Alaska'sWomen Pilots

Alaska's Women Pilots 6/2/04 12:45 PM Page i Alaska’s Women Pilots Contemporary Portraits Alaska's Women Pilots ...

Author: Jenifer Lee Fratzke

75 downloads 2351 Views 3MB Size Report

This content was uploaded by our users and we assume good faith they have the permission to share this book. If you own the copyright to this book and it is wrongfully on our website, we offer a simple DMCA procedure to remove your content from our site. Start by pressing the button below!

Report copyright / DMCA form

DOWNLOAD PDF

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page i

Alaska’s Women Pilots Contemporary Portraits

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page ii

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page iii

Alaska’s Women Pilots Contemporary Portraits

Jenifer Lee Fratzke

Utah State University Press Logan, Utah

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page iv

Copyright © 2004 Utah State University Press All rights reserved “She Who Hunts,” page 77, from Bad Girl with Hawk, by Nance Van Winckel, is published courtesy of the author. “Crash,” pages 1–4, previously appeared in The MacGuffin, special issue 2000, vol. XVII, number 2. Photo credits Page 11—National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 85-14508). Page 13—National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 94-7874). Page 54—National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 2004-15001). Page 104—National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 2002-23705). Page 105—National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 80-12873). Page 106—Photo by Carolyn Russo, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 2004-14329). Page 134—Photo by Carolyn Russo, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 2004-14333). Page 135—Photo by Carolyn Russo, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 2004-14317). Page 157—National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 84-10315). Page 161—Photo by Carolyn Russo, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 2004-14351). Page 181—Photo by Carolyn Russo, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution (SI 2004-14315). All other photos courtesy of the pilots. Manufactured in the United States of America Printed on acid-free paper

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Fratzke, Jenifer Lee, 1956Alaska's women pilots : contemporary portraits / Jenifer Lee Fratzke. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-87421-583-8 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN 0-87421-499-8 (e-book) 1. Women air pilots--Alaska--Biography. 2. Air pilots--Alaska--Biography. 3. Airplanes, Piloting--Alaska. I. Title. TL539.F733 2004 629.13'092'2798--dc22 2004008143

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page v

To the women pilots of Alaska, the pathfinders, who have gone before us and whose oral histories have never been recorded.

When I Have Fears When I have fears that I may cease to be Before my pen has glean’d my teeming brain, Before high-piled books, in charactery, Hold like rich garners the full ripen’d grain; When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face, Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, And think that I may never live to trace Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance; And when I feel, fair creature of an hour, That I shall never look upon thee more, Never have relish in the faery power Of unreflecting love;—then on the shore Of the wide world I stand alone, and think Till love and fame to nothingness do sink. January 1818 John Keats

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page vi

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page vii

Contents viii

Illustrations

xiii

Acknowledgments Introduction

1

Commercial Pilot 16 Tamar Bailey 25 Flight Instructor 51 Noralie Jennings-Voigt 60 Big Game Guide and Bush Pilot Ellie Jones-Elg 83 Private Pilot 103 Sanna Green 111 Helicopter Pilot 127 Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 137 Aerobatic Pilot 153 Darlene Dubay 164 Aviation Safety Inspector Val Aron Jokela 188 Conclusion Glossary

206 219

Works Consulted Index

226

224

178

72

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page viii

Illustrations Map of Alaska x–xi Amelia Earhart 11 WASPs 13 The author with Captain Duane Marvin 19 Tamar Bailey 26 Tamar fueling a DC-3 30 Tamar loading a DC-6 32 Flight Engineer Jim Anderson 43 Blanche Stuart Scott 54 Noralie Jennings-Voigt 61 Noralie breaking camp 63 The author’s Super Cub at Ellie’s hunting camp 80 Ellie Jones-Elg 84 Ellie flying for Lee’s Air Service 89 Ellie loading her rifle 92 Ellie’s catch 97 Harriet Quimby 104 Bessie Coleman 105 Patrice Clark-Washington 106 Sanna and her partner Laurita 112 Sanna and her Cessna 113 Sanna in the cockpit 116 Krista Bonino 134 Linda V. Hutton 135 Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 138 Caroline flying for New York Helicopters 139

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page ix

Caroline on an oil rig platform 143 Caroline on the Norris Glacier, Juneau 149 Florence Lowe “Pancho” Barnes 157 Patty Wagstaff 161 The author and Darlene Dubay 162 Darlene Dubay 165 Darlene with her Decathlon 171 Darlene flying for Northwest Airlines 176 Ellen Paneok 181 Valerie Aron Jokela 189 Val as first officer in the DHC-6 196 Val with her sled leaders Rita and Freddie 203 Val and fourteen-year-old, retired Sadie 203 The author fly fishing with her Cub 209 The author near her ranch with her horse, Dez 211 Alena and Nessa, 2003 213

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page x

Barrow

Kuparuk

Prudhoe Bay

Point Lay

C A R C T I

Deadhorse

A N O C E

Umiat Point Hope

Red Dog Mine

BRO O

Kivalina

KS RANGE

Anaktuvuk Pass

Kotzebue Bettles

Moses Point

Yu

Ri v e r

ko n

FAIRBANKS

Tanana

Kaltag

er

Skwentna

Kipnuk

S

E

Turnagain Arm

Kenai

CO Iliam

Platinum Cape Newenham

B RISTO L B A Y

PE Port

K A Moller AS AL Cold Bay

N

Mount Veniaminof

N

Seward

Iliamna

Goodnews Bay

A

River

Trading Bay

Kwigillingok

G

Turnagain Arm

Ta l k

ke na La

Homer

Kvichak King Salmon Naknek

T

IN

Kwethluk

LA

R

Aniak

Mount McKinley Deshka River

eet n Talkeetna a M t Wasilla n s . Alexander Lake Creek Creek Palmer Red Shirt Trinity Lake Chugiak Lake ANCHORAGE Eagle River T Tyonek LE

Rainy Pass Lodge

U

E

Ye ntn a

S

S

B

Bethel Napaskiak

okw im

Riv

Flat sk Ku

L

A

Shageluk

R A N G E

K A A S

Ri ver

Yu

Emmonak

Iditarod

I

ko

Kotlik

Susitn a

n

Ri

Unalakleet

OK

ve

r

Nome

IN Port Heiden S

H

I EL

K

O

F

T

R

A

I

Kodiak

G

U

L

F

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

B EA U FO R

T

Page xi

SE

A

Barter Island (Kaktovik)

Ri v

Yu

k

er

Fort Yukon

on

C A N A D A

Circle Hot Springs

FAIRBANKS

Deshka River

Ri ver

ALASKA

RAN W

GE

ra

C

Susitn a

Gulkana n g Ta l k eet ell n Glennallen Mo Talkeetna a M unt ai tn p p s ns Skwentna Palmer e . Chug Wasilla Red Shirt ac h Chugiak McCarthy Lake Eagle River Mo Lake Creek ANCHORAGE u Valdez

Ye nt n a Rive r

o

r

R i ver

Turnagain Arm

nta

Cordova

ins

Seward Yakutak Juneau

L F G U

O F

A L A S K A

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page xii

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page xiii

Acknowledgments First and foremost, I want to thank Dr. John R. Alley, executive editor of Utah State University Press for committing to this project. His interest and support made this book a reality. I especially want to thank Brooke Bigelow, marketing manager at Utah State University Press and my project editor for her insightful editorial suggestions. Her hard work and project orchestration helped immensely throughout the various stages of production. To her, I owe a great debt. My sincere gratitude belongs to the seven women pilots featured in this collection. Not only did they share their lives but their friendship during the various stages of this project. Thank you as well to Prudence Plunkett, English teacher at Colony High School in Palmer, Alaska, for her years of dedication to this book and the many long hours spent reading and rereading the various narratives. She has been a stellar supporter. To the late Captain Mark Poindexter, who gave me the most beautiful Waterman pen for my first book signing. I will always miss you, Mark, and thank you for your unwavering faith in my writing. To the late Dr. Arlene Kuhner, for helping me love literature, especially Shakespeare; Dr. Genie Babb, for her countless hours of reading and rereading stories; Dr. Joseph (Clay) Nunnally, for showing me the marvelous world of the Romantic and Victorian poets and being such a great professor; Dr. Ron K. Pollock, for being the Fisher King; Debbie LeFleiche, for her structural techniques and copy editing; Karen M. Jensen, for her many hikes and discussions about Alaska women pilots; Lucille Frey, for her sponsorship of the Alaska Women’s Bookstore Award in Feminist Studies; Shari Olander, for her encouragement and support; Jennifer Boyd, for her hours of listening to my ideas; Douglas Shaw, for his belief in me as a pilot and professional; Terry Cartee, for his xiii

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page xiv

xiv Alaska’s Women Pilots

enthusiasm about aviation and life; Verona Fratzke, for her many prayers over the years; the late Gordon “Gordie” Bergman, for his hikes and discussions; and Joe and Mary Headley, for their love and support throughout the years. To my mother, Margaret Jean Tench, for the many long talks on one of our road trips about women pilots, and to my sister, Jean Jones, for her support and encouragement with my writing. I’d like to thank Bruce Merrell, Alaska Section supervisor at the Z. J. Loussac Public Library in Anchorage for his hours of research and help during the early stages of this project; also, Robert W. Stevens, for his aid in research of Alaska aviation history; and Cindy Roccodero, licensing examiner for the State of Alaska Department of Commerce and Economic Development for her aid in researching big game guides and transporters for this project. To the late Bob Nance, friend and fellow Super Cub pilot, who supported and encouraged my writing and let me sit near his airplane at Lake Hood and write for hours, and Marjorie Carter for her many articles of interest. To David Blumberg and all the band members at Aire Traffic Productions, Inc. Your strength and support throughout the years has meant a great deal. And to the late Roberta Brown, my fellow Seair copilot, who died in a plane crash in the early eighties doing what she loved to do. We miss you. I am especially thankful to the Smithsonian Institution for all their support: Kate Igoe, permissions archivist at the National Air and Space Museum Archives; Carolyn Russo, author and photographer at the Smithsonian, who generously made her photographs available for this project; David Burgevin, photographic archives and imaging sales at the Smithsonian Office of Imaging and Photographic Services; and Kristine Kaske, photo archivist at the National Air and Space Museum. I’d like to thank the flight service folks at Deadhorse and Bethel for their help and professionalism over the years. My greatest appreciation is reserved for my husband, Arlin Fratzke, who has supported and believed in my writing dream, and is the best detailed aviation copy editor I know.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 1

Introduction Clouds began to drop; the ragged edges of gray and black created a blanketed ceiling for me to pass beneath, 200 feet over the Kuskokwim River. An engine runup would have to wait. If I didn’t accept the clearance to enter the Bethel Control Zone right now, we’d have to spend the night in Napaskiak. A 250-pound passenger named Carl sat beside me; he talked a lot. Behind us sat his two sons, eight and ten, resting their sleepy heads against the Plexiglas. The plane rolled down the runway, trying to turn into the thirty-knot crosswind. I held directional control by working the yoke and rudder; we lifted off. My eyes scanned the instrument panel, and the dull throbbing sound of an engine losing acceleration hit my ear. But we were already airborne—too late for an aborted takeoff. We crossed over the shoreline of the Kuskokwim River, barely holding altitude. The 172 steadily lost power: 2250 rpm, 2100 rpm, 1950 rpm, 1750 rpm. It was the actual loss of altitude over a rushing river a half-mile wide that stunned me. We weren’t going to make it. And I could only observe that my hands were compulsively reaching for the fuel selector, carburetor heat, magnetos—anything and everything I could remember to check in a mere one hundred feet. The yoke vibrated through my fingertips. 1

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 2

2 Alaska’s Women Pilots

I wanted to pull back on the controls and gain altitude to make it to dry land a few hundred yards away. The stall warning horn screeched in my left ear. If it were a fire drill I would run, but I was stuck. I heard my first flight instructor’s voice: “Fly the plane! Fly the plane!” I abandoned my natural impulse to climb and conceded to the inevitable. None of the buttons or levers or switches I tried worked. I was along for the ride. “My boys can’t swim,” Carl yelled, looking first at me, then out his window at a wall of moving silt water. I sat tall in the pilot’s seat and watched my hands pushing the yoke forward. The 172 responded. The horn quieted to an intermittent wail, then a gust of wind and another wail. I thought it must have been a simple thing like air in the fuel line or a faulty crossfeed. Any second I would hear the engine explode to full power. “The prop stopped,” Carl shouted. “We’re going in.” Silence in the cabin. The smell of rotten eggs—flatulence that could very well be my own. I didn’t care. My mother’s face, a mere flash of brown eyes turned to stone. The pointer of the altimeter read a height near sea level. “Tighten your seat belts.” I spoke in a voice I didn’t recognize as my own. I grabbed the microphone. “Mayday! Mayday!” I said, “Going down, Kuskokwim.” A controller responded, “Say again, position and problem.” I reached down and switched off the button; the microphone broke off and fell on the floor. I needed to think—not chitchat about where I was. He would have to figure it out. The most important thing at this point was flying the plane. At fifty feet the propeller was still motionless. Now it was too late. Even if the engine started, I couldn’t possibly stop the rate of descent to prevent the plane from hitting the water. I didn’t know if we’d land on a sandbar or in a channel, or sink in a deep hole thirty feet and go under. I didn’t want to drown. “Open the doors so we can get out,” Carl yelled. I saw the swirling river, the shape of branches no bigger than my arm floating down. The steep banks rose higher than the nose

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 3

Introduction 3

of the airplane, and I counted four rocks no bigger than my fist near the water’s edge. We’d never make it. Second after second froze and then passed before my memory like ice in a slow-melting icicle— drip drip. Each time I believed we’d hit the water, I saw another drip and held my breath until it disappeared. The tail hit first, then the wheels and underbelly. I felt my head jerk forward and almost hit the dashboard, like a car smashing into a brick wall at forty-five miles an hour. The harnesses stopped me. I felt punched in both shoulders and breasts; I couldn’t breathe. I saw a bleeding hand in front of me and felt blood oozing over my leg, the seat. We must not have flipped over, because I wasn’t hanging upside down from the lap belt. Water poured in through the door jams, cracks in the fire wall, air vents, doors. I felt icy water rushing around my ankles and pouring over my knees. I was losing feeling in my legs. “Let’s go!” my voice shouted over the boys’ crying. My fingers clawed at the buckle, unfastening it. I leaned my elbow against the door and pushed with all my weight against the pressure holding it closed. The cabin was almost dark, with just a streak of light near the top of the ceiling. I pushed the door open and wedged first my leg, then my buttocks through the slit and turned sideways to keep it open. There was a blur of movement near the passenger door: Carl was doing the same thing. I reached back and grabbed one boy by the nape of the neck. The water flowed around my waist and felt like cold pee. I felt the boy’s hand clutch my arm and hang on. I had to trust that Carl got the other kid out. I could barely stand up and hold onto one child. As I half-walked and half-swam to shore, I held the boy in a rescue hold I had learned in college, my right arm wrapped around his upper body. I flipped him around so his back was touching my chest. His hair smelled like wet dog. Underneath my fingertips, I felt his heart pitter-pattering. No doubt he thought he’d drown. He wiggled and almost got away from me. I curled my right hand around his left armpit and hung on; if I let go, he would disappear into the silt. In a few places, the water reached my throat. I swam a modified scissors kick using my legs to propel me toward shore. The kid

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 4

4 Alaska’s Women Pilots

gulped water, then breaths. I tried keeping his head above water as much as I could, but I felt the weight of the sand pulling us under. If a log floated past, I’d try to grab it and hang on. I couldn’t let it hit me in the head, or I couldn’t swim. My feet touched bottom. There were forty more yards to shore. Over my shoulder, I saw Carl crossing the river and hanging onto the back of his son’s coat. The boy was crying and kicking his feet, but Carl kept moving. He had enough weight to keep pushing across the river. My knees buckled; my head went under the frigid water. I pushed with my feet and caught my breath. I felt bad that the kid had to go under again. Overhead, a Twin Otter circled and landed. The engines made a whirling noise and as the power came off, a soft whistle. I couldn’t feel my legs moving. I watched the left one push forward, then the right, then the left. “You’re hurting me!” the kid screamed. We’d reached shallow water, but I didn’t know it yet. I refused to let the boy go and stumbled toward a small gravel bar. The kid dropped behind me, then tried to run toward his father. His legs wouldn’t hold. He sprawled out, both arms reaching forward. As I watched Carl reach the shoreline, I studied my pink fingers. Everything hurt: my fingers, legs, feet, ankles. I wanted to scream. Searing pain shot up and down my legs. As they began to thaw, I experienced the pain of something dead coming back to life. Bush piloting in Alaska has a slim margin for errors. It is exhilarating, dangerous, and empowering. It allows for the freedom of travel just about anywhere in an area otherwise very uninviting. And historically it is regarded as a man’s occupation. Ask people to tell you the first name that pops into their mind when it comes to Alaska aviation, and most likely they will machine-gun back Noel Wien or Russel Merrill or Don Sheldon. We can imagine these rugged aviators in fur parkas—burly, adventurous, and brave. We can almost hear their noisy propellers whirl as they taxi next to a glacier strip like the ones Sheldon describes in his book Wager with the Wind. We have confidence that these men can fly across this vast state without getting lost, transport cargo stacked to the ceiling, and

