Chapter OneAirminded
Only a few short weeks after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Teresa James stood on the freezing platform of Pittsburgh’s Union Station saying goodbye to the love of her life. They were an attractive couple: Teresa a pretty, curly-haired brunette with brown eyes and a ready smile, and George—who went by Dink—looking so handsome and clean-cut in his new uniform, with his cropped hair and square jaw. The couple had been preparing for this moment ever since America’s entry into the war, but even so, they hated that the time for goodbye had come so soon.
Both Teresa and Dink had spent years anxiously following the news, waiting for the moment when their country might finally join the fight. They were children of European immigrants—Teresa’s mother was from Ireland and Dink’s was from Hungary—and perhaps, as a result, they took events overseas personally. Dink was a well-qualified pilot with 2,100 hours of flying time, and the Army’s Air Transport Command wanted him to join their Ferrying Division. But by the time the telegram from the Ferrying Division arrived, he had already gone with a friend and enlisted. He was now Private Martin, headed to training at Keesler Army Airfield in Biloxi, Mississippi.
Seasoned pilots like Dink were in high demand in January 1942. A sleeping nation had finally woken up to the fact that America was woefully underprepared for war. In the weeks that followed Pearl Harbor, the nation’s military began a fevered rush to train and recruit new personnel, especially pilots. It was clear that this new conflict was going to be fought, and won, in the air. In the years since the end of World War I, advancing airplane technology had transformed the nature of armed conflict, with newly developed combat aircraft enabling both sides to enact swift and deadly violence. In particular, the might of the German air force—the infamous Luftwaffe—drew the awe and respect of all who knew airplanes. In order to counter it, the United States would not only need to train thousands of pilots to fight overseas but also to manufacture and deliver aircraft in vast numbers.
Across the country, pilots were being called up to serve. Many didn’t wait to be asked and, like Dink, simply enlisted. These patriotic Americans came from every state in the nation, from every race and social class. But they had one thing in common. They were all men. In 1942, the draft applied only to males ages twenty-one to forty-five, and while the military did recruit women volunteers as nurses and for other positions, it did not admit them as pilots.
On the icy train platform, Teresa and Dink said their goodbyes and promised to write. Teresa wanted to know all about Dink’s training. After all, she was an accomplished pilot in her own right, well-known for her stunt flying, which she had only recently given up to make her living as a flight instructor. Teresa had been flying for nine years, during which time she had amassed almost 1,200 hours in the air, teaching scores of young men to fly and to improve their flight skills in preparation for war.
The couple had met on the airfield in 1937. Dink noticed Teresa right away, but it took him a while to pluck up the courage to ask her out. Then, one summer day all flying stopped for a sudden rainstorm. Dink took the opportunity to invite Teresa over to his family home for lunch. That day they spent time talking and getting to know each other. Teresa always asked her new students if they were good dancers: she had a theory that people who were light on their feet would likely turn out to be light on the airplane controls as well, making them good pilots. Teresa soon learned that although Dink couldn’t jitterbug, he loved to slow waltz with her and that he was a natural in the air. She had met her match.
After Dink’s departure, Teresa went back to work as an instructor, but the busy airfield now felt lonely. The year before, Teresa had helped to set up a local division of the Civil Air Patrol, a civilian auxiliary organization that was preparing to surveil the surrounding area from the air in the event of war. Although she continued to volunteer for work in the air patrol, Teresa felt at loose ends. She wished she could do more. She missed Dink terribly. The couple wrote to each other, sending letters back and forth daily.
Then an opportunity arose. Teresa learned that one of her flying friends, a local pilot named Helen Richey, had received a telegram two pages long signed by the prominent aviator Jacqueline Cochran. In the telegram Cochran explained that since the attack on Pearl Harbor every front in the war was now an American front and it was time for patriotic American women to step up and do their part. She was taking a group of women pilots to England to fly for the war effort there, and she wanted Helen to come with her. Helen was already beginning to prepare to leave for Canada, where she would be put through rigorous flight and medical tests along with the other potential recruits.
Teresa wrote to Cochran, hoping for her own invitation to join. In her letter Teresa touted her credentials: she was thirty-one years old, had been flying for nine years, had 1,200 hours of flight time, was an active flight instructor and a member of the Ninety-Nines, the all-woman flying organization. She desperately wanted to go with Helen to Canada, but it wasn’t to be. That same month her mother suffered a heart attack. Teresa wasn’t about to leave her side. When Cochran’s offer arrived a few weeks later, Teresa turned it down.
Stranded in Pennsylvania, Teresa took care of her mom, who slowly recovered her health. Dink was now in Colorado. In July 1942, after seven months of separation, he asked Teresa to come and see him and to bring along his mother and Teresa’s sister Betty, too. The three women made the long drive west in Dink’s Buick across two-lane highways with their windows down and hot summer air blowing. Finally, Teresa and Dink were reunited, with Dink able to get a two-day pass to spend time with his visitors.
It was in Colorado Springs that Dink proposed. He explained to Teresa that he didn’t want to leave to fight overseas without marrying her first. Although Teresa was Catholic and had always dreamed of a big church wedding, Dink convinced her to agree to a more modest setting, at least for the short term. The couple was married at the Colorado Springs City Hall, with a private from the 6th Photographic Squadron as best man. Instead of a wedding gown, Teresa wore her Civil Air Patrol uniform. Her sister Betty was maid of honor in her own uniform, as she was also a pilot and had joined Teresa in her air patrol work. Dink’s mother served as witness. The couple had planned to keep the wedding a secret and to have their traditional church wedding after the war, but a local journalist gave away the game, running the headline famous stunt pilot married, much to the shock of Teresa’s stunned mother—who learned of her daughter’s wedding from the newspaper the following day.
There was little time for romance or celebration. After two weeks of day trips to the mountains and evenings with Dink, Teresa returned to Pennsylvania with her sister and Dink’s mother. She went back to work at the airfield, taking on even more hours as a volunteer pilot in the Civil Air Patrol while continuing as an instructor training men to fly for the war, still hoping that the time might come when she could do the same.
Then on September 6, 1942, Teresa received a telegram that was the answer to her prayers. It was from the well-known commercial pilot Nancy Love and Colonel Robert H. Baker of the U.S. Army Air Forces’ Ferry Command, inviting her to join a newly formed Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron at New Castle Army Air Base in Wilmington, Delaware:
FERRYING DIVISION AIR TRANSPORT COMMAND IS ESTABLISHING GROUP OF WOMEN PILOTS FOR DOMESTIC FERRYING STOP NECESSARY QUALIFICATIONS ARE HIGH SCHOOL EDUCATION AGE BETWEEN TWENTY ONE AND THIRTY FIVE COMMERCIAL LICENSE FIVE HUNDRED HOURS TWO HUNDRED HORSEPOWER RATING STOP ADVISE COMMANDING OFFICER SECOND FERRYING GROUP FERRYING DIVISION AIR TRANSPORT COMMAND NEWCASTLE COUNTY AIRPORT WILMINGTON DELAWARE IF YOU ARE IMMEDIATELY AVAILABLE AND CAN REPORT AT YOUR OWN EXPENSE FOR INTERVIEW AND FLIGHT CHECK STOP BRING TWO LETTERS OF RECOMMENDATION PROOF OF EDUCATION AND FLYING TIME STOP
With her mother returned to good health, there was nothing standing in Teresa’s way. She made plans to leave for Wilmington immediately.
Copyright © 2020 by Katherine Sharp Landdeck. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
