Winning My Wings: A Woman Airforce Service Pilot in World War II

Winning My Wings: A Woman Airforce Service Pilot in World War II by Stegeman Hodgson, Marion. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9781931721479.

One of the first women in the United States to train as a military pilot, the author was part of a little-known World War II experiment called the WASP (Women Airforce Service Pilots) program, which gave young women the then unheard-of opportunity to fly military aircraft. Marion Hodgson tells an exuberant story of the time back in 1943 when she and other WASPs earned their hard-won wings. They learned to fly everything from open-cockpit primary trainers to P-51 Mustangs, B-26 Marauders, and B-29 Superfortresses, and their stateside missions freed their male counterparts for combat duty oversees. This is an action-packed story, often humorous and sometimes harrowing, told mostly through letters Hodgson wrote to a Marine pilot fighting for his life after a fiery crash. It reveals what it was like for these pioneering women as they ferried planes from factories to airfields, test-flew repaired aircraft, and performed a variety of other duties traditionally assigned to men.