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 5

Introduction 5

land in the middle of a snowstorm. We familiarize ourselves with their faces by looking at black-and-white photographs splattered across the walls of the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum. We read about their many achievements in pilot books featured at libraries and bookstores. We revere them. But women pilots in Alaska came north to find adventure and opportunity, just like male aviators, so why do we hear so little about them? In the historical canon were aviatrices forgotten or lost? Was Alaska such a rugged, isolated place that only the bravest and boldest and bushiest of men dared fly an air machine? These questions, and those like them, are the reasons I initiated this project. To date, the most comprehensive book about this subject is Robert W. Stevens’s Alaskan Aviation History, Volumes I and II. After fifteen years of extensive research, Stevens’s collection—complete with never-before-seen photographs—is exhaustive in its attempt to preserve historical accuracy. Yet after I had read both volumes—1,097 pages—I asked him if I had somehow missed a name or two. In my counting and recounting of women pilots who flew in Alaska before 1930, I came up with a grand total of one: Marvel Crosson. Could this be true, or was it just the author’s perception? Over the phone, Stevens assured me that my counting had not been in error. Back then, there were a handful of ladies who supported and encouraged their husbands’ aspirations in flying, but only one had actually flown by herself. Perhaps this lack of women pilots during the early days of aviation in Alaska had everything to do with the harsh Alaskan environment. During the Great Depression, men came to the Far North looking for work. This vast state was and is known as a remote, isolated territory. In Dirk Tordoff’s Mercy Pilot: The Joe Crosson Story, he discusses travel in the early days. In 1926, Interior Alaska needed aviation and was embracing the new technology. At the time, transportation options were few. Shallow-draft stern-wheelers on larger rivers and small boats on the others provided passage in the summer. The Alaska Railroad connected the Interior to Seward on the southern coast, and some of the gold camps were served by narrow-gauge railroad. A

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 6

6 Alaska’s Women Pilots horse-drawn stage was the most reliable transportation between Fairbanks and another coastal town, Valdez, but a businessman named Bobby Sheldon was taking passengers on the same route in his “auto-stage.” Other than these, getting around meant walking along the trail system or venturing cross-country. Wider trails were called wagon roads, but most were not good enough for motorized vehicles. In winter, dog teams delivered freight and passengers around the region, but travel was slow and hazardous. (27)

In Alaska the invention of the airplane could be compared to that of the light bulb. Opportunities for travel and trade exploded. Settlers had the means of transporting furs and gold other than by foot or dogsled across a territory twelve times the size of the state of New York. Because of the air machine, children stuck in bush villages hundreds of miles from the nearest doctor could get medical attention. Important letters—announcements of births, deaths, engagements, and visitors—arrived within a few days instead of weeks, months, or never. Friends and relatives kept in contact with each other and felt a little less isolated. Bullets and booze (negotiating tools) could easily be transported and used as a sign of good will toward Native Peoples. In many areas, a plethora of mountain ranges with jagged peaks and roadless valleys made travel nearly impossible, except by bush plane. Maybe this type of flying didn’t appeal to the woman of the early nineteen hundreds because it would necessitate singlepilot flying with literally no support. Besides loading and fueling the aircraft, a pilot would have to possess the ability to survive perhaps two or three days in frigid weather. Mechanical aptitude was a must. Tordoff illustrates the hardships of cold-weather flying in the early days: The planes were powered by early-model liquid-cooled motors that were far from reliable, especially in the Alaskan cold. When the temperature dipped below 10 degrees Fahrenheit, pilots had to drain the oil following each flight and take it indoors so it wouldn’t congeal in the engine. Buckets of motor oil were left near

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 7

Introduction 7 woodstoves each night to keep them warm. Before a flight, engines were warmed with a plumber’s torch under a canvas tarp and the warm oil was poured back into the crankcase. After these preparations, pilots hand-propped the engines to start them. If the plane didn’t start within a few minutes, the oil had to be drained again and both oil and motor reheated for another try. (31)

Preparing aircraft for flight and keeping them running was no easy task. Today we have multi-grade oil that compensates for temperature. But in the early days of aviation, radial engines used primarily fifty-weight oil. At cold temperatures the viscosity was more like tar than lubricant, and if you could get the engine started, you were lucky. If not, a pilot remained stranded in the Alaska wilderness and waited for rescue—or walked out. But the harsh environment is not the only reason that we hear so little about Alaska’s women pilots. At the time of interviewing and writing this collection, the shelves of libraries and bookstores were literally packed with Alaska aviation books about men. Certainly, there were publications that contained a chapter or two about the lives of women pilots, but not a single book could be found that featured Alaska aviatrices, exclusively. I wanted to fill that void. My intention was not to write a happy romance novel where women could escape vicariously into the lives of heroines who ended up married and lived happily ever after. My intention was to connect women pilots to the larger narrative of Alaska aviation history and to accurately relate their struggles and triumphs. Flying began in Alaska ten years after Orville and Wilbur Wright made their historic flight at Kitty Hawk on December 17, 1903. From the outset women participated. At the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum in Anchorage, a black-and-white photograph dated July 1913 features a married couple as “Early Bush Pilots.” They stand near the bottom wing of their Gage-Martin tractor biplane just moments after completing a flying exhibition over the Fairbanks skies as the first heavier-than-air machine to fly in the Far North. Wearing a wide-brimmed hat, Lily Irvine Martin stands

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 8

8 Alaska’s Women Pilots

beside her husband and flight instructor James Vernon Martin, her head cocked, smiling. One can easily imagine this English aviatrix starting the engine: holding the tail rope in both hands, leaning into the propeller wash, and letting go at just the right moment as Robert Stevens describes in his chapter “First in Alaska Skies”: By 1912, air shows were proliferating. A Fairbanks businessman, while on a trip to the States, conceived the idea of an aerial exhibition in his home town. Arthur Williams, owner of the Arcade Cafe, and R.S. McDonald joined forces as the Fairbanks Amusement Company. They engaged the services of aviator James V. Martin. Both the aviator and his wife had been kept busy since their arrival assembling the parts to the machine and putting it in order. At Pioneer Dock, the motor was run up and the wingless plane transported to Exposition Park (later Weeks Field), where the wings were installed by the Martins. Lily proved an able mechanic for she could swing a hammer, spin the propeller, or lift one end of a crated wing with the best. The promoters were selling tickets at $2.50, and $1.00 for children over six years of age. But when many of the residents took to their woodpiles and rooftops for the show they were doomed to financial disappointment. With only 250 people inside the rope and between two and three thousand outside, the promotion failed as a fund-raiser, although the flights were a smashing success. Martin made five flights between July 3 and 5. Having no tachometer to determine motor performance, and with memories of some bad experiences at the Canadian air shows, the Martins rigged an ice scale and roped it to the tail of the aeroplane. As the aviator revved up the motor, his female mechanician stood by in the prop wash. When the scale read about forty pounds, indicating enough power for takeoff, Lily released the rope and the plane trundled down the rough field. (17–19)

In 1927, the same year as Noel Wien established Wien Alaska Airways, Charles Lindbergh flew the first non-stop transatlantic

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 9

Introduction 9

flight. This feat was an aviation milestone. Departing New York, Lindbergh flew his Ryan, Spirit of St. Louis, direct to Paris. His successful flight had far-reaching implications not only for the rest of the United States, including the territory of Alaska, but around the globe. Aviation was popularized, causing more men and women to take flying lessons and pursue careers in aviation. Around the same time that Lindbergh was promoting general aviation around the world, Amelia Earhart became a “spokeswoman for aviation” (Lopez 80). One of her articles entitled, “Should You Let Your Daughter Fly?” was featured in Cosmopolitan and planted seeds of possibility in the public mind. By September 1928, Earhart had already set a record, completing the first solo continental flight from New York to Los Angeles and return. On May 20, 1932, she departed Newfoundland and arrived fifteen hours later in Ireland: the first transatlantic solo flight completed by a woman. Her achievements acted as a catalyst for other girls and women all over the world. Alaska was no exception. In 1932 Irene Irvine-Ryan was the first woman to solo, and Mary Worthylake was the first to earn her pilot’s license. In Gerry Bruder’s Heroes of the Horizon: Flying Adventures of Alaska’s Legendary Bush Pilots, the author discusses his impression of meeting Mary Worthylake and her remarkable solo flight. When you first see photos of Worthylake as a twenty-eightyear old student pilot in Anchorage in 1932, it’s pretty easy to feel intrigued. Bright-eyed and attractive, she smiles vivaciously in her leather helmet, commanding your gaze, looking as keen for a stroll in the hills or a philosophical discussion as for a flight in a biplane. After learning a little about her, you realize that Worthylake would have made a fascinating companion in just about any activity. She was intelligent and articulate enough to teach school, outdoorsy enough to take an eight-day horseback ride as a sixteenyear-old with a girlfriend in rural Oregon (they carried pistols to protect themselves), adventuresome enough to fly as both passenger and pilot in open-cockpit airplanes, and traditional enough to bear and raise three children. A man might even start wishing she

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 10

10 Alaska’s Women Pilots had been born sixty years later, or himself sixty years earlier. . . . Joe [Her husband] had never encouraged her to fly and had let her handle the controls only once, during their courtship in California. So Mary went ahead with her plans without notifying him. She scrounged some extra cash, began taking lessons in Star Air Service’s Fleet biplane at Anchorage’s Merrill Field, and, after a few early ground loops, learned quickly. “It was a bit unnerving when I went up on my first solo and suddenly realized there was nobody in the front cockpit,” she says. “The plane seemed so much lighter. I came in and made a good landing and got out, and my knees were knocking together. Frank was four then and he said, ‘Did you really fly all by yourself, Mama?’ I said yes. (223–228)

Another milestone in Alaska aviation was World War II (1939–1945). By the time the Battles of France and Britain were won, the war in the Pacific was just beginning. During this time of aviation expansion, crews built the Alaska-Canada Highway. This road system, etched out of what used to be nearly impassable landscape, became a busy thoroughfare. More and more runways were built. Fire power increased. “In 1942, Japan’s empire stretched from Indonesia to Southeast Asia to the Aleutian Islands of Alaska” (Lopez 136). Classic warplanes such as the P-38, P-40, and PBY Catalina defended the jagged coastline of the Alaska Peninsula. Runways were dredged out of the marshy tundra next to the shoreline. Strategically located for aerial defense, the land was bashed by winter storms off Shelikof Strait, which was a mostly uninhabited region and difficult to get to. As a result pilots, died more often from weather systems and navigational difficulties than from enemy fire. To support the effort, women built parts, assembled aircraft, and did a variety of important tasks. Noted flyer Jacqueline Cochran collaborated with Eleanor Roosevelt in using women aviators in military service (Noggle 4). It was just a few years later that the first twenty-five women signed up to be Women Air Service Pilots, WASPs. Besides giving flight instruction, these women pilots ferried fighters such as the P-51 Mustang and bombers such as the B-17 Flying Fortress. Thirty-eight died for the cause, but

Alaska's Women Pilots

Amelia Earhart.

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 11

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 12

12 Alaska’s Women Pilots

many are still alive to give their testimony of the work women did in aviation during the war. In Anne Noggle’s book For God, Country, and the Thrill of It: Women Airforce Service Pilots in World War II, photographs depict some of these 1,074 women pilots who flew more than 60 million miles. In the pictures they stand tall, wearing freshly starched uniforms complete with wings. Most of the women look fit, like they could easily climb into the pilot’s seat, crank the engine, and take off. The lines etched around their eyes and on their faces suggest that the women had many amazing stories. One of these early pioneers was Alaska pilot Virginia Hill, who ferried aircraft from manufacturing plants near New York to Great Falls, Montana (Wood). During the war, WASPs were not permitted to ferry planes outside of the continental United States because of a lack of facilities—restrooms and lodging—at various military bases. Once Virginia delivered the plane to Montana, a Russian or American male pilot continued the flight through Canada, Fairbanks, and beyond. After the war, Virginia and a fellow WASP, Celia Hunter, flew commercially and gave flight instruction in Alaska from 1947–1962. This was not an unusual transition into civilian life for women pilots trained during the war. As we enter the twenty-first century, many bush communities and cities throughout Alaska have at least one woman pilot who transports cargo, mail, and passengers via airplanes with wheels, floats, or skis. According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), there are 8,711 registered pilots in Alaska, 639 of whom are women. This number is a staggering increase from seventy years ago when there was only one. During the eighteen years that I’ve flown in Alaska both commercially and recreationally, I’ve met several women pilots. Some of them I’ve known several years; others I’ve met more recently. As I talked with these pilots and heard the stories they had to tell, I became more and more intrigued. I began devouring articles and books having to do with women and aviation, and I became more aware of the various careers available in aviation: flight instructor, aerobatic pilot, taxi operator, commercial pilot, flight safety inspec-

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 13

Introduction 13

WASPs.

tor, helicopter pilot, and registered guide. Each career involved a demanding lifestyle, and it fascinated me to think of the women in those fields. Why had they chosen to do what they were doing? What had drawn them to aviation and to Alaska? This book chronicles what I have gathered about Alaska’s women pilots. It is a collection of seven interviews of contemporary Alaskan aviatrices, representing seven lives uniquely and passionately

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 14

14 Alaska’s Women Pilots

connected to one another through flight. Selecting the candidates was as much a matter of friendship and trust as chance. Each woman possesses her own area of expertise, which corresponds nicely to the various aviation careers available today. What I sought to collect were personal, insightful narratives—stories that friends would want to share with each other and pass on to their children. And these seven women came through with just that; each woman tells her story openly and honestly, with a desire to help fellow aviators. Their willingness to share their lives has had a profound affect on mine. The women pilots in this collection have several common threads. Many of them have suffered hardship, such as the death of a loved one or job discrimination, only to somehow find the strength to continue onward and upward with their career goals. Another common thread that many of these pilots share is the story of when each woman first realized she had a desire to fly airplanes. Tamar Bailey grew up literally inside the cockpit of planes touching the controls, learning about flight by flying. Her father used to work for Pacific Northern Airlines (PNA), which merged with Western in 1968. When Tamar was very young, her father introduced her to the cockpit and allowed her to steer the plane. Caroline Lachmann-Spivak had relatives working for Pan American and British Airways. At an early age, Caroline acted as a stewardess-helper during flights and learned what it was like to travel around the globe. Others, such as Noralie Jennings-Voigt and Ellie Jones-Elg, watched eagles soaring high in the sky. These women became fascinated with the flapping of wings and the possibility that someday they might rise and descend with the air currents. Their experiences bordered on the spiritual; their young minds envisioned gliding above the pine trees, becoming almost one with the birds. Noralie still feels her heart quicken whenever eagles fly alongside her Cessna 170. Two other women in this collection—Sanna Green and Darlene Dubay—didn’t grow up under the influence of aviation. Even though Sanna had brothers who became U.S. Navy pilots during WWII, they didn’t share their experiences or take her to the airport for an airplane ride. She grew up on a ranch in eastern

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 15

Introduction 15

Montana, riding horses and herding cattle. It wasn’t until Sanna arrived in Alaska, where the environment made it impossible to see much of the state without becoming an aerial traveler, that she took up flying. It was the same with Darlene. Growing up on a farm in Michigan, Darlene learned how to drive a tractor and bale hay. But it wasn’t until she arrived in Alaska that the opportunity to fly was available and drew her toward the cockpit, initially as an aerobatic pilot and later as a crewmember for Northwest Airlines. Val Aron Jokela was invited for an introductory flight. At twelve, she climbed into the cockpit, took off, and flew over Minnesota, a land known for its 10,000 lakes. She loved every second, and in the back of her mind, a tiny spark of “I can do this” ignited. It wasn’t too many years later that Val saved money, took flying lessons, and started flight-instruction to pay for her flying. Later, when she moved to Alaska, she was well on her way to becoming an established professional. My story is quite similar. At eight, I climbed into the backseat of a twin-engine float plane near Seattle. It was my first airplane ride. This initiation into the world of flight left me with a feeling of power and control that would stay with me for the rest of my life. So when I turned fifteen, I didn’t tell my mother, and she didn’t ask, where I rode my bicycle. Every week I circled the Yakima Airport, stood behind the chain link fence, and pressed both hands against the wire mesh. For thirty minutes at a time I stared at the sky, mesmerized by the airplanes flying overhead. I loved watching the silver wings glisten in the sunlight, loved hearing the purr of engine noise. I imagined myself sitting inside the cockpit and controlling the direction of flight. “You can accomplish whatever you set your mind to,” my mother said again and again. I wanted to believe her words, wanted to see myself become a pilot or anything else I imagined. But from my hours and hours of standing outside the chain link fence separating pilots from spectators, I witnessed another reality—only rich people fly airplanes. I would have to find a way.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 16

