 01:25:56.120

So I started going and the Panamanians were teaching me their craft. So I went back to the plating shop and they taught me how to plate. Then they built me a little plater that I could take home and gold plate and silver plate, because I was getting into jewelry at that time.

01:25:57.140 - 01:26:06.580

I learned how to weld. And each shop had a different apron. They were beginning to compete who could make the fanciest apron. Oh, I had a ball. I loved it.

01:26:06.580 - 01:26:17.960

Then they decided that since I was doing so well with this job that they would bring in an office crew. Rather than have one girl in the office, they would bring in the whole crew and dissolve the one at the squadron level.

01:26:18.980 - 01:26:32.700

Well, that sort of put a crimp in my style, but I still was able to go out and learn more. I learned a lot from the Air Force. I learned how to airbrush from them. Where was I going with this?

01:26:33.280 - 01:26:45.960

So how long did you live in Panama? Sixteen years. Things were beginning, it reminded me of the WASP. I'm beginning to think every time I join something it falls apart.

01:26:46.580 - 01:27:03.360

Joined the WASP and they dissolved. I went to the canal zone and now they were going to turn it back over to Panama. One of the first things to go was the post office. Well, I wasn't crazy about that because the mail sometimes didn't go through.

01:27:04.360 - 01:27:18.700

Then the court system was scheduled to go out of the Canal Zone into the Panamanian courts. So, my husband decided that he would take the retirement that they were offering. So, we retired and came back to the States in '68.

01:27:21.460 - 01:27:34.940

I said I'd never go back to Pennsylvania. We had property in Florida, but the family situation at home was such that I felt I should stay. So I'm still there.

01:27:36.040 - 01:27:49.820

The property in Florida I couldn't sell because if you're not there, they figure you're just one of those carpetbaggers that picked up some property and they wouldn't offer you anything. So I gave it to the Habitat for Humanity.

01:27:49.820 - 01:28:03.060

I figured if I wanted to give it away, I wanted to give it someplace that would do some good. So now I'm in Pennsylvania and will stay there. Okay. Once you went back to Pennsylvania with your husband, then what did you do?

01:28:03.800 - 01:28:12.000

Did you work? What did you do? Well, no. My dad, of course, had passed away.

01:28:12.000 - 01:28:26.200

He passed away within a month after we got back. He was quite ill. That was another decision for reason for going back. He had an electric motor repair shop which was built behind the house.

01:28:27.180 - 01:28:44.260

So we decided we were deep into lapidary at that time. I was deep into silver and gold work because every time we went to the States we would stop in Mexico and go to a little town called Taxco. And there was one shop in there that was teaching me the basics.

01:28:45.020 - 01:29:00.200

then I would come back and practice and what I needed help, the Panamanian back in the welding shop would help me. So we decided to open up, to do it as a hobby. Well before long it developed into a business.

01:29:00.980 - 01:29:19.580

That was his business. I mean, I helped and basically it was his. I like flowers, so he built for me a greenhouse and that was to be a hobby. But it proved to be so profitable that I was selling uranium as a one-crop once a year,

01:29:20.620 - 01:29:34.180

and I enjoyed that. So we had two businesses going. And then when he passed away in '88, I dissolved the jewelry shop, and in the meantime I had the greenhouse torn down.

01:29:35.060 - 01:29:52.620

So now I'm on my own, and I decided that I could use all of what I had learned and the equipment that I had and use it for the WASP. So I became in charge of stores in '86. There was absolutely nothing on the table.

01:29:54.280 - 01:30:12.840

I started making the sterling rings, then I started reproducing the early class wings. I ordered the—am I getting off course here? No. I ordered the stamp wings from Jostens, and they were so unsatisfactory that I discontinued

01:30:12.920 - 01:30:28.080

that. So I had built it up, and I used that area now for strictly the WASP stuff. I packaged there, I airbrushed there, I do my silver work there, and I use the rest of the house for the other things that I'm doing.

01:30:30.020 - 01:30:45.360

And then tell me about the profits from the business, what the profits are used for. You mean for the WASP? Every two years I turn them back into the Treasury. We go to these different air shows.

01:30:45.560 - 01:31:06.640

In 1993 we were featured at Oshkosh. We got a new air show chairman who was real gun-ho, somebody that really could get in there and get things moving. I asked her if we could sell anything when we went up in '93, and we weren't sure.

01:31:07.120 - 01:31:25.000

So I took some FIFINELLA pins that I weren't too happy with, the way they were done, and found they just disappeared within a couple hours. So that was our first of opening up to the general public. So now that Oshkosh is one of our biggest fundraisers, I mean, we make the stuff.

