cover image Women Pilots of World War II

Women Pilots of World War II

Jean Hascall Cole. University of Utah Press, $19.95 (165pp) ISBN 978-0-87480-374-7

A member of the Women's Air Force Service Pilots (WASP) during WW II and retired editor of Research News published by Arizona State University, Cole here covers much the same territory as did Marianne Verges in On Silver Wings (Nonfiction Forecasts, Oct. 4). This oral history, however, focuses on just one of the 18 graduating classes of the program, group 44-W-2, which completed its training at Avenger Field in Sweetwater, Tex., in March 1944. Interviews with 35 members of the group reveal their sense of pride and determination to succeed (less than half of the candidates got their wings) and their work ferrying planes, towing targets for gunnery practice and serving as flight instructors or test pilots to prove that they could handle every aircraft. The postwar disregard of the service rendered by these women is depressing to read about, but a bright spot in this interesting, instructive book is the official recognition granted them, albeit belatedly, as valued WW II military personnel in 1979. Photos. (Feb.)