Commercial Pilot Virginia Woolf’s prescription for personal freedom—fixed incomes and personal space—is most certainly filled by the lives of women commercial pilots. A commercial pilot’s salary insures economic independence and security. And as far as personal space is concerned, what better place to call your own than a cockpit? With only the stars and sky above, a pilot surrounds herself with instruments and controls that translate into power. A pilot makes decisions that cause an MD-11 to depart Anchorage for round-theworld flights to such places as Indianapolis, Paris, Dubai, Bombay, Bangkok, and Taipei. The word “commercial” comes from the Latin conduco, to hire or to profit. According to Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR) Part 61.121, a commercial pilot must be at least eighteen years old; read, speak, and understand English; hold at least a valid second-class medical; and pass written, oral, and flight tests. A total of 250 hours of flight time is mandatory, including instrument instruction, pilotin-command time, night flying, and cross-country flights. These rigorous requirements demand that commercial pilots be self-disciplined, focused, and smart. Yet for a majority of people, the defining factor that separates commercial piloting from recreational flying is one of monetary gain. In short, commercial pilots fly in order to 16

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 17

Commercial Pilot 17

make a living. Ruth Jefford is one of these professional aviators. For twenty years in Alaska, Ruth flew a weekly mail run from Merrill Field at Anchorage to Skwentna (seventy miles northwest of Anchorage). A small cockpit with Plexiglas windows gave her the personal space that bush pilots flying over tundra, rivers, and mountains appreciate. Her job as air taxi operator and owner not only provided her with a fixed income and means to support herself but also allowed her to work in a career she loved. In Heroes of the Horizon: Flying Adventures of Alaska’s Legendary Bush Pilots, Gerry Bruder discusses Ruth’s childhood fantasy of flight: “At the age of four, as she was swimming one day on Lake George in upstate New York (where her father was headmaster of a prep school), she noticed a Curtiss flying boat land and taxi to shore. It was the first airplane she had ever seen, and she stared at it, transfixed. In a dream that reoccurred for weeks afterward, she flew her brown rocking chair over the Adirondack Mountains” (68). In 1937 Ruth soloed an Arrow Sport airplane in Nebraska. She later married her flight instructor, Jim Hurst, and came to Alaska with him in the early forties. While her husband continued to work for the Civil Aeronautics Administration in Anchorage, Ruth earned her commercial and instrument certificates and became a flight instructor at Merrill Field. In 1957 Ruth and Jim started International Air Taxi. When they divorced four years later, Ruth continued operating the air taxi business and did most of the flying herself until she married Jack Jefford nearly a decade later. Her contribution to Alaska aviation has earned her numerous awards: 99s Amelia Earhart Memorial Scholarship for her advancement in aviation, Alaska Airmen’s Association citation for her contribution to Alaska general aviation, and the Pioneer Women’s Award of the OX-5 Aviation Pioneers. Yet flying is only one of Ruth’s many passions. As a concert violinist, Ruth helped found the Anchorage Symphony Orchestra and has participated as concertmaster, performer, and teacher. One can easily imagine her fingers sliding up and down the neck of a violin, the bow artfully stroking out Schubert’s “Ave Maria.” Aviation enthusiast Dusty McTavish once said, “Flying is a lot like playing a musical instrument; you’re doing so many things and

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 18

18 Alaska’s Women Pilots

thinking of so many other things, all at the same time. It becomes a spiritual experience. Something wonderful happens in the pit of your stomach” (English 27). This “something wonderful” still happens for Ruth today. With over 10,000 hours of flight time, she still finds personal freedom and enjoyment in the cockpit of her Bonanza or Cessna 180 on floats. And when she’s not flying, she keeps active in the performing arts and plays the piano at home. In many respects, Ruth is an artist of the air as well as an artist on the ground. Many Alaskans remember her today as the flight instructor or music teacher who introduced them to life-long interests. We commercial pilots each possess our own professional recollections. One of my most exciting experiences happened in 1981 during my first week of North Slope flying near Umiat, Alaska, for SeaAirmotive, Inc. One evening I was sitting in the copilot’s seat of a Twin Otter piloted by Captain Duane Marvin. He wore a peagreen parka with a hood of rabbit fur. His six-foot-two inch frame almost touched the padded ceiling, which covered the top of the cockpit area. He wasn’t fat, just solid, like he’d spent the summer bucking hay. I stared at the black sky over the Brooks Range and heard the engines whirling and slicing the thin air at twelve thousand feet. Outside the cockpit windows, the northern lights twisted in streams of red and green and blue and made the sky look uneven and painted. I studied the cockpit instruments and artificial horizon on either side of the instrument panel; the three-inch miniature airplane was flying on the horizontal line, perfectly level. I reached toward the cockpit ceiling and toggled the silver bleed air switches for more cabin heat, then the cabin lights. Five passengers slumped down in their seats with coats thrown over their heads; their heavy Bunny Boots barely fit underneath the tiny seats. Toward the back of the airplane, a three-foot generator was securely fastened to the floor by cargo straps. The droning wail of the engines relaxed me. I touched the propeller levers with silver indentations and moved both of them forward, changing the slow melody to a quicker rhythm of wa-wawa-wa. The sound of syncopated engine rhythms, a bit off key, fit

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 19

Commercial Pilot 19

The author with Captain Duane Marvin.

my mood. After 650 turbine hours and many evenings with the Twin Otter, I could sense there was something eerie going on. Just a premonition, but I trusted my inner feelings and scanned up and down the instrument panel for clues. The left oil pressure gauge flickered slightly, then stopped. I kept watching the round instrument and noticed it flicker again, this time more slowly. I mentioned it to Captain Marvin, and he said something about women’s intuition and smiled; his brown-rimmed bifocals slid to the bridge of his nose. The left oil gauge flickered wildly back and forth from low pressure to high pressure. The blood rushed to my face. Then it happened. Bang! An explosion. Everything seemed to stop in time: as the torque gauge fell from forty-four pounds of torque to zero, the left oil and fuel gauges dropped too. In the dark sky a fireball four feet long appeared behind the left wing. The turbine wheel had exploded; sharp strips of sheet metal were ripping though the exhaust stacks and blowing fire behind it.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 20

20 Alaska’s Women Pilots

I watched Captain Marvin as his hand shook and moved the left power lever to idle and the propeller lever to feather. In a robotic voice that I didn’t recognize as my own, I told him to level the airplane. Fumbling for the checklist, I started reciting the emergency procedures as the captain shut the fuel off at the firewall and distributed the fire-extinguishing agent to the appropriate engine. I watched his hands carefully because if he pulled the wrong tee-handle and shot the agent into the good engine, then we’d have to emergency land over the Brooks Range. I flicked on the landing lights. Jagged rocks and scraggly spruce jutted at forty-five-degree angles, growing from the side of mountainous terrain. I wondered if the generator would break loose from the cargo strap and crash through the cockpit on impact. I said again, in a voice too low and controlled to be coming from me, “Put your shoulder harness on.” The glowing ball of flame vanished, and Captain Marvin raised the nose of the airplane to maintain twelve thousand feet with half the horsepower. My legs quivered and my knees knocked. Engine fire training had paid off. I unfastened my seatbelt and walked to the back of the airplane. All of the passengers were sitting straight up in their seats, their eyes bulging. My facial expression gave away nothing, and I assured them this was no big deal and happened on occasion. “Everything is fine,” I told the faces. A man threw his head back and sucked from a fifth of vodka and passed it around. Booze was not allowed, but I didn’t care. If they wanted to get drunk, fine. Perhaps if the other engine failed the passengers would be too numb to panic. I looked at the left engine and didn’t see any residual smoke or smoldering glow. More reassuring was the fact that the wing didn’t have huge chunks missing from the aileron [a movable surface near the trailing edge of an aircraft wing, used to control roll and to perform banks] or flaps. At least we wouldn’t have aerodynamic problems to look forward to. We flew directly to Deadhorse, a larger airport with a paved runway. A mile out, Captain Marvin lined up directly on the white centerline and slowly brought the power lever back. On numerous

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 21

Commercial Pilot 21

flights he had drilled into me the danger of getting too low and slow, so he kept extra power on the good engine and waited until two feet above the pavement to pull it completely back. When we safely landed, the Seair mechanics met the airplane and the five passengers stepped down from the airstair door and talked to anyone who would listen. A few of the men ran over to pay phones and called their wives. Captain Marvin slapped me on the back and told me that I’d done one hell of a job. Flying and danger are nothing new to women. Throughout WWII women flew some of the biggest and most modern aircraft. Juanita Bailey flew search and rescue missions for the Civil Air Patrol during the war. As a young girl, Juanita saw an airplane flying overhead and knew that she wanted to become a pilot. “She began taking flying lessons in 1940, doing so between haircuts and dye jobs, dashing from her Pennsylvania beauty shop to a nearby airport for a thirty-minute lesson. She quickly became known as the flying beautician” (OX5 News 1). As a ferry pilot, Juanita delivered Piper airplanes to remote places in Alaska and Central and South America. Back then essentially all small planes did not have navigational equipment or radios. With only a compass to steer with, Juanita had to become an expert navigator. She is also credited as the first woman to fly a plane to Alaska, solo, during the winter months. According to Dr. Peggy Baty of Women in Aviation, International, the first woman to fly for a regularly scheduled airline was Helen Richey, who flew for Central Airlines in 1934. Due to pressure from the pilot’s union to fly only during favorable weather conditions, Helen quit after six months. It wasn’t until 1973 that Emily Howell Warner was hired as a commercial pilot at Frontier Airlines. Today Ms. Warner is a Federal Aviation Administration aircrew program manager assigned to United Airlines’ Boeing 737 fleet. Throughout history airline pilots have encompassed a wide range of temperaments. Women with personalities that are in constant need of mental and physical challenges find happiness in the skies. And when these driven aviatrices retire, they will most likely

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 22

22 Alaska’s Women Pilots

disregard the age sixty rule and work as flight engineers or air taxi pilots. I’ve met other women who choose an airline career because they abhor the nine-to-five work schedule. These global sojourners live out of suitcases and prefer spending time with their extended airline family than at home. As of December 31, 2002, there were 7,454 women commercial pilots registered in the United States; 4,792 had their Airline Transport Pilot Rating. Statistics show that women comprise nearly 6% of the pilot force. One of these aviators is Tammy Thiele, who flies captain for Alaska Airlines on a Boeing 737. Her family may well hold the record for the flyingest family of the Far North, with (on last count) six out of eight siblings flying. Ingrid Pedersen, born in Stockholm, Sweden, used to fly commercially out of Skagway and later became a flight instructor in Anchorage. In 1963 she became the first woman to pilot a Cessna 205 over the North Pole with her husband, Einar, as navigator; the twenty-one hour flight originated in Fairbanks and was completed at Station Nord, Greenland. Another career airline pilot is Teresa Delgado-Dodson. At sixteen Teresa started flying gliders and later became a flight attendant to earn money for her pilot ratings. Before the company folded, she flew a Lockheed Electra for Reeve Aleutian Airlines as a flight engineer and enjoyed visiting western Alaska, the Pribilofs, Aleutian Islands, and Russia (Rosa 9). Yet no other pilot—male or female—can compare to the Alaska pioneer Tamar Bailey. Few people know it, but Tamar was the first woman to finish the Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) mechanics course at Anchorage Community College. She was also the first woman to fly for Northern Air Cargo and become a DC-6 captain. In those days, Tamar would wear blue jeans, a chamois shirt, and work gloves. As a crewmember, she drove forklifts and loaded fish or telephone poles or cars into what she fondly called “the old round motors.” In the fall of 2000, Tamar was flying overseas and initiated a conversation with my husband, Arlin, a former Seair pilot turned FedEx captain. In that crucial exchange of dialogue, Arlin discovered how Tamar was the pathfinder, the one who had filed a complaint

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 23

Commercial Pilot 23

against Seair and opened the door for other women pilots in Alaska. “You’re looking at the person responsible for your meeting your wife,” Tamar said. After a decade of wondering why Seair hired me in the first place, listening to the pilots complain about the good old days, feeling excluded from the group, the mystery was solved. In 1981 I was flying a Cessna 207 for Bush Air. One morning I flew passengers to Kongiganak, picked up mail at Kwigillingok and Kipnuk, and then returned home to Bethel. As the propeller sliced the air, I imagined myself pushing forward with it, closer and closer to my goal of more logbook time so that Ted Lamb, the chief pilot for Seair, would hire me. The Kuskokwim River passed beneath the left tire. I started timing. In one minute twenty seconds, the runway would be close. The left tire passed above ice and snow, and when the plane touched down, I had to squint to make certain I didn’t miss the taxiway. The air was thick and gray. After the propeller stopped whirling, I looked up to see my favorite pilot pushing the terminal door open and walking straight toward my plane. I opened my pilot door and stepped outside. “Seair’s asking about you,” Larry said, huffing and puffing. He lit a cigarette and blew smoke off to the side. I moved closer to Larry to watch his face, his eyes. Pilots teased me all the time by telling me something I wanted—salary increase, bigger airplane, longer flights—then taking it back really fast. “You’re not joking, are you?” “No,” Larry said, “I’m not joking. Ted asked me if I knew the name of the bitch flying for Bush Air.” My back stiffened. Bitch! No way could Ted have forgotten my name after a month and a half of hearing it. I pulled my hood over my head to keep the snow off my face. But if Ted wasn’t teasing, I felt angry that he would call me a bitch for taking the time to come to his office, every afternoon, to ask for a job. Maybe Ted had so much paperwork he couldn’t think straight; perhaps he had a family emergency. If I were under a lot of stress, maybe I’d forget a name or call someone by an inappropriate slur. The most important issue was the opportunity to fly the Twin Otter.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 24

24 Alaska’s Women Pilots

I walked over to the Seair hangar, climbed the familiar steps, and poked my head inside Ted’s office. He didn’t smile. “Take the Convair to Anchorage,” Ted said, looking up for a second. “Ground school starts at 8:00 A.M. tomorrow morning. Don’t be late.” He waved his hand in dismissal. But, after my husband’s conversation with Tamar, I realized because of her successful complaint against Seair’s discriminating hiring policies that Ted couldn’t dismiss me or any other woman altogether. If you want to find Tamar now, you pass through FedEx security and climb fourteen steps to the second floor. Turn right and two hallways down you’ll see the pilot’s lounge. Or listen for the sound of laughter. Tamar is a natural storyteller—articulate and dramatic—and usually the center of conversation. I arrive early one afternoon before her flight to Memphis. I expect to find Tamar surrounded by fellow FedEx pilots, leaning into the conversation so they don’t miss one of her anecdotes. But she’s standing next to her mailbox, shaking her head and skimming a letter before she tosses it into the recycling bin. As a former DC3 pilot who used to haul fish from beaches throughout Alaska, Tamar does not appreciate corporate memos having more to do with rigid rules than common sense. As a FedEx MD-11 pilot, she wears leather shoes, blue pants, and a white shirt with epaulets. Her suit jacket is tossed across a chair. Under fluorescent lights her short hair is the color of graham crackers and tucked behind her ears. It would look stylish beneath her pilot’s hat if only she would wear it.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 25

Tamar Bailey I knew when I was five years old that I wanted to live in Alaska and be around airplanes. Every summer, I would come up to Anchorage and fly with my father in the Connie and be a junior stewardess. And of course, because I was born in 1957, I thought I wanted to be a stewardess because that was all that was available. But when I got into junior high school, things started to break loose and women started getting into nontraditional careers. So I thought, “Stewardess, hell, I’m going to be a pilot.”

In October of 1978 I was working at Sawyer Aviation in Phoenix, finishing my commercial license. My friend Glenda called me—obviously long distance. I asked, “Where are you?” “You’re not going to believe this,” she said. “I’m in Kenai-frigging-Alaska.” “What? You told me you were never going to Alaska.” “When are you coming?” “Right away.” That’s all I needed because at least I’d have a place to stay. It was October when I came up to Alaska. My father warned me to never go up there in the middle of winter, but I did anyway. Of course Glenda, who was a fish out of water, had a vested interest in my staying, so she drove me all over the place. I had 350 hours, maybe, and an instrument rating that I had gotten in Phoenix, where you had to chase a cloud to find one. Anyway we drove all over, going into these air taxi places and proceeded to get laughed out of every office on the Kenai

25

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

Tamar Bailey.