01:31:25.440 - 01:31:35.780

It's nickel and dime stuff. I mean, you don't make much profit. Because everything was geared to be sold to the WASPs. So naturally, we kept it just a little above cost.

01:31:35.920 - 01:31:45.060

Now we're selling to the general public and we still have kept the same policy. But we go to Oshkosh. This year we're going to go to Redding, Beaver Falls,

01:31:46.280 - 01:31:58.560

Frederick, Maryland, Sun and Fund in Florida, and of course back to Oshkosh. In the meantime, you're still in Connellsville. Do you still have family?

01:31:59.460 - 01:32:11.780

Tell me about your family that's left. I have no family left there. I'm strictly on my own. My sister lives in Cleveland and we keep AT&T Solvent.

01:32:12.640 - 01:32:23.440

We call it that every other day. And your brothers? My one brother, who was a dean at the local college, has passed away a couple years ago, And my other brother is retired, living in California.

01:32:24.910 - 01:32:44.740

Tell me, Schutze, having lost your dad, that you were so fond of, having lost your husband and your brother, what got you through the hard times? I always feel that a person should look inward for strength, not lean on somebody else's shoulder.

01:32:50.300 - 01:33:02.540

If you're speaking of the philosophy that my dad taught me, it doesn't apply here, but I'll tell you what it is, and I've lived my whole life by this. I'll correct that. I tried to live my whole life by it.

01:33:03.500 - 01:33:16.640

Ever since I can remember, every time I went to walk out of the house, no matter where I was going, my dad would look me in the eye and say, "Now, remember, young lady, honor is your first consideration." That's where I live by.

01:33:18.900 - 01:33:33.360

I think it's a good guideline to go by. Still applies. Still applies. In looking back over your life, what is the one thing that you're most proud of?

01:33:34.860 - 01:33:49.560

The WASP, being a member. Sometimes I think about it and I think, "Was I actually a member? Did I really make it?" I mean, I'm part of a unique organization that had opened doors.

01:33:50.020 - 01:33:55.560

Was I really a part of that? Yes, I was. Yes, I was. And it's good to know that.

01:33:57.720 - 01:34:09.640

It may not make a mark anywhere, but it does with me. What do you feel the legacy of the WASP will be? We opened doors. We didn't open it very far.

01:34:09.640 - 01:34:32.840

We just got a foot in, but it was enough. When I flew in here yesterday, I noticed the co-pilot was a woman. She reminded me of the WASP, sitting up there, confident, maybe a little arrogant, knowledgeable. Levy: What do you think the WASP accomplished?

01:34:35.360 - 01:34:47.940

Opening those doors? Lowdermilk Honstein: Yes. I mean, I hear it said. The Army was really desperate to get us, but I don't think of it as that way.

01:34:47.940 - 01:35:00.540

I think it was destiny. It was destined to be that way. I mean, we opened the door, we showed the way, they slammed it shut, it was reopened. Nothing is forever.

01:35:03.540 - 01:35:17.480

The good Lord didn't make me a second-class citizen, and to be anything less is a dishonor. What do you feel your legacy will be? Personally? Mm-hmm.

01:35:19.080 - 01:35:42.260

I really hadn't given it much thought. A feeling of, I always try to impart to my nieces and nephews a feeling of honor. Honor means a lot to me. If I can instill that in just one individual, I'll be satisfied.

01:35:46.140 - 01:36:12.200

In looking ahead to the young people who will be watching this interview in years to come, what would you like to say to them that might encourage them to have that same spirit of honor and integrity that you possess? Do whatever we did.

01:36:12.420 - 01:36:23.300

Jump in with both feet and start running. There's a lot of good kids out there. Today's society, we only hear about the sour apples. But I have all the confidence in the world,

01:36:24.160 - 01:36:33.860

in this young generation. They'll do good and go far. Stay the course. But be true to yourself.

01:36:36.800 - 01:36:51.580

- And my one last question to you is about Wings Across America. What do you feel that this project might accomplish? Oh, you're doing a tremendous service.

01:36:53.840 - 01:37:14.420

It has my whole support. You're preserving for history an important part of it. I commend you greatly for it. I want to thank you for flying all the way from Connellsville.

01:37:14.740 - 01:37:19.200

I want to ask about the cross. Okay. About the cross in Panama. In Panama?

01:37:19.980 - 01:37:34.360

Yeah, tell us about the cross that you helped make. Boy, I really was talking last night, wasn't I? The bishop of the Episcopal Church in Panama approached us. We were deep into lapidary work at that time.