12:45 PM

Page 26

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 27

Tamar Bailey 27

Peninsula. I asked for an application, and they said, “Oh, you mean for a secretary?” I said, “No, no, for a pilot.” “Ha, ha. You’re joking, right?” “No, I’m not.” No one was remotely interested in hiring me. Finally I walked into Andy’s Flying Service at Kenai, which later became South Central Air. It just so happened that they needed a pilot yesterday. Dave Dimond, the owner, said, “I’ve never had a woman fly for me, nor have I wanted one. I have no idea if my customers will fly with you. I’ll give you a two-week trial. If they don’t fly with you, you’re fired. And you start tomorrow.” I said, “Well I have to go back to Phoenix.” I had a dog, a life. He said, “No, this job is good for today only. You start tomorrow.” So he hired me for $800 per month. It was six days a week. There were three other pilots who lived in Dimond Acres. They got the same pay but lived for free. I made $800 per month and had to pay rent. I felt lucky. I also was very naive. Let’s face it: Alaska was the epitome of the die-hard male, and I didn’t really know that yet, so I didn’t consider it. My naïveté probably served me well because I didn’t have an attitude. I was walking into it blind. Slowly but surely I passed the two-week trial period. I only worked for Andy’s Flying Service for six months and learned a heck of a lot. Of the three pilots, one of them, Dave, was a sweetie. The other two guys couldn’t stand that I was flying there. It was a really cold winter in Kenai, and I was flying a Cessna 206, 207, and a 336 Skymaster (a twin push-pull plane). You have to put these things to bed at night [put on wing covers and engine heaters and blankets]. Especially if it’s five below zero and blowing twenty knots. The other two guys, Jeff and John, would help each other put their airplanes to bed, then walk off and leave me. Wherever I turned, there was little support. We flew crew changes to the oil camps on the west side of Cook Inlet: Drift River, Trading Bay, Granite Point, Nikolai Creek. Every Monday morning, these oil-field hands (mostly from Louisiana and Texas) would show up. They had a contract. There

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 28

28 Alaska’s Women Pilots

were just enough seats in these twin-engine airplanes. Every week, we flew them over to Trading Bay and took the old crew back to Kenai. One of my fondest memories was flying over there and watching all the guys run for their seats. There was one guy left. The other two planes were full, and I had one seat left in my airplane. The fellow came up and said, very loudly, “I’m not getting into any airplane with any goddamn cunt!” I knew that word was very bad. So I grabbed the door and said, “No problem. The next plane will be here in a week.” I yelled, “Clear!” and started cranking the rear engine. He pounded on the door and said, “Okay, okay! I’ll get in.” The oil guys kind of thought it was a novelty having a woman pilot—the only one in south-central Alaska at the time. When they wanted tools or supplies, they said, “Send that girl pilot.” So I’d come over, and they’d invite me for lunch. It was great. However, my fellow pilots were seething; they hated that. I couldn’t win for losing. One time I landed at Kenai, and one of them turned me in. It was really windy, so there was blowing snow. I shot the approach and circled around to land. While I was circling, the visibility went below the prescribed minimums. I landed. A fellow who was buddy-buddy with the pilots saw me. He called my coworkers and they told my boss. Dave called the tower. Fortunately the tower asked, “What’s the problem?” Dave said, “Well, she landed below minimums.” “She did the only safe thing to do,” the tower said. “There is no problem.” Anyway, what happened is that I learned a lot. Innocence helps. I was young and gung-ho. But I loved Alaska, and it was trial by fire. I remember going into Homer one evening and the weather was shitty, and it wasn’t supposed to be shitty, but it was shitty. They cleared me for an approach, via the arc. I had an instrument rating, and I had never even heard of an arc. I looked down at my chart and saw, by God! an arc. But I didn’t know what to do with it. Fortunately I saw the airport and asked them for a contact approach. Afterwards I learned what an arc was and how to fly it.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 29

Tamar Bailey 29

My education was fairly limited, so I learned everything I needed to know to stay alive. Let’s face it: it was survival. One night, about five months into my job with Andy’s Flying Service, they called me in the middle of the night to take a part up to Anchorage. The weather was bad, and I wanted to take a twinengine airplane for safety. They had already loaded the airplane with a very small piece of metal that was hot [priority item]. Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! They never told me what it was. It was pitch black outside. So I put the hot piece in the Skymaster, flew to Anchorage, and dropped it off. No problem. The next day I got fired because it turned out that a second piece of freight was in the 207, which wouldn’t have fit in the Skymaster. But I didn’t know it was there, so it didn’t go. The jerk (pardon me) fired me, and it turned out that this was his MO. He fired pilots and hired them back at a lesser rate. So he wanted to hire me back at $600 per month. “That’s fine Dave,” I said, “but I can’t live on that.” My rent was $500 to $600. “Fine,” he said. “Well you’re on probation.” It was just ridiculous. So I kept the job and decided at that point that I was going to quit. One day I was just hanging out waiting for a flight. There was a man who was trying to pick up a piece of freight at a nearby air taxi, and nobody was helping him. So I said, “I’ll come help you.” We walked into the warehouse looking for whatever it was, and there was this big box and he opened it. I said, “That’s off of a DC-3, isn’t it?” He looked at me. He said, “How did you know that?” I didn’t know. I’d always had this love affair with DC-3s—I’d never even been in one. He’s the guy I ended up going to work for. The company was called Bishop Brothers, and I worked for them off and on, seasonally, for three years. So I went back to work for Dave—to finish that story. A few weeks later I quit: the good part of the story. One of the pilots asked if he could buy me a drink. “What?” “No, really,” he said. “I’d like to take you out for a drink.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 30

Tamar fueling a DC-3 when she flew for Bishop Brothers.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 31

Tamar Bailey 31

“Sure.” So I went with him to this old bar, Daddy’s Money, which is long gone and used to be at the Kenai Airport. We sat there and bless his heart, he apologized to me. He said, “I really want to apologize for my behavior and how I’ve treated you since you’ve been here. I wish you wouldn’t quit. I think you should take this guy for all he’s worth and build a lot of time. I think the reason I couldn’t stand you was because when I came to Alaska to be a bush pilot, I thought it was a pretty cool thing. And if a woman could do it, it must not be so cool. I realize that isn’t true.” His apology took a lot of guts. In the spring of 1980, I rendezvoused with Bishop Brothers in Renton, where I had learned to fly from my godfather, Tom. I joined Jim [Bishop of Bishop Brothers] and went for my first ride in the DC-3 and became totally enamored with the plane. He hired me. I actually did get some training in the DC-3. It was a great airplane—easy to fly. I couldn’t really believe I was there. It was like getting what I was seeking: Alaska and flying. I was in heaven. I was twenty-two, almost twenty-three, dressed in blue jeans and work shirts and gloves. The funny thing about the DC-3 was it didn’t have an electric winch, so of course the copilot had to crank the thing, and the captain sat there with the pallet jack and rode up the incline. It was a lot of work. Back in Kenai, we went to classes at Jim’s house. He was putting this whole thing together and had people based in Alaska who flew the DC-3 and the DC-6, trying to put manuals together and so forth. Jim gave me a shot at something. I probably wouldn’t be where I am today if it hadn’t been for Jim Bishop. Right away they brought this DC-6 up with two crews. There were the beautiful people, right, and I was put with the not-sobeautiful people. In fact, I should have never been put with this one captain. I mean, he really, really didn’t like having a woman around. We’re hauling fish and he’s dressed in a uniform with white gloves? He was a tragic figure. The thing he attained in his life was flying captain on a DC-6. He would wear his uniform around Spenard Road. He would go into restaurants dressed in his uniform so the waitresses could see that he was a captain. It was very sad, very sad.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 32

32 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Tamar loading the DC-6.

One day, I got to fly with a guy named Gerry—a good instructor who knew about the airplane because he’d flown them in the Navy down in Whidbey Island. A lot of [pilots] were in the Navy. Only I didn’t know it was a checkride. Jim, the owner, was in the airplane. Gerry was in the left seat, and I was in the right seat. We went to Kotzebue, and I flew the trip back to Anchorage. I was actually getting a little bit of instruction from this guy. It was the first DC-6 instruction I had in the airplane, and I’d been part of the crew for a month. So I lined up to land at Anchorage. Gerry set a big flashlight on the glare shield. He said, “Okay, you land this airplane. If you keep the flashlight standing, we’ll all buy you a beer, but if it falls over, you have to buy all of us a beer.” There were six men crammed in the cockpit watching. Okay. So I’m blasting toward the runway, going fast, and George, the engineer, is trying to help me because I don’t have the right flap settings. In the DC-3, I recall, it’s quarter flaps, half flaps, full flaps. In the DC-6, it’s degrees.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 33

Tamar Bailey 33

George said, “Tamar, your flaps are still twenty. Still twenty.” “Oh . . . oh . . . full flaps! Good idea.” So I selected full flaps. Because I had all this extra speed, it helped me out, and I got on the runway and made one of those rare squeak-squeak landings. The flashlight teetered back and forth but stayed standing, even when I landed the nose wheel. Gerry said, “I’ll be goddamned!” Jim admitted the flight had been a checkride because the guys had a hard time with me. “Yeah, no kidding,” I said. Jim said, “We’re not asking more of you than 100%.” “Bullshit, Jim,” I said. “You’re asking at least 120%.” Gerry jumped in, “Sure you are Jim. To be considered half as good, a woman has to perform twice as hard, or whatever the saying is.” So what happened—the best thing that could have happened—was that Jim took me off the DC-6 and put me on the DC3 with two great captains who I developed wonderful friendships with. We hauled fish from Cape Yakataga and Yakutak. It was great—just what I needed. The next summer I went back to flying the DC-6. But they didn’t hire that strange captain again. Years later I ran into him at Kodiak. I was the captain for Northern Air Cargo. He was flying for some deadbeat outfit, flying an old beat-up DC-6. He said, “You look really familiar.” “I’ll bet I do,” I said. What happened was I got time in the DC-3 and DC-6 and developed a lifelong love affair with round motors. They definitely have a soul unlike jets. We flew Part 91 [basic regulations governing private pilots] round-the-clock. Between Anchorage and Bethel, as soon as we handed off to center, one of us would go to sleep until descent. It was remarkable. Sometimes it was tough. I mean the guys had one of those nice wonderful gallon plastic milk jugs with the little hole for peeing. I couldn’t use it. If I went on a Seattle flight—six hours in a DC-6 from Anchorage—I brought a wide-mouth, plastic peanut

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 34

34 Alaska’s Women Pilots

butter jar. I learned every knoll and building and tree around Alaska. We hired another woman named Kim, who was rated in the DC-6. She was my first peer. I never got to fly with her though. You couldn’t let two women fly an airplane. What might happen? But we hung out together. It was wonderful. I think the thing that I gleaned from Kim, although I’d learned a lot of it on my own, was how to deal with the guys. If they threw shit, you had to throw it right back. Somehow bantering—I wouldn’t call it respect—caused a mutual balance. The day I got fired, Jim and I went to lunch. He drank two beers and wanted to go flying with me. I had become—only because I had scared the hell out of myself numerous times—a pretty good instrument pilot. Jim liked to fly with me because he felt comfortable with my knowledge. But I didn’t want to fly with him because he’d been drinking. It was a bad situation. I no longer respected him. He said, “Yes, you will fly with me.” “I can’t deal with your drinking,” I said. He said something like, “Well fine, I didn’t drink.” “What are you talking about?” “Are you calling me a liar?” “I’m not calling you anything,” I said. “I don’t respect you any more.” “You’re fired.” “Thank you.” I felt terrible about losing the flying but also relieved. I learned that being fired by Jim was a feather in my cap when I moved to Anchorage and sporadically flew a DC-3 for the Salerno Brothers. I told them I’d been fired from Bishop Bothers, and they said it was a good recommendation. In the off-season, I tried to get on with Northern Air Cargo. I also went to SeaAirmotive because they were hiring. There was an ad in the paper: Seair wanted a copilot in the Twin Otter. It was the winter of ‘81. I went to Seair to fill out an application, and Ted Lamb, a good old boy, decided to have a little chat with me.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 35

Tamar Bailey 35

I tended to take people at face value until they proved themselves jerks: Ted didn’t take too long. We sat down. I had DC-3 time, DC-6 time, and probably 1500 hours. I was certainly qualified for the job. He looked right at me and said, “Well you know, I can’t hire you because you’re a woman, and I’ll tell you why.” He said, the first reason was because I would be flying with men: scheduling would be a nightmare. He’d have to call all these guys’ wives and find out if it was okay if I flew with their husbands. I looked at him and said, “Mr. Lamb, I have no problem flying with them. I don’t need to be responsible for their strange relationships.” He said the other reason was flying to oil camps without facilities for women. “As a matter of fact, Mr. Lamb,” I said, “by law they all have to have facilities for women now.” There was a third reason, and I don’t remember what it was. I was amazed that we were having this conversation. I thought I would give him the benefit of the doubt and allow him to back out of it. So I said, “Mr. Lamb, let me understand this. Are you telling me you’re not going to hire me because I’m a woman?” He said, “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m telling you.” I said, “Okay, thanks” and left. I pondered this for a long time. It wasn’t like I ran out and filed a complaint. I realized, having been up here for a few years, that if I did the right thing and talked to some organization, I could get blackballed and never work again. Those were the stakes. I talked to my father about it, and he said, “Shut up. Don’t say a word.” He was still struggling with women flying as professional pilots. So he wasn’t any help. Now, looking back on it, one reason I wanted to fly was because I wanted a better relationship with my father. So I’m quite certain that somewhere in my person I thought, “If I get into this, maybe we can communicate.” But I’m very fortunate because I know a lot of people who become doctors or lawyers because their parents did, and they hate it. But it just so happened that I took to flying like a duck to water. I love it. Anyway, I talked to Karla, a friend of mine who happened to be an attorney, about the Seair problem. She told me about the

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 36

36 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Equal Rights Commission. I thought about it and thought about it. I pursued the complaint because I never would have been doing what I was doing if some woman, somewhere, hadn’t stood up at some point. It was my time to stand up. So I elected to file a complaint. Karla went with me. I didn’t hire her (I didn’t have any money anyway). We sat down with this man, and I told him my story. “You know,” he said, “this is your word against Ted Lamb’s. There’s no proof here.” I said, “Well no, of course I can’t prove this. I’m telling you the story. It’s a true story.” “Let’s discuss a settlement.” “A settlement?” I asked. “Well what would you want? Money?” “No.” “Do you want them to hire you?” “God, no. I’d never want to work there, especially after filing this complaint.” “What do you want?” “If Seair has future openings, and there are equally-qualified women applying for the job, that they be given equal consideration.” He said okay and went to work on it. An investigation followed. I don’t remember all the details because it was sixteen years ago. But I do remember Al Gay, the owner of Seair, calling me and asking me to come to his office. I went. He told me he didn’t have a problem with women and proceeded to tell me about his Asian wife. Then he talked about Amelia Earhart. I didn’t know why I was there. I went because I was intrigued by what he wanted, but I never did find out. I think he just wanted to know who put this monkey on his back and wanted to meet her. What came out of the complaint was that the commission acted as a watchdog for six months or a year. Every time Seair hired a pilot, the company had to show the organization who applied and who was hired. It was a complaint, not a lawsuit. Within a couple of months, Seair hired two women, and so did Alaska Aeronautical Incorporated. The cat was out of the bag; the old ways had to die.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 37

Tamar Bailey 37

After the complaint, I was on the streets. I wanted to pursue this aircraft maintenance thing (I always was intrigued by how things worked), so I moved to Anchorage and went to Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) school at Merrill Field. I wanted the knowledge, to make myself more marketable. Besides, I had always wanted to fly for Northern Air Cargo. They had DC-6s: the best maintained fleet of round motors in the world. The ones I’d been flying for Bishop Brothers had cockroaches that dropped out of the instrument panel. So I started A&P school in May of ‘83 and went through December of ‘84. Nonstop. From four in the afternoon until eleven at night, five days a week. I supported myself on student loans and flight instruction. Eventually I finished the A&P license—the first woman ever to complete the course. I met a lifelong friend at A&P school, Jim Anderson, who had all of these skills that I never got to learn growing up as a girl. He knew woodworking, all the tactile stuff. I was good with the books and an excellent test taker, so we dovetailed with each other. We had a great experience—darn hard. There were lots of margaritas on Friday nights after electronics. I was smart enough, thank God, to make this an associate degree. But I was avidly pursuing Northern Air Cargo. They had not seen the last of me. Yet. During the last semester of A&P school, they put students into the industry (a great thing). They tried to match you with your interest. They asked me where I wanted to work. I said, “Northern Air Cargo.” The guy laughed. “Is that funny?” “Come on,” he said. “They’ve never taken any of our students.” “Have you asked?” “Well, no,” he said. “It’s highly unlikely.” He agreed to ask. “Where would you like to work other than that?” “Nowhere, really,” I said. “But if I have to go somewhere, I’d like to work for Fish and Game or Fish and Wildlife—whoever had those round motors like Beavers and Mallards.” The director of maintenance for Northern Air Cargo called; he wanted to meet me. We hit it off. My father had been in aviation