01:37:34.360 - 01:37:50.600

We were making gem-top tables. They hauled in, or they had the Navy haul in under our quarters a 15-foot cross made out of Nazarene wood, which is a purplish wood native to Panama. They had just finished the cathedral.

01:37:51.400 - 01:38:05.980

The backdrop was the stones from Columbia. Of course, you know, Panama was part of Columbia until 1903, or was it '23? Either way. They wanted the Canal Zone stones.

01:38:06.620 - 01:38:24.080

So we embedded them in plastic and they maybe hauled it back out again. It was an interesting project. Fifteen feet high. We started, I think at the center we had used a piece of coral to represent the heart and

01:38:24.100 - 01:38:45.460

then we explained each piece as we put it into the cross. One of the most common that we did besides coral was bloodstone, which is known in lapidary circles as the holy stone. The legend being that when Christ was on the cross and he was stabbed with the lance, the

01:38:45.520 - 01:39:02.320

blood fell on green jasper, and these red dots went into the stone and became the bloodstone. And there was quite a bit of that. That's all dredged out of the canal and dumped up on the beach for the rockhounds like ourselves to get down and go through.

01:39:03.260 - 01:39:14.260

But now that this is all Panama, you have to have a special license for that, and you can't ship it out of the country. So another door is closed. Kelly: Right.

01:39:14.580 - 01:39:19.740

And that cross today? Lowdermilk Honstein It's still there. It's in the cathedral.

01:39:20.880 - 01:39:27.300

It's been mounted. I have pictures of it. I'm real proud of it. Right, you should be.

01:39:28.140 - 01:39:43.120

Is there anything that you can think of that I've left out that you would like to tell us? You covered quite a bit. If you had me remembering things that I hadn't even thought about. No.

01:39:45.720 - 01:39:55.280

No, I cannot. I will five minutes from now. Right, and I will think of other things to ask you. No, I think that covers it pretty well.

01:39:56.360 - 01:40:03.300

Oh, I wouldn't have missed it for the world. >> Nancy? >> Do you have a favorite word? >> Do you mean like awesome?

01:40:03.660 - 01:40:10.280

>> OK. >> No, that's not my favorite word. No, that's not it. >> Do you have a favorite word?

01:40:10.780 - 01:40:19.280

>> No, I don't. What? >> Honor. >> Oh, honor, that has that to be is more than a word.

01:40:20.380 - 01:40:30.680

I mean, that's a way of life. I mean, I'd die for honor. I mean, that sounds melodramatic maybe, but that's how I feel. Good.

01:40:31.040 - 01:40:40.340

I'd say that's your favorite. That's my favorite. Honor, I often thought of putting it on a shirt or putting it on a patch or putting it on a pin.

01:40:40.440 - 01:40:51.600

I've given that a lot of thought. I thought, well, maybe others don't feel the way I do. And I find among the WASP a lot of honor. I mean, but they don't express it in the same way.

01:40:52.400 - 01:41:00.600

They don't have a childhood to go back and have your father tell you that every time you walked out the door. But it didn't do me any harm. It did me an awful lot of good.

01:41:02.800 - 01:41:06.440

Yes, it did. That's a great word. Yes, it did. It's a wonderful word.

01:41:07.040 - 01:41:23.700

Can I ask you one more thing? What do you have in your life that you look forward to getting up and doing every day, that just turns you on, that makes you happy? Oh, I love the silver work, but I haven't been doing it lately.

01:41:25.400 - 01:41:33.580

When I wake in the morning, I think, "What shall I do next?" I'm like the general who gets on his horse and rides off in all directions. I can do many things. I can do research.

01:41:33.660 - 01:41:40.400

I can do the computer. I can do silk screening. I can do the airbrush. I can do the silver work.

01:41:41.020 - 01:41:56.300

But the chances are I've got a stack of invoices and packaging to do and run to the post office. They know me down at the post office real well. What was the last time you flew a plane? Oh, gee, let me think.

01:41:57.960 - 01:42:14.700

I flew the B-17, the one out of Galveston up at Oshkosh a couple years ago. It made me feel not only real good to fly it, but then they offered later, when Columbia, to fly some of the other WASPs. But they didn't put them in the left seat.

01:42:14.820 - 01:42:31.760

They put them in the engineer's seat and they were—I like that. I've been flying a Cessna 172. I flew that for a while, just to see if I could still do it. What's your favorite airplane?

01:42:32.980 - 01:42:40.100

The Stearman. I didn't tell you about my legend, did I? No, that's your legend. Tell Mom.