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 38

38 Alaska’s Women Pilots

up here years ago so we knew some of the same people. He hired me for the semester as a mechanic. This wonderful Irishman named Pat Doyle (who’s dead now) was the lead guy under the director of maintenance. Pat ran the shop. He took me under his wing. He never said a sentence except one that was full of four-letter words, but he was a pussycat, just a sweetheart. Pat helped me out, and I worked with these old geezers who were not happy to have me there. We used to drink beer in the break room on Friday afternoon. I was definitely in their space. One day a fellow mechanic blamed something on me—the jerk—a mistake he had made himself. Pat said, “Did you do this?” “God, no,” I said. Pat took me out to the airplane. We were building up an engine, and this fellow forgot to put a seal in—maybe it was under the feather pump or something. When they started it up, all the oil spilled over. Pat said, “Point out a feather pump.” “That’s a feather pump,” I said, pointing, “and I didn’t do it.” Fortunately he believed me, which I didn’t expect because I didn’t belong to the club. Pat asked me why I was here. “Do you want to turn wrenches for a living or do you want to fly?” “Are you kidding? I want to fly.” He said, “Well get your butt to the other end” (maintenance and the flight department were two separate buildings). I said, “Pat, they won’t hire me.” “Why?” “Because I’m a woman.” He said, “One of these days somebody is going to light a fire under their tails.” He was great. In the meantime, I was trying to get on as a pilot. It was, “Don’t call us, we’ll call you”—a game. But they hired people who were less qualified. One of the guys had a twin-engine rating and no twin-engine time, just Cessna time. He worked for flight service. His qualification was being a white man. That’s the thing I lacked.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 39

Tamar Bailey 39

At the time I was teaching Bev Landes how to fly. She was in this house with all men who flew, and she didn’t so it was really important for her to get this license. Of course, Bev knew Rita, the owner of Northern Air Cargo because they’re longtime aviation families. Bev said, “I’ll talk to Rita.” “You most certainly will not,” I said. “I’m going to get in the front door or I’m not going to get in there at all.” One day I’m at the hangar working, and the director of operations and chief pilot come down, unannounced, to have a little talk with me. They took me out to the ramp and put me in a station wagon. It was the middle of winter. We drove out to the road near the taxiway. They sat in the front seat. I’m in the back. They shut the engine off and both turned around. I definitely was a problem because I was persistent. I had DC-6 time; I had this A&P license; they were running out of excuses. Initially they made three accusations: two of which were bullshit and one that was truth about Seair. The chief pilot said to me, “How dare you go behind my back and talk to Rita.” I said, “I’ve never met Rita, never spoken to Rita, and most certainly didn’t go behind your back.” His next accusation was, “You’re the person who backed the DC-6 into that hangar up at Moses Point, aren’t you?” “That’s an interesting story,” I said. “The only thing I have in common with that person is she’s a woman. She’s a friend of mine, but no it wasn’t me.” It was my friend Kim. She didn’t know you shouldn’t trust a marshaller in Alaska because she’s not from there. At Moses Point, Kim tried to get this DC-6 off a strip and the guy’s waving the baton to go back, go back, and she’s in reverse backing up. He put her right into the hangar. Fortunately they only hit the tail cone. So he was accusing me of doing this, which is so funny because we all know there’s only one woman pilot in the world. Then he said, “You’re the person who filed a lawsuit at Seair.” I said, “That’s partially true, and I’m here to tell you that I’m very proud of it.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 40

40 Alaska’s Women Pilots

He was shocked. “It was a complaint, not a lawsuit,” I said. “You are most certainly correct. I did file it. I’m happy that I did because it evidently made some changes up here in Anchorage.” They basically let me know there was no job, just stop bugging them. Don’t call us; we’ll call you. That was the last time I saw the flight department. It was remarkable, something you read in storybooks. We were out on the ramp in the middle of winter with the engine off and these two men facing me. It was very intimidating; it was meant to be intimidating. So the winter of 1984 I continued to work at the hangar and finished the semester. Pat wanted to keep me on but there were no positions. I took my exams, got the A&P license, and continued to check back with Pat regularly. He encouraged me to. I was pounding the streets trying to find employment. In February I was at my home in Mountain View near the A&P school, and the phone rang. “Tamar, this is Doug.” “Doug who?” “Doug at Northern Air Cargo—the chief pilot. We’re having an engineer class next week, and I wondered if you wanted to sit in on it.” “Are you offering me a job?” I asked. “Oh no, I’m not offering you a job. You’d have to pass this checkride first.” So my first feeling was, “Oh great, that’s how they’re going to deal with this. I’m obviously a threat to them, so they’re going to take me into this school and wash me out during a checkride, which anyone can do.” “Are you interested?” “Very,” I said. So I showed up, went through ground school, passed the checkride, and got the job. My first revenue trip was with a guy named Charlie. We left Anchorage on Runway 32, and he was visibly nervous having a woman in the cockpit. So we took off. Right after rotation we lost the number one outboard engine. We were heavy. So I feathered the engine [turned a propeller blade ninety

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 41

Tamar Bailey 41

degrees to the relative wind to reduce drag], ran through the checklist, and shut number one down. We circled around and did an overweight landing on 6R. By that time I had completely finished the checklist. Really, it was uneventful. We got back to the ramp at Northern Air Cargo, and Charlie was just beaming. I mean he was absolutely tickled. “God, you did a great job,” he said. “Thank you,” I said, “but all I did was read the checklist.” I think he was surprised because I didn’t fit his preconceived notion of how a woman was going to perform. I don’t know if he thought I was going to scream or what. He was my first convert. I flew engineer all winter long, which was not a fun job. You’re sitting on the wing—thirty below zero with winds blowing thirty knots—using a fuel hose with a diameter of a half an inch. It took an hour to go into the tank; it was miserable. But really, engineering in a round motor was a lot of fun because I did everything but steer. I also got to be a mechanic and company inspector on it. I had the A&P, and so when things broke down, I fixed them. I was an engineer for two years, but I wanted to fly. At the time the company had no seniority system and used the good-old-boy network. The chief pilot and vice president would bring their buddies up during the summer time. In fact, the first summer I remember there were two chiropractors from the Midwest on vacation, and they got to fly copilot all summer long. That’s how it was. They came in and got the gravy. We stayed in the backseat and froze our tails off all winter long, and the next summer, the same thing would happen—they would bring their buddies up. One time I confronted Doug about it. I told him I wanted to fly, and when did he foresee that happening? He said in no uncertain terms, fairly gruffly, that he was in charge and could do whatever he darn well pleased: that I was a good engineer, and that I was going to stay right there because that’s where he needed me. It was kind of a backhanded compliment: if I was terrible, I would be a copilot. What eventually happened was there was a company shake-up. The director of operations was gone, and Doug was back on the line and no longer the chief pilot. They put a retired man named Holger Jorgensen (Jorgy)—a tremendous pilot, one of

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 42

42 Alaska’s Women Pilots

the most talented pilots I’ve ever met—as acting chief pilot. He had worked for real airlines like Wien, so he immediately started turning Northern Air Cargo around. The first thing he did was call me and another fellow into his office. He asked us if we wanted to fly or stay engineers. Engineers made a dollar or two more an hour. “What? I want to fly.” So did the other guy. “Okay,” he said. “You both start copilot ground school tomorrow.” Immediately he started making changes. We finished ground school and became copilots. The company also started the long, pull-your-hair-out fight for a seniority system. Everybody fought long and hard, and it happened. Holger Jorgensen contributed a lot. He was one of the first Eskimos to make captain in Alaska. He did a lot of civil rights stuff growing up in Nome. I flew copilot for a year and a half. One day I came to work, and they had printed a list of who was going to be upgraded to captain. By now we had the seniority system in place. There were three names on the upgrade list: two guys were senior to me and one was junior. I had been bypassed. I was furious. So I decided the first thing I had to do was attend the class because if I didn’t (even if I had won the argument down the road), they would just say, “Oh yeah, next year because we’re not going to run a captain class just for you.” The class was three days long, during the day. I was flying a night schedule, as fate would have it, and showed up at eight sharp. “What are you doing here?” the ground instructor asked. “I’m just trying to keep the company honest.” Of course I had to fly all night. The next day I’d be back in class at eight in the morning. I did this for three days. At the end of this time I was essentially drunk tired. Exhausted. It was a poor time to talk to Jorgy about whether I was going to be given a shot at being captain because I had lost all my filters. But I wasn’t going to take any punches. I drew my line in the sand: they were going to give me this checkride, or I was going to quit. I wasn’t going to be a professional copilot. Either I was going to be part of the system, or I wasn’t going to be in it.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 43

Tamar Bailey 43

Flight Engineer Jim Anderson on the wing of Tamar’s DC-6.

So I went to Jorgy that day, in that condition, and sat in his office. I confronted him, very respectfully—I love Jorgy—but I was mad. “What’s going on here?” I asked. “Two guys are senior to me and one guy is junior. Were you going to forget I existed?” Jorgy said he wasn’t on the line anymore; he had to go on recommendations of his line pilots as to who was ready for upgrades. I said, “Holger Jorgensen, if you are going to wait until your line pilots recommend me for upgrade, you are going to be long dead, and I’m going to be old and gray in the right seat. You and I both know it will never happen.” He sat back in his chair. He knew it was true because of his own history of growing up Eskimo, trying to make it in aviation. I got angry. He got angry back (he’s got a temper). We ended up rising toward each other—leaning over the desk, pounding our hands on the table, talking very loudly—and finally he backed down. I was resolved: I was going to walk out of there one way or the other. He knew I was right. Jorgy said he’d call in Charlie, one of the senior pilots, and go on his recommendation.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 44

44 Alaska’s Women Pilots

“If Charlie thinks you are ready,” he said, “I’ll give you the ride myself. Will you accept that?” “Absolutely,” I said. “Fair enough.” So that’s what he did. Charlie told Jorgy I was at least—if not more—ready than the other guys on the list. Charlie trained me, and Jorgy gave me the checkride. It was the best checkride I’ve had in my life. For some reason, everything clicked. I couldn’t do anything wrong. It was magic. I passed my Airline Transport Pilot and type ride in the DC6. I got to pick my engineer because in that airplane, an engineer can make or break you. If they are really good they can help you without looking like they are. I chose Bob, a really great guy. I was in this airplane with guys—all of them—who were as old as my father or older. I was the young kid on the block. Flying captain was great. It took me awhile to get my feet wet. I never realized how many minor, but hundreds of, decisions are made from that seat. When you’re in the copilot’s seat, you are footloose and fancy free—not encumbered by pressure. To me, it was like putting on this oversized coat. It took me a long time to feel comfortable as captain. I had a great crew my first month that wet-nursed me. They were wonderful. My first month in the left seat, I lost the number one engine and landed in Aniak and off-loaded all the freight. We did a three-engine ferry, where you bring it back from anywhere in the state without passengers or revenue. There aren’t many airplanes you can do that with. Taking off on three engines was challenging, as you can imagine. We took off from Aniak and flew over the Alaska Range. The weather was going to hell in Anchorage. I’m checking weather in Kenai and King Salmon. We’re down to three engines with the number one feathered. Over Sparrevohn, right over the mountains, we lost a jug [cylinder] on the number two engine. Bob looked at his engineer panel, at the engine analyzer and spark plug firing patterns. He said, “We’ve got a dead jug on two.” I said, “We’re going to keep it running aren’t we, Bob?” “Yes, we are.” So he pulled the power back. It was trial by fire. The airplane will fly on two engines, but I had never done it. I had been flying

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 45

Tamar Bailey 45

for all those years—thousands of hours—and of course this was during my first month as captain. I told the crew if we end up feathering that engine, we’re going to declare an emergency and get priority handling. As it turned out, we kept it running on zero thrust and never declared an emergency. We shot the approach and landed. They’re great engines. So I learned to be a captain. There was one person who purposefully bid not to fly with me because he didn’t like the idea of a woman captain. That worked out well. I didn’t have to deal with him. There was maybe one incident with a belligerent copilot because he was a man’s man and couldn’t stand me sitting in the left seat. But everyone else was great. In fact, when everyone knew I was going to leave, when I was in the hiring pool at FedEx, the dispatcher told me that people were bidding my line. “How can that be?” I asked. “I’m the most junior captain here, flying the shit stuff.” The dispatcher said she didn’t know, but these people wanted to fly with me. That’s quite a compliment. Northern Air Cargo and I impacted each other. We grew up together and changed together. I certainly didn’t burn any bridges when I left. Prior to making captain, I had thought about leaving for Flying Tigers and Alaska Airlines, but I really wanted to get into the left seat of the DC-6. Once there, I loved it. It was the best job, in the prettiest country in the world, with the best airplanes. After five years with Northern Air Cargo, flying captain for a year and a half, I loved coming home every night. The work was really hard. We were glorified stevedores. We’d grab our work gloves and load and offload freight. If it was a palletized load on nice square pallets, it was easy: there was a pallet jack, and I pumped it up and moved it to the tail and somebody on a forklift took it off. I had no problem doing that—I could do that until I was sixty—but the problem was that most of the loads were not palletized. Everything in the bush got there on these airplanes, unless it was barged in during the summer. We flew tractors, five-hundredpound telephone poles, and tons of lumber. If they didn’t have forklifts, we’d take it off a stick at a time or a trellis at a time. We figured

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 46

46 Alaska’s Women Pilots

out what we could use for pulleys and how much weight cargo straps lifted. A lot of people were operating injured or with bad backs. It was a dangerous job. I knew that I couldn’t do this until retirement because I’d probably be in a wheelchair. I was over thirty myself, trying to carry my weight. I’m not as strong as a man. If some piece weighed seven hundred pounds, and I only could pick up a hundred pounds of it, that meant that these poor two guys had to pick up three hundred pounds apiece instead of their fair third. So I was overdoing it. Accidents happened really fast. Not airplane accidents: flying the airplane was easy. It was offloading the freight when things happened so quickly. I didn’t want to do it anymore. At one point I talked to Rita about it. A lot of guys were bitching because we didn’t get paid [to] spend seven hours on the ground offloading a plane. That was just gratis. You didn’t get paid till you got the airplane moving again. They all wanted to get paid, and I understood that. But I wanted them to send loaders or have loaders out at the stations to help. Rita said it would never happen. That was the way she ran her business. Then that winter hit. It must have been the winter of 1988, when we had those incredibly cold temperatures. I think it was thirty-five below zero in Anchorage for over a month. Around the state, some of the village thermometers went down to eighty-five below and bottomed out. Steve Cowper was governor and made an emergency broadcast. He informed everyone about Red Cross safe homes in all the villages. “Leave your homes if the heat’s out,” he said. “It’s a killer cold. Get out of the weather.” We were flying DC-6s. One of those engines had thirty-five gallons of oil: there were four engines. It was not the airplane to be flying in those temps. The Anchorage ground crew worked their tails off trying to preheat with big Herman Nelson heaters. It didn’t matter. You could stick a heater hose inside the cockpit for hours, blankets on the engines, and you’d reach up to start the engines and pieces of phenolic block would fall out of the panel. One time I watched them try to load the DC-6, and the airplane just sat down on its struts because the seals cracked. They had to offload the whole thing and fix the landing gear. It was miserable.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 47

Tamar Bailey 47

I believe the flight department drew the line at fifty below zero. You weren’t supposed to land someplace colder than that. The problem was you’d be overhead a village at two thousand feet and the outside temperature gauge would be above the limitation. But in that last two thousand feet, it would just dive. On another flight we took off and couldn’t get the gear up. We flew all the way back from the Kuskokwim River like that. It was bad. Very hard on the airplane. Very hard on the pilots. It occurred to me that I didn’t have to do this. It wasn’t fun anymore. I was so cold that I would get home at night and take a hot bath, and I would get out of the bathtub shivering, frozen. So that inspired me. Also knowing that I had climbed up this ladder as far as I could go. I couldn’t abide the loading; I needed to look elsewhere. The fortunate thing was that I knew what I had—a really good job—and I kept that job while I was looking for other jobs, unlike pilots on the street, willing to take anything. So I was really picky. I was interested in FedEx because it was a great company to work for, and I wanted to fly freight. There had also been scuttlebutt that they were going to merge with Flying Tigers. I was also interested in Alaska Airlines. So I sent unsolicited applications to all three of those companies, and the only one I ever heard from was Alaska [Airlines], who called me for an interview. And of course, I was like this country bumpkin. I’d been flying up here for years, and I’d never applied for a real airline job because it wasn’t where I was headed. I was not enamored with jets; I certainly didn’t want to wear a uniform. It seemed like the only place to go that wasn’t down from Northern Air Cargo. I didn’t want to apply to an air taxi or do that all again. So I went down to Seattle, not having any idea that getting hired by an airline was a game. I was so naïve. It’s so funny looking back on it. I was dressed nicely, but dressed completely wrong. I didn’t have one of those power suits on. I walked in and there were five or six guys, and they looked exactly alike, walked exactly alike. And I thought, “Oh my, these guys know something, and I don’t know what it is.” So I took the simulator ride and went to the interview, which was four pilots and one woman, a personnel lady who I knew didn’t

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 48

48 Alaska’s Women Pilots

like me. So we’re sitting there and of course it’s very serious, this airline interview. And the woman, who’s kind of off in the corner leans forward. She looks me in the eye and says, very seriously, “Do you use nicotine products?” And I almost broke out laughing because I didn’t quite get the question. I mean, I’m here for this airline interview and that was the first question. I almost laughed, and I swallowed the laugh. And I leaned back at her and looked her in the eye and said, “No, I don’t.” And she said, “Well, that’s good because this is a non-smoking airline.” And I thought, “Oh, wow,” and that’s the only question she asked. And these guys, who I could relate to, started asking me questions—if I knew somebody and knew somebody. And I said, “Yeah,” and it turned out that there were some people up here that knew I had an interview at Alaska [Airlines], and they recommended me. I never asked them to. I don’t know how they found out that I was interviewing. And the fellow said, “Well, you come highly recommended.” And I said, “Really?” I said, “Well, that’s great.” Anyway, I didn’t get the job. Of course they don’t tell you why. But as it turns out, my godfather knew somebody at the company and found out that the woman downed me. The four pilots voted to hire me. And she said, “No, because she doesn’t fit the profile.” And she was exactly right. I didn’t fit the profile. I didn’t look like all those guys. I wasn’t wearing the right clothes; I wasn’t playing the game because I didn’t know it was a game. Initially I was highly offended. My first reaction was, “Well fine. I don’t want your stupid job anyway,” which was kind of arrogant. And then I thought, “Now wait a minute. If this whole thing is a game, and that’s the only way to get into the door—even though I don’t agree with it— then I guess I’m going to have to learn how to play the game.” So that’s the gift Alaska Airlines gave me, this knowledge that it’s a complete game and that I needed to master it. So I called up Future Airline Pilot’s Association (FAPA), and I told them that I heard they teach people how to play this game and that I wanted to get on with FedEx. And the fellow laughed and said, “You and whoever’s army.” And I said, “If you can help me, then I’ll join.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 49

Tamar Bailey 49

“Well,” he said, “we recommend that you send out thirty applications.” “No, no, no,” I said, “I have a job. I just want this job.” “We can help you, but I don’t recommend it.” So I joined and got all the different publications, and I learned. I paid money to do an interview over the phone with a fellow who actually used to work for [Flying] Tigers who did those mock interviews. He taught me the psychology of interviews. The whole game is they give you enough rope to see if you’re going to hang yourself. We set up a time on the phone (he was in L.A.), and he would ask me all these latest FedEx interview questions, and then I’d answer them and he’d critique my answers. I went down to Nordstrom here in Anchorage, and I got one of those professional dressers and said, “Dress me.” I had to have two suits: one with pants for the simulator and one with a skirt for the interview. I also went down to the makeup department and said, “You have to teach me how to wear makeup and it has to look like I don’t have any on.” I’d never worn makeup. They were wonderful with me. I practiced. Another thing I did was fly to Seattle and buy two hours in a 727 simulator. I knew what was on the FedEx checkride, so I said, “I don’t want to do any takeoffs and landings. This is what I want. Put me in this thing and let me fly it.” So we did that. The instructor was funny. He wanted to know my background, and I told him I’d flown DC-6s mostly, almost entirely, and he said, “Okay, well get the feel of that. What do you think?” And I said, “Oh, I like this.” He said, “Yeah, we call that manual reversion” [without the hydraulics turned on]. So I jumped right in with both feet. If I got the interview with FedEx and didn’t get hired, it was not going to be because I didn’t play the game. By this time, I heard that to get on with FedEx was difficult. Mostly they took recommendations from their own pilots, and I didn’t know anybody who worked for FedEx. So I was talking to my girlfriend Kim, and she said, “I grew up down the street from a woman who’s a captain with FedEx.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 50

50 Alaska’s Women Pilots

“What? Kim, you know I’ve been trying to get an interview with them.” She said, “Well, I didn’t know that’s how they did it.” “I think you should call her,” I said. So she called her friend Anne. Anne, I believe, was the first woman hired at FedEx in 1978. There were two or three hired at the time. One is gone, and Anne and this other woman are still there. I know she was the first woman captain. And Anne, bless her heart, she’d never recommended anybody, and she kind of keeps a low profile at the company. But on Kim’s recommendation, Anne called me and talked to me a very long time. She told me exactly what it was like flying for FedEx and was kind of trying to talk me out of it. “This is all-night flying. It’s a drag. It’s not fun. And I don’t want to recommend you if you’ll quit in a year.” I sent her my resume. Anne sent it back. She said change it, do this, put a cover letter on it with this person’s name who is the chief pilot, and she walked it in for me. That’s how I got my foot in the door. Anne was on vacation when I interviewed. It was the best theater I’ve ever done in my life. I had this great power suit on. I knew the ball game, so I was much more comfortable than when I went down to Seattle for Alaska Airlines. And I did very well on the simulator ride. [Anne] called me in Memphis and said, “Okay, how’s it going?” So, bless her heart, Anne mentored me through that whole process. I mean, that’s what it’s all about isn’t it? It’s helping each other that gets any of us where we’re going.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 51

Flight Instructor One of the most important and influential careers in aviation is that of a flight instructor. These teachers of the air guide us toward career goals, compliment and scold us, clarify our questions, recommend us for a flight check, and build up our self-confidence. These valuable mentors of the flying community are accountable for the welfare and education of our future pilot force. They instill life-long habits of safety and judgment that save lives. Yet, since the advent of commercial aviation, instructors have become the least paid of all pilot positions. Many writers have explored the idea of teaching and learning. In Illusions Richard Bach, that magnificent philosopher who delved into the imagination and flight, said: People couldn’t fly for a long time, I don’t think because they didn’t think it was possible, so of course they didn’t learn the first little principle of aerodynamics. I want to believe that there’s another principle somewhere: we don’t need airplanes to fly, or move through walls, or get to planets. We can learn how to do that without machines anywhere. (29)

51

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 52

52 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Bach proposes that to learn is to discover “what we already know,” to do is to demonstrate “that you know it,” and to teach is to help others to see “that they know just as well as you.” This idea of learning, demonstrating, and teaching is emulated in the lives of professional flight instructors. I was working as a stewardess for Pan American World Airways in 1979 and collecting flight ratings—private, commercial, instrument, multi-engine, flight instructor—like professional students earned degrees. My flight instructor from the Pan Am Flying Club was amazed. What he didn’t know (or anyone else, for that matter) was that at the time I was flight instructing and accumulating logbook time, I also worked more overtime than any Miami stewardess on record. After I visited Pan Am scheduling and asked the guys if they could help me pay for my flying, they beeped me for lastminute trips. They knew I loved working holidays such as Thanksgiving or Christmas because it was double pay. It was also an excuse not to spend holidays alone. Even though Burnside-Ott Aviation Training Center only paid beginning instructors $10 an hour, it was a good deal. At least flight instructors didn’t have to buy the airplane or gas. Further, they could log each flight hour and count it toward pilot-in-command time for a future airline or charter position. The only drawback to this “good deal” was the fact that some flights were downright scary. One such flight happened after a six day Pan Am trip. The Boeing 747 landed in Miami, and I drove straight home to my apartment near Tamiami Airport. I made fresh coffee, took a hot shower, and changed into my flight instructor outfit—crisp blouse, epaulettes, black pants, black belt, black shoes. I loved dressing like a pilot; it made me believe I was getting somewhere. When I arrived at the Burnside-Ott Training Center, my student David was waiting. He was twenty-two, a new recruit from Columbia, and roughly thirty pounds overweight for flying in the incredibly small Cessna 150 trainer. But his father wanted a professional pilot for a son. David and I walked outside. All the Cessna 150 planes—that looked more like flying tin cans than aerodynamic marvels—were

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 53

Flight Instructor 53

numbered. Our assigned plane was in spot ten and easy to locate. We set our flight cases inside the cockpit. After I showed him how to do a careful preflight, we took our seats and fastened our seatbelts. Sweat poured down his face and neck. He told me that I was his third flight instructor and that this would make his third flight in a small plane, but he wasn’t scared—only overheated. I redirected the air vent so it pointed straight toward him. His delicate hands and watery eyes caught my attention. Because I spoke Spanish quite fluently in those days (a Pan Am requirement as well as my college minor), I instructed David first in English, then in Spanish how to use a checklist and start the engine. We completed the engine run up, called the tower, and taxied into position. I assured David, once again, that we’d do the takeoff together. “Add a little power,” I said, just like my beginning flight instructors had told me. “Put your feet on the rudders.” I reached over and gently touched his fingers wrapped around the yoke—the control surface similar to a car steering wheel but shaped like a “U.” “Relax your fingers,” I said, and continued instructing him in a soothing voice all the way down the runway. Together we lifted the nose, and the plane climbed straight ahead. Several seconds passed; the altimeter read 800 feet, and we were well past the runway. All of a sudden, David grabbed the yoke, yanked it back to his stomach, and held on. “Lower the nose,” I said loudly in both languages. I pushed the yoke forward. We climbed straight up. I couldn’t budge the controls; David was too strong. The airspeed dropped off: sixty-five, sixty-two, fifty-eight, fifty-five, fifty. If I didn’t do something quickly, the plane would exceed the critical angle of attack and stall—roll to one side and spin to the pavement. I saw my life flashing before me, a maze of unfinished dreams. I whacked David as hard as I could with my elbow, directly in the ribs. I beat my pointy bone against his flesh. Finally he let go. With my left hand, I pushed the yoke forward. As he held his sides and tried to catch his breath, I looked straight ahead. Before this flight, it had never occurred to me that someone paying for flight

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

Blanche Stuart Scott.

12:45 PM

Page 54

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 55

Flight Instructor 55

lessons and signed up for the professional pilot course could be so afraid of flying. For the rest of our hour, I encouraged David to face his fears. Step by step, we climbed to two thousand feet and practiced flying straight and level. Then we tried shallow turns. When I saw his hands reaching for the yoke to hang onto something, I leveled the wings. A Cessna 150 trainer will fly quite well by itself in straight and level flight if you trim it up and don’t touch anything. I demonstrated this fact several times until David’s knuckles turned from white to brownish-pink. After fourteen hours of dual instruction, David could tolerate a steep turn, slow flight, and one spin. “There’s no need to teach spins,” the Burnside-Ott manager told me when I started instructing. “If you teach your students to keep the turn-and-bank-indicator ball centered at all times, there won’t be a problem.” But I disagreed. Companies didn’t want instructors teaching spins because it might damage the instrument gyros and cost a lot of money for replacements. I didn’t care, especially in David’s case. A life was worth more than a gyro. David needed to experience what it felt like for a wing to drop to one side and a plane to spin round and round. Teaching stall-and-spin recovery was essential, and it was such an easy thing to do: neutralize the stick, push the opposite rudder, and level the wings. When it came time for David to take his private pilot checkride, I knew he would pass. But I suspected—even hoped—that he would wash out of commercial pilot training. I was a flight instructor, not a career counselor, but in my heart I knew David would be a lot happier in another field. He could mechanically fly an airplane around the pattern and land safely. But he didn’t love to fly. It was as if David were a musician but tone deaf to the music of the air: the wind rushing past the window, making his body want to give in to the sky. One of the first female pilots to receive flight instruction was Blanche Stuart Scott, an aviatrix who took flight for some forty feet against the wishes of her flight instructor Glenn Curtiss (Lopez 64). Perhaps Curtiss was trying to protect Blanche’s womanly sensibilities when he strategically placed a throttle block on the air

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 56

56 Alaska’s Women Pilots

machine. Or possibly he was concerned about the potential harm an airplane accident involving a woman pilot might do to the future of the aviation industry. Regardless of Curtiss’s intention, this handicap—retrofitting Blanche’s airplane—failed. On that historic September day in 1910, she made aviation history as the first woman to take flight successfully. Later she became a renowned barnstormer (the name given to a group of aviation pioneers who traveled around the country and gave airplane rides from unimproved landing fields). In Gerry Bruder’s book Heroes of the Horizon: Flying Adventures of Alaska’s Legendary Bush Pilots, he interviews another aviation pioneer and flight instructor from Fairbanks. Virginia Merrill Clayton believes she was the first woman flight instructor in Fairbanks; certainly she was one of the first in Alaska. The world of flying in the 1940s largely belonged to men, the accomplishments of Amelia Earhart and other pioneer women aviators notwithstanding. Women were absent from the cockpits of both civilian airliners and military aircraft. Yet, at the instructional level, Virginia says she experienced no prejudice or harassment, either in Alaska or in her native Pacific Northwest. As a girl in Baker, Oregon, Virginia had watched biplanes pass overhead on their way to or from the local airport. “I’m going to fly one of those someday,” she told her mother. Her intention was to join the government’s Civilian Pilot Training Program in college, but after initially accepting women, the CPTP administrators barred them. “I was going to buy a horse, but then someone knocked on my door and said he had heard I was interested in learning to fly, and he invited me to join a flying club, so I did,” says Virginia, whose dark hair and pleasant face look little changed from her 1940s photos. On December 7, 1941, she soloed in Baker in a Piper J-3; she was nineteen. But because authorities had already officially grounded all light aircraft in the region after the attack that day on Pearl Harbor, she had to solo again on December 15, 1941 to make it count. That summer she got a job as a flagman at the Walla Walla, Washington, airport (some fields without control towers used

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 57

Flight Instructor 57 flagmen to direct air traffic), where Whitman College students in a naval flight program were learning to fly. “I had a white flag and a red flag and a little box to sit on at the end of the field,” she says. “Sometimes they’d buzz me, maybe because I was a girl.” When she wasn’t working at the field, Virginia took lessons. Then, with commercial and instructor certificates in hand, she signed on as the only woman among ten instructors for the cadet program. Any suspicions she had about male chauvinism on the part of her fellow instructors evaporated when she was hospitalized for an emergency appendectomy: all of them chipped in to pay for her operation. Virginia had hoped to join the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots, or WASP, a wartime project in which women pilots ferried aircraft from the manufacturer to military bases in the United States and abroad. Before she could achieve that goal, however, a representative of Top of the World flying school in Fairbanks, who’d come to the airport to buy several used J-3s offered her an instructing job at Weeks Field. “He told me I could instruct twenty-four hours a day if I wanted to,” she says, laughing. “I thought he was kidding, but I didn’t know that there was daylight all night up here in the summer. There was lots of interest in learning to fly in Fairbanks, and it turned out I actually could have instructed all day.” The representative gave her a round-trip ticket in case she became homesick, but she tore it up after arriving in Alaska. The North Country makes a lot of instant converts. In Fairbanks, Virginia found residents friendly and curious. “People wanted to look at this woman flight instructor.” George Clayton wanted instruction as well as a look, and he earned a certificate in both areas. Several months after he became a licensed pilot, he and Virginia were married. It was a generation before women’s lib, and even women adventurous enough to fly airplanes often deferred to the ethic of home and hearth. “I gave up flying after marrying George because I felt I should be at home raising a family,” Virginia says, adding that she’s never regretted the decision. (134–136)