01:42:42.000 - 01:42:54.480

Well, it's an old Indian legend, and I should explain that my husband was part Indian, American Indian. He always tried to hide that, but I knew it, and I was real proud of it. But that's beside the point.

01:42:54.600 - 01:43:10.820

Anyway, he told me this legend of the Indian, that when lightning strikes from the cloud to the ground, if you are quick and you look into it, you will see what is waiting for you in eternity. So the next time you see one, you look in there and you're going to see a Stearman

01:43:10.980 - 01:43:22.820

with my name on it. I'm going to renegotiate for an AT6. I love the 6. And I keep telling my husband, you know, make room for a B-17 while you're up there,

01:43:23.280 - 01:43:37.360

you know, because I'm coming and I expect to have everything in line. But the AT6 actually would be my favorite, but I don't think I deserve that. I'll start with the Stearman. I'll probably get a pair of roller skates.

01:43:38.040 - 01:43:43.840

[ Laughter ] >> Just be glad he'll accept you. >> All right. [ Laughter ]

01:43:44.320 - 01:43:51.940

>> I don't think the wasp will be in the walking army in heaven. I just don't think so. I'll get someone to turn this off. That's great.

01:43:51.960 - 01:44:00.020

>> Bless you. >> That's great. I'm glad we have you. >> And you're flying along and he's looking at you in the mirror and you can't talk to him.

01:44:00.020 - 01:44:09.720

He talks to you and you think -- and I remember this one time I was up there. I think it was a civilian checkride. And I thought, everything is going too-- I must be doing something wrong.

01:44:10.820 - 01:44:17.960

Ah, carburetor heat. So I turned on the carburetor heat and the engine coughed and quit. Nope, that wasn't it.

01:44:19.740 - 01:44:29.840

But it's a feeling of freedom I think you get from it because you're in the open cockpit. As you get a little older, that canopy on the AT-6 is very comforting.

01:44:30.130 - 01:44:44.880

I mean, you don't have the wind and the bugs in your face. but -- and the 86 sounds so nice and it flies so easy. But that Stearman, you have to fly it. I think this is the -- wouldn't you say?

01:44:45.460 - 01:44:58.620

The secret of it is you have to fly it. It's not as stable as you would think. But it's that -- you know, it always tickles me about the WASP. They always -- and this is not meant as criticism,

01:44:59.360 - 01:45:10.220

But they're always, you know, they'll enhance their stories, you know, as they get a little time in the B-25. I flew the B-25, you know, maybe they only had five minutes, but that's beside the point.

01:45:10.280 - 01:45:23.360

Maybe they had 50 hours, I don't know. But they all flew the exotic stuff, and I would try to be very honest and say, no, I flew the mundane, routine jobs. But when they want to be pictured, you know what they want

01:45:23.380 - 01:45:32.340

to be pictured in? Helmet and goggles. I mean, you know, right down to the basics. So that's where we're going.

01:45:34.500 - 01:45:49.420

But we had to fly everything, because we had no cruise control. Yeah, you had to stay with it. And the stearman, I thought, was a little unstable. Especially in a crosswind.

01:45:49.740 - 01:46:03.120

Yeah, especially in a flat crab. Especially if you have a crab in the front seat. - That's right. - David was your 86 instructor?

01:46:03.300 - 01:46:07.180

- David Lamb? - Yeah. - Yes. - See, he taught me primary. After I went to bed--

01:46:07.180 - 01:46:13.040

- Did he teach primary? I didn't know he taught primary. - After I went to bed, I couldn't figure out how you could have had him in primary

01:46:13.220 - 01:46:21.840

when I had him in primary. We weren't through with primary when you came in. 'Cause we had two months. Oh, about a month and a half and everything.

01:46:21.960 - 01:46:41.100

'Cause we were there seven months. primary, basic, and advanced. So I was trying to figure out how could you have David Lamb? Because I had him in primary. Yeah, I could see that. He went right into advanced. I didn't know that we were his first class. Because you know what, eventually

01:46:41.100 - 01:46:53.900

at the end of the training they allowed us to crawl in the back seat of that 86 and I got back here and I said, "He doesn't see much from back here." Right. I know, yeah, you're from there. - You know, it's frightening, I think that.

01:46:55.100 - 01:47:05.920

- Well, I guess he moved up to sixes once he finished us in primary. - Oh, that was the name of the game, I guess. - Oh, at that point, when you were in,

01:47:06.820 - 01:47:47.580

when you went to 86s, I was already, I was in instruments by that time. - I had Mr. Wolf for, (scoffs)