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 58

58 Alaska’s Women Pilots

At Lake Hood, I stretch out on the grass in front of a float slip, near which I can watch and listen for my flight instructor Noralie Jennings-Voigt. A polished-aluminum Cessna 170B roars overhead, glides easily toward the gravel runway of the busiest seaplane base in the world, and lands. After what seems like seconds, a striking woman with shoulder-length dark hair taxis up. Today she doesn’t bring her two daughters, Nessa and Alena, because there are only two seats in my Super Cub airplane, including the pilot’s. I’m sorry for this because the girls—spitting images of their mother—are well behaved and ask interesting questions. Noralie opens the pilot door and steps to the ground at the same time I scramble to my feet. Carrying a black pilot bag, she walks toward me, and when we embrace, the zipper in her floatation vest digs into my skin. With the exception of a few gray hairs, she doesn’t look a day older than when we first met. In the spring of 1981, I was flying a Cessna 207 packed to the ceiling with Pampers and soda pop. As I was unloading cargo in Kwethluk, a village just to the west of Bethel, Noralie circled overhead and landed. I remember watching her unload the Twin Otter, and I dreamed someday that I, too, would be a Twin Otter pilot, adding full power and lifting off the ground, the sixty-five-foot wingspan of the Otter making shadows over the snow like a trumpeter swan. Today we meet for my biannual flight review. Noralie plans to fly with me for a couple of hours to test my aerial skills in my Super Cub airplane on floats. According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA): “no person may act as pilot-in-command of an aircraft unless, since the beginning of the 24th calendar month before the month in which that pilot acts as pilot-in command, that person has accomplished a flight review given in an aircraft for which that pilot is rated by an appropriately rated instructor” (61.56). To accomplish this requirement, Noralie will most likely exceed the minimum of one-hour of flight instruction as well as the one hour of ground instruction because we plan to fly past Red Shirt Lake and execute a series of takeoffs and landings. Even though I have more than 5,000 hours of total flight time, a pilot like

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 59

Flight Instructor 59

me always learns something, especially since float season in Alaska lasts only a few months. Glassy water landings are the most difficult because essentially it’s like landing on a mirror—you have no depth perception. You line the airplane up close to the shoreline, begin a slow descent to what you think is the water line, and try hard not to stall ten feet above the surface. This type of landing takes practice and is a good one to review on a checkride. Throughout the years, I’ve received instruction and checkrides from many flight instructors. Noralie is by far one of the most professional, dedicated, and safety minded of the bunch. After she puts me through a series of stalls, slow flight, and steep turns, I feel as though I’ve honed my skills and discovered new techniques that work for me. We find a glassy lake and practice takeoffs and landings in various configurations. We end our session by landing on a lake near Wasilla. Her next student is waiting next to a blue and white Maule. He’s on the south side of the lake instead of where they talked about meeting, so Noralie and I taxi toward him and wave. After a few circles around the water, he recognizes her and communicates via radio in a thick Norwegian accent that he will comply. By the time he arrives at the north end, Noralie and I have already tied my plane to the brush in order to sign my logbook. After she completes the entry, I thank Noralie for such a good session. We make plans to meet in a week or two when she has more time to sit up in the front seat and try out my new Bauman floats. She reiterates that she wants me to tie a rope to the float cleats in order to facilitate docking in rough seas. When she talks, I notice the tiny freckles across the bridge of her nose. Her eyes are dark brown and inquisitive. When she teaches a student anything new, she leans forward and her eyes sparkle.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 60

Noralie Jennings-Voigt Long time ago, when I was a child sitting on my grandfather’s porch, I was watching jets fly overhead, and I thought, “Boy, one of these days I’m going to fly in a jet. If it’s not going to be physically at the controls, it’ll be at least going for a ride.”

In 1970 I found out about a flying club on Phillips Field, a real small field outside of Fairbanks International. I went for a demo ride. We went up in this Cessna 150. It’s just a small airplane, and I thought, “Oh, I’m in heaven!” It was just so neat. I got back down and signed up because I wanted to take lessons. That’s actually where I began my flying in Alaska, on that little, tiny field. It was very narrow and actually not very long. I had to come in over trees and obstacles. It was an excellent start if you’re going to be flying up here and getting into some really remote strips. From Fairbanks you could go north to Circle Hot Springs or the Brooks Range. You could come down to Anchorage if you want. The summers were great. Of course, the winters are real cold up there and you can’t do much flying at forty to sixty degrees below. After getting my private in Fairbanks, I ended up going to the International Airport at Alaska Central Air, getting my commercial, instrument, multi-engine land, and multi-engine sea ratings. A multi-engine rating is expensive. To pay for it, I had to go out on the pipeline for four months just to earn the money to pay off my debt. I did office work because they were always looking for office helpers, and I could do secretarial work: type or file, whatever. In the camp it’s seven days a week, almost twelve hours a day. I didn’t like it, but I did it just to pay for my ratings.

60

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 61

Noralie Jennings-Voigt 61

Noralie Jennings-Voigt.

After I had about 500 hours, I decided I wanted to get out of an office and see if I could get a job flying. Well, because it was so male-oriented at that time, I’d go to these places and they’d say, “Oh, we need somebody with a thousand hours of flying time before we can hire anyone.” I knew people who had gotten jobs with less than a thousand hours, so it was an excuse. What I ended up doing was going down to Anchorage to get my instructor’s rating. Once you get an instructor’s rating, you can keep flying and get paid for it. There were a number of little outfits at that time—they’re all closed down now—that I worked for, and I also freelanced a little bit. Gill’s Aircraft Service, which is no longer there, got me into flying Cessna 206s, Bonanzas, and light twins. Actually, they wouldn’t even let me get in the twin until one day they needed a Duchess brought up from California, and there was no one to do it. I said, “Well, I could do it.” This was a proving-type deal for them. They said, “Okay, we’ll let you try it.” So they sent me down, bought my ticket, and I picked up the plane. It was a real easy, light twin to fly. Came through Canada.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 62

62 Alaska’s Women Pilots

IFR, all that good stuff. Made it into Merrill Field with no problems, and they would go, “Wow, maybe she can fly! Maybe we could let her do our twin work now.” After that they started giving me more twin trips, more charter trips, so it was a combination of teaching and flying singleengine and multi-engine charters. That was a good time for me because then they could see that I was flying, not trying to compete with the other person on the block, just trying to fly. If you can demonstrate that you have skill, usually you can get the work. While flying for Gills, I heard that Evergreen Helicopters was looking for pilots. I remember that it was May 1980, another turning point. They weren’t real enthused about having any women pilots because they’d had one before, and they said that she didn’t quite work out as they wanted. She wouldn’t move the cargo; she expected everything to be done for her. So knowing this, on the interview I said, “I’ve heard that you had a woman pilot before and that she really didn’t perform like you guys expected. I just want you to remember that all women pilots are not the same. I am a really hard worker, and I would do a really good job for your guys.” So they said, “Okay, we’ll think about it.” A week later the chief pilot calls me back and says, “So you want to fly Twin Otters?” I said, “Yes, I would.” He says, “Well, why don’t you come down in the next day or two and we’ll get you signed up.” So I got the job to fly and learned how to fly Twin Otters. I was really excited about that because I was the only woman at the time. I think my first assignment was going out to Kotzebue. I did some training with one of their higher-time pilots, a National Guard pilot who had been there for awhile. He would take me out in the evenings and work with me on the Twin Otter. He really showed me how to fly the Twin Otter and do the short field work— more than I’d got in the little bit of training they give you when you’re hired. It was exciting flying out of Kotzebue because we went to all these small villages in the interior north, and the people, they were just really great. I did my work. I worked with the other person I

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 63

Noralie Jennings-Voigt 63

Noralie breaking camp.

flew with. I didn’t have an ego problem where, hey, I’m so-and-so, and I can’t do this or that because I’m a woman. I never had that image. I always worked with the person, was very tactful when I spoke or asked questions. I didn’t do anything to make them feel like they weren’t in charge because I respected their position. I think if it were the other way around, I would have been out the door in no time. Because I liked it so much and I liked working with who I flew with, it always worked out really good. There were a couple guys, they didn’t really like flying with a female. But I knew that, so I always made sure that we got along really well and didn’t do anything that would send them up through the roof of the Twin Otter. I had really good experiences out in the bush. Kotzebue was really neat because a lot of the villages, especially during the winter at night, have no runway lights. They would light flare pots along the runway edges. There’d be a snow machine down at one end or the other just so we could come in to land. That was really exciting because it’s so different than what you would ever see in the Lower

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 64

64 Alaska’s Women Pilots

48. There were no navigational aids in a lot of these small places. Luckily the Twin Otters had really good equipment—radar, radar altimeters, and GNS 500s [a global navigational system that allows you to insert latitude and longitude and navigate to that designated point]—if it was kind of a bad day, and we had to get in there for some reason. We relied on waypoints and the radar altimeter for the height above the ground. It’s like we made out some of our own approaches to get into villages. So that was exciting. I remember coming out of Platinum Bay, south of Bethel. Two of us were flying the Twin Otter: one taking care of the controls, and the other with the power levers. Really, you could get in such rough wind and turbulence in that area. And Cape Newenham had such a high, sloped runway. One way in, one way out. No way could you do a go-around. If we didn’t have certain weather minimums, we didn’t even attempt a landing. In the summer I also flew contract for Bureau of Land Management (BLM), carrying smoke jumpers around to fire sites. I had some funny responses when I carried guys for BLM (you didn’t see too many women smoke jumpers). At that time, Megan Rust had got on with Evergreen Helicopters and so did another lady, Lani Tillman. It seemed when it was an all-women crew, we had more comments from the guys. They’d say, “Oh no! Two women at the controls.” Actually, after we got to our destination, if it was a smooth flight, they would clap in the background. It always worked out as long as you could show that you had confidence and you knew what you were doing; people seem to respect that. Then in August, when fishing got into swing, I’d fly sports fishermen down to the Tsiu River, southeast of Cordova. It’s a really beautiful area, just a super place for silver salmon fishing. We’d take Twin Otter loads of guys down there, and we’d fish with them. Of course they were always surprised to see a woman pilot. They said, “Are you sure you can fly this?” I said, “I think so.” The weather changes really fast down there, and if the wind picked up or I could see things moving in, it didn’t take me long to round people up. And they could see it, so I’d say, “We have to get out of here and go because the wind is getting too strong. We don’t

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 65

Noralie Jennings-Voigt 65

want to get stuck down here over night.” I never had any problem rounding up people. If I ever had any confrontations or something where I had to be more tactful, it would be the person that I flew with. One pilot in particular wanted to take off with full flaps in a Twin Otter. I knew taking off with full flaps wasn’t the best thing to do, even though we were empty. I said, “I won’t do it,” because of this and this and this. I said, “If you want to do it, go ahead, and I’ll get out and wait.” You have to play the person by ear on how you’re going to approach him. In a situation where they have more seniority and they’re of the opposite sex, it’s ego. Ego plays a lot, more so with men than with women for this profession. One day Evergreen said, “Well, we think you’re ready to go to the left seat. We’re going to have you go out with some of the other guys and let them be your safety pilot while you practice your approaches and engine-out procedures.” One guy in particular went with me. We were shooting some approaches at Anchorage International, and I’d get a little bit too high or too low. All of a sudden, he’d just start screaming and yelling. I said, “I can’t really handle you screaming at me while I’m doing this approach because I’m trying to concentrate, and now I’m making mistakes. But that’s why I’m out here because I’m practicing and trying to get proficient.” It’s not like we do approaches every day of the week, flying a Twin Otter, but he kept screaming. So I got mad and said, “I’m calling this off.” Went back to Merrill Field. Parked the airplane, went into the office, and I told them, “I am not flying with him as a safety pilot. I can’t handle screamers. I can’t concentrate if someone’s yelling and harping at me like this. I’m coming out to perfect these maneuvers or these approaches, and I’m not going to fly with him.” So we went around and around with the office people for thirty minutes to an hour, and I said, “I’m not going to do it. You get me somebody else.” So I guess they talked to him and they told him he was supposed to be a safety pilot. He said, “Okay, I’ll try not to scream.” But that was his personality. That was how he spoke to other people and other guys, and that’s what they’re used to in their training.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 66

66 Alaska’s Women Pilots

From that point, when I was teaching, I never screamed at anybody. I would say, “Okay, we’ll try it a different way, or try doing the maneuver this way and you can get a better response from the airplane.” I always had alternatives and respected the other person. This is a learning situation, and you don’t learn when you scream at people. I don’t learn. I know other people don’t either. They get real intimidated, and they get on the defensive, and that’s not a learning situation. So he did his best to try just to watch for other traffic, but they knew I was really mad. They’d never seen me that mad before because I’m really a pretty mellow person. You have to really do a lot to get me fired up. After the training, then I got together with the chief pilot, who was also a check airman. We went through all the maneuvers. Actually he checked me out when we were on a BLM flight. We did some approaches into Fairbanks. He said, “Well, I think you’re ready. You’re left seat now, so go for it.” But after the last layoff with Evergreen, they just didn’t have enough work to rehire a lot of pilots back. They had slowed down so much that they just kept the pilots that were dual rated for helicopters and the Twin Otter. In ‘82 I found out about a job opening at Crowley Maritime, based out of Anchorage International. They said that they knew of me from flying with Evergreen in their Twin Otters. They knew I could fly. The company sent us down to Wichita, Kansas, for simulator training in the King Air, then to Texas for the Twin Otter. These were each week-long training sessions. The simulators were full motion, so they were just like flying the airplane. They could simulate emergencies that you would never, ever do in an airplane, their airplane. That would be hazardous to your health. The training was excellent, very thorough. Because Crowley was a corporation—a barge company—we flew VIPs around, parts for the barges, cargo, whatever they needed. They wanted their pilots to be well trained, so they didn’t spare any expense. That was probably the best training that I had ever had. We had CPR. We had cockpit management training—how to relate to each other while you’re flying. From that point on I always kept some of their training methods, like cockpit management, in the back of my mind

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 67

Noralie Jennings-Voigt 67

so I could pass it on to other students or whoever I flew with. I think the most exciting part of flying with Crowley was when we would do ice reconnaissance up from Barrow to Barter Island. We would fly the E-90 King Air, which can cruise pretty fast. At 500 feet above the ice pack, we’d look for leads in the ice so we could give waypoints to barges so they could wiggle their way through the ice to get over to Barter Island. That was really neat because you could see polar bears, seals, and walruses. I always looked forward to getting up in the morning and heading out in the King Air. I didn’t have any women mentors because I didn’t know about them as much at the time. I had one friend, an airline captain with Wien. I don’t even know where he is now, but he was real supportive about women pilots. He would keep saying, “It’s really great that you’re doing this.” Even when he heard me talking on the radio, and he was flying his Wien jet at so-many-thousand feet, he would at least say, “Hi,” or “Glad that you’re flying,” or something like this. At Crowley we did have our layoffs in the winter. The company started having financial problems and a couple of things had to be wiped out, which happened to be aviation. But I kept up with my flight instructing and did a little bit of charter work out of Palmer. I also ended up meeting somebody that I got married to. So the timing was okay because I ended up having two girls, and when you have children, they keep you grounded more. So I really couldn’t do the flying that I did because it takes you away from home quite a bit. I didn’t want my kids to grow up in a day care or have someone else raise them. Why have kids if you’re going to be leaving them all the time? With my husband out of town a lot, there would be someone else raising them, and I didn’t want that. So I worked it where if I wanted to fly—after I got back in shape after having a baby—I would trade off with my good friends who have kids. There’d always be somebody that I knew who I trusted, and then I would take care of their kids. But I still did my teaching, charter flights over glaciers, and stuff, just so I could keep up. You can’t keep me on the ground forever. I had two kids, and they almost grew up in an airplane. Nessa, my first girl, when she

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 68

68 Alaska’s Women Pilots

was a baby, if my students had a four-place plane, I’d put her in the backseat, strap her in, and she would just fall asleep. And I’d go ahead and do the lesson. Same thing with Alena. Not as much with Alena because I can’t take two kids with me if I’m in a teaching situation if there’s no room. I did a couple times though, with people who knew me, and they didn’t mind at all. So I always kept flying because it was just that strong desire. I didn’t want to let it out of my life. Some people after they have kids, they get in a fear mode: what if something happens? If you crash, then who’s going to take care of your kids? Even though people said that to me, I still felt, “Well, if you think of that, you’re going to draw it to you.” So you think, “Okay, everything’s going to work out,” and it’s positive. Of course, you’re always current on emergency procedures, and you always have control over yourself. A lot of times you can walk away from it instead of just panic and let everything go. I always kept in the back of my mind, “Always be in control, and just don’t think of all the negative things.” I always try to keep a real positive attitude. That’s what I’m doing today. My kids are older now, like seven and Nessa’s going to be eleven next month. So they’re used to me still flying. It’s just part of my routine. Nessa being older, she says, “When are you going to fly so I can go play with my friends?” They’re real attached to you when they’re younger. It’s not that bad. They’re real supportive of my flying. For students now I have probably three or four women pilots more than I have men, which is different. It’s good. Female students, of course being a little more cautious and conservative, still really want to learn. Women love to fly. They’re just getting out more and doing it. They’ve been suppressed so long, and they’ve been told, “No, you can’t do this.” Well you can and even better. When I was training down in Wichita for the King Air at flight safety school, my parents, who lived in Kansas at the time, came down to visit. We had dinner. They said, “Well, gosh, you’re still flying and doing all this.” My dad casually asked this question: “Well, what are you going to do when you grow up?” I laughed, and I said, “Are you serious?” My mom, she had this kind of smile on her face, which was kind of half serious, too. And

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 69

Noralie Jennings-Voigt 69

I said, “Well, this is it, Dad. I wouldn’t be down here training and flying if this wasn’t what I wanted to do.” They weren’t real supportive because they thought it was kind of a dangerous occupation to be in, and they’re real traditional, where a woman should be a teacher, a nurse, or whatever women do. Men, they have the more engineering, construction-type jobs. So when I was doing this, they thought, “Oh, wow! Noralie’s turning off a whole new direction, and I wonder how she’s going to turn out when she gets older.” Now after all these years when my parents come up to visit, my mother won’t fly because she’s really fear oriented. She is a real ground person. She does not like to be up in the air. She’s afraid of bears. She’s a city person; she doesn’t like camping because she’s afraid of the environment. She feels safer being around people in a city. That’s where she’s coming from. She went up with me once, and she was actually terrified. My dad, now he’s more adventurous. I’ve taken him out fishing in a float plane or clamming. He loves it. He thinks it’s great. I said, “Dad, isn’t this neat that I fly because you would never have this experience. You’d be paying a fortune for somebody to take you out.” And even though he won’t come out and say it, you can see that little smile in his face: “Oh yeah, this is great.” He loves it, and I think he’s glad that I fly so he can have these experiences, too. It’s really nice. If you feel like you want to get away from it all, there’s spots we’ve picked. We can land, look at the mountains for an hour or so and kind of get grounded and go back to the hectic schedule that one can get into when they have families or working or building. It’s been a positive thing for me to keep flying. I can’t think of another occupation that I would have enjoyed. If I hadn’t gotten married, I would probably be flying for a corporation because I really like the corporate flying aspect. I thought, “Okay, if I flew for an airline that went from point A to point B at 35,000 feet or whatever, every day or every other day, whatever their schedule is, I think I would get bored.” I have friends that went that route. They say it’s okay, but they really wish that they could have their own schedule, go to different places, bush flying. That’s what they really like, even though they can do that when they get done with their flying job. I can see where I would have

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 70

70 Alaska’s Women Pilots

gone on a corporate routine because the flying would be more varied, more around-the-world-type stuff. Even though you have to be available more, there would be days when you have your time off. Being born and raised in Kansas, in a big city, I don’t want to go back to that environment. It’s too stressful. Your home should be a healing place to relax where you feel good. My husband Don had a job offer to go down to Bellingham to work for a year or so. I said, “I can’t do that; I wouldn’t be happy down there.” He was out of town a lot to begin with, and I said, “If you want, you could do the job and then come up on the weekends, once or twice a month, whatever, because I have my students.” I know I wouldn’t have been happy down there. I would have been whining to come back up. Flying has been a real passion for me. If my husband asked me to stop, it would be one of the hardest things I could do. He would never ask me to stop because I wouldn’t be able to. It would be too much. I’ve done it for such a long time. We have a Cessna 170B, and he likes to fly it because of his work schedule. He just doesn’t have time and then he’s tired sometimes when he comes home. So I end up flying our airplane way more than he does. Of course, the girls go with me. He’s pretty supportive. He just felt it is part of my nature to go fly, which is good. If I had someone that wasn’t that way, then we probably wouldn’t be together very long. He’s real good, too, when we go flying together. We alternate legs flying. It’s not like he’s the macho guy; he’s going to fly all the time. I’ve learned so much with flying: the experience of meeting people, seeing new places. I would never be able to see that if I had some other type of occupation. If you like adventure and excitement, you can get it with flying. It’s been one of the most positive moves in my life. You never stop learning. If you get to that point where you don’t want to learn anymore, there’s something wrong. There’s so much to learn, and I’m always amazed at myself. How am I going to learn all this before I die at one hundred years old? The best advice I would give to a woman is when you start flying, make up your mind that’s what you really want to do and don’t do a stop-go, stop-go routine. Have the money to start out with. Because people who stop-go, stop-go, they end up spending more money, and it takes more time to get it done. Also, anytime you’re

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 71

Noralie Jennings-Voigt 71

working with another person, just try to know where they’re coming from. Don’t let ego get in the way. Respect the other person you fly with, even though they might be kind of harsh on you. You know you can only take so much. Voice how you really feel, too. You don’t have to do that in a screaming way, just be a real person and say, “Hey, I don’t like the way you’re doing something.” Just be real honest and up front with them. That’s always the best way to be because that person’s not going to doubt where you’re coming from. Be consistent with whatever endeavor you undertake. Just go for it. If it’s really what you want to do, then just keep after it, even though you might have some holdups. If you like something well enough, you’ll stay with it. You’ll keep plugging at it. It’s a combination of things that gets you where you want to go.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 72

Big Game Guide and Bush Pilot Few careers are as challenging as that of big game guide. Once you’ve sighted a grizzly bear lumbering across a blackberry patch, you’re hooked. You naturally want to circle around and take in the beauty of this magnificent animal again. You can anticipate the bruin doing two things: running for cover or standing to face you head-on. It won’t matter to an aggressive bear if you’re flying a Twin Otter with screeching turbine engines or a Super Cub that sounds like a buzzing fly. When the grizzly stands up—massive paws raised and swiping the air like a tetherball strike to knock your plane from the sky—you’ll be happy that he misses. If you ask people what comes to mind when they think of women and hunting, they may well mention the Roman goddess Diana or recall the Greek goddess Artemis from studies in mythology. The goddess Diana—huntress, protector of the weak—symbolizes the feminine values of strength and virtue. Diana, the moon goddess, has the ability to radiate light, not only into the human heart but also into the vast darkness of a mythic sea voyage. In contrast to Diana’s ability to radiate light, Artemis (Maiden of the Silver Bow) has abilities and powers: to heal and to kill. According to legend, Artemis was bathing in a stream while Actaeon, a mortal, watched. As soon as the goddess discovered his voyeurism, Artemis 72

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 73

Big Game Guide and Bush Pilot 73

changed him into a stag that his own hounds later tracked and killed. Her ability to withstand erotic love has earned her the name of Deer Slaying Hunter. Despite this rich heritage of women hunters, women pilots who work as professional big game guides are scarce. Perhaps this is because in the majority of cultures, men have been the hunters in the hunter-gatherer equation. In Aviation: A Smithsonian Guide, Donald S. Lopez gives an authoritative history of women in aviation who were involved in a variety of careers: stunt fliers, test pilots, barnstormers, ferry pilots, wing walkers, air racers, flight instructors, and astronauts. Yet his chronology includes only one aviatrix big game hunter: Beryl Markham. Beryl, an Englishwoman who lived most of her life in Kenya, possessed an adventurous spirit and ardent passion for the outdoors. As a young child she hunted barefoot with the Nandi Murani. Spear in hand, she hunted the antelope, wildebeest, lion, and warthog. Her memoir West with the Night has been reprinted nearly thirty times and is available in bookstores around the globe. In Book Two of her memoir she writes about her childhood hunting experiences: I know animals more gallant than the African warthog, but none more courageous. He is the peasant of the plains—the drab and dowdy digger in the earth. He is the uncomely but intrepid defender of family, home, and bourgeois convention, and he will fight anything of any size that intrudes upon his smug existence. Even his weapons are plebeian—curved tusks, sharp, deadly, but not beautiful, used inelegantly for rooting as well as for fighting. . . . The old boar sees me, another enemy, and charges once more with magnificent courage, and I sidestep and plunge my spear to his heart. He falls forward, scraping the earth with his great tusks, and lies still. I leave the spear in his body, turn to Buller, and feel tears starting to my eyes. The dog is torn open like a slaughtered sheep. His right side is a valley of exposed flesh from the root of his tail to his head, and his ribs show almost white, like the fingers of a hand smeared with blood. He looks at the warthog, then at me beside him on my knees, and lets his head fall into my arms. (90–96)

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 74

74 Alaska’s Women Pilots

During the thirties and forties Beryl was known as the “Lady from the Skies.” Her lifestyle epitomizes the way of life—freedom and independence—that big game guides in the Far North are desperately trying to preserve today. For several years now the federal government has tried to retract an exemption that has allowed Alaska guides to operate aircraft under Part 91 regulations. What this means is that professional hunters are required by law to possess a private pilot’s license instead of a commercial pilot’s license, as required in the Lower 48. For example, in the Frank Church River Of No Return Wilderness Area in Idaho, hunters are normally flown into an airstrip and dropped off by a commercial pilot who works for an air taxi operator. From there they often travel via horseback with a hunting guide (non-pilot) to pursue game. But that is not how professional guides operate in the biggest state in the union. Similar to the African landscape, Alaska comprises a vast wilderness with few roads and limited access. Many landing strips are Super Cub-only runways that consist of sandbars, glaciers, lakes, cinder bars, and rivers. Only two people—pilot and client—can possibly squeeze into such a small plane. Big game guides use the airplane as a tool of transportation in lieu of a horse or pickup. An air machine is secondary to their primary task of guiding in the field. Guides fly by the seat-of-their pants and navigate by landmarks on the ground. It is not surprising that many Alaskan guides don’t have commercial or instrument ratings. Why should they when many of them believe they are professional hunters, not air taxi pilots? For now, big game guides in Alaska have succeeded in avoiding the plethora of bureaucratic requirements found in the Lower 48: increased paperwork, thick manuals, one-hundred-hour inspections, flight tests, and strict physicals. They are also permitted to fly more than eight hours a day without required rest periods. Professional guides of the last frontier can certainly identify with Beryl’s description of her quest for freedom and independence: I think I am the first person ever to scout elephant by plane, and so it follows that the thousands of elephant I saw time and

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 75

Big Game Guide and Bush Pilot 75 again from the air had never before been plagued by anything above their heads more ominous than tick-birds. The reaction of a herd of elephant to my Avian was, in the initial instance, always the same—they left their feeding ground and tried to find cover, though often, before yielding, one or two of the bulls would prepare for battle and charge in the direction of the plane if it were low enough to be within their scope of vision. Once the futility of this was realized, the entire herd would be off into the deepest bush. . . . . . . A normal bull elephant, aroused by the scent of man, will often attack at once—and his speed is as unbelievable as his mobility. His trunk and his feet are his weapons—at least in the distasteful business of exterminating a mere human; those resplendent sabres of ivory await resplendent foes. (206–208)

The literature of hunting is exceedingly diverse. Writers and philosophers from Henry David Thoreau to Pam Houston have insightfully mused about their own hunting excursions. The captive reader may explore Ernest Hemingway’s Green Hills of Africa or To Have and Have Not as literary descriptions of hunts. Another prolific writer, Tobias Wolff, has written a moving piece entitled, “Hunter in the Snow.” In this short story Wolff explores the concept of a hunting experience gone awry when three friends go to the woods and one dies from a gunshot wound and negligence. My personal favorite is Pam Houston’s, “Dall,” a fictional piece that describes the rigors of an Alaskan hunt: I am not a violent person. I don’t shoot animals and I hate cold weather, so maybe I had no business following Boone to the Alaska Range for a season of Dall sheep hunting. But right from the beginning, my love for Boone was a little less like contentment and a little more like sickness, so when he said he needed an assistant guide I bought a down coat and packed my bags. I had an idea about Alaska: that the wildness of the place would enlarge my range of possibility. The northern lights, for example, were something I wanted to see.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 76

76 Alaska’s Women Pilots After the first week in Alaska I began to realize that the object of sheep hunting was to intentionally deprive yourself of all the comforts of normal life. We would get up at 3 A.M., and leave the cabin, knowing it would be nearly twenty-four hours, if not several days, before we would return. Everything depended upon the sheep, where they were and how far we could chase them. Boone was a hunter of the everything-has-to-be-hard-and-painful-tobe-good variety, and there was nothing he liked better than a sixor seven-hour belly crawl through the soggy green tundra. The weather was almost always bad. If it wasn’t raining, it was sleeting or snowing. If the sun came out, the wind started to blow. We carried heavy packs full of dry and warm clothing, but if we saw some sheep and started stalking them, we had to leave our packs behind so that we’d be less conspicuous, and often we didn’t return to them until after dark. We got our feet wet very early in the day. We carried only enough water so that we were always on the edge of real thirst. We ate Spam for lunch every day, even though smoked baby clams and dried fruit would have weighed considerably less in our backpacks. It seemed important, in fact, not to eat any fruits and vegetables, to climb up and down the steepest part of every mountain, and to nearly always get caught after dark. (162–163)

In her anthology Women on Hunting, Houston talks about her own personal philosophy of hunting. French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan believed that men desire the object of their desire, while women desire the condition of desiring, and this gives women a greater capacity for relishing the hunt. I believe that is why, in so many ancient and contemporary societies, women have been the superior hunters. Good hunting is no more about killing an animal than good sex is about making babies or good writing is about publication. The excitement, even the fulfillment, is in the beauty of the search. While a man tends to be linear about achieving a goal, a woman can be circular and spatial. She can move in many directions at once, she can be many things at once, she can see an object from all sides, and, when it is required, she is able to wait.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 77

Big Game Guide and Bush Pilot 77 Occasionally there is a man who can do these things (most of the male guides I knew were far better at them than I), and he is a pleasure to guide and to learn from. But the majority of my clients started out thinking that hunting is like war. They were impatient like a poor general, impatient like an earnest sergeant who thinks he should be the general, impatient for the sound of his own gun and impatient for the opposition to make a mistake. But the sheep didn’t often make mistakes, and they were as patient as stone. So it was my job to show the hunter that he would be required to choose a different metaphor. If hunting can be like war it can also be like opera, or like fine wine. It can be like out-of-body travel, it can be like the suspension of disbelief. Hunting can be all these things and more; like a woman, it won’t sit down and be just one thing. (x–xi)

In the anthology, Houston includes well-known authors such as Joyce Carol Oates, Margaret Atwood, Louise Erdrich, Annie Dillard, and Terry Tempest Williams. Metaphorically and literally these authors join in the discussion offering perspectives ranging from an environmentalist to a trophy hunter. Nance Van Winckel’s poem “She Who Hunts” describes the hunting experience: 1 She knows to wait in the thicket, to stoop ready among its brambles, soundless as snow. But first, like snow, she must gather herself, a long inhaling for the long letting go, the breath given up into freezing air. Slowly the earth, the earth comes up to meet her. This meeting the hunters call patience. 2 Hours in the thicket. Legs of thorns. Briars up her dead calves. Her back burrowing a nest there, its slow sinking as she listens for deer, light

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 78

78 Alaska’s Women Pilots careful footsteps. With the surprise and strength of her quiet, she calls them. 3 Days of snow. The thicket full, deep around her. Only her eyes, blue blades, cut through the wide white clearing where the one who can no longer resist her vigil must come forward and release her. 4 Or not. That no deer remain. That she will wait for one more new moon to open, or for the starlight of April alone to melt her, return her to her stiff little sac of flesh. And that the earth will fall away into mud, deepening rot, and she in her thicket with it. All that she considers. 5 Disentangling herself from the brambles, she shakes off the white mantle and goes to him. Her hand divides his body, empties him clean. His eyes, the darker black of many nights to come, watch as her knife goes down. And the arrow in her hand again as if it had never left. The weight of snow is a memory on her shoulder, and the fear her arm pulled back, pulled and pulled. How had she let go? How had she sent warm blood rushing into the trees?

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:45 PM

Page 79

Big Game Guide and Bush Pilot 79 And how long before she forgets what she’s done here, how she’s done it. (74–76)

Some hunters believe that because of big game hunting, many caribou or elk won’t starve to death during heavy winter months and suffer a prolonged death. Beryl Markham has much to say about this philosophy of hunting: “As to the brutality of elephanthunting, I cannot see that it is any more brutal than ninety per cent of all other human activities. I suppose there is nothing more tragic about the death of an elephant than there is about the death of a Hereford steer—certainly not in the eyes of the steer. The only difference is that the steer has neither the ability nor the chance to outwit the gentleman who wields the slaughter-house snickersnee, while the elephant has both of these to pit against the hunter” (208). In Alaska the definition of big game for purposes of government regulation includes brown bear, grizzly bear, caribou, moose, black bear, bison, Sitka blacktail deer, elk, mountain goat, musk-ox, Dall sheep, wolf, and wolverine (08.54.790). Qualifying as a registered guide is not an easy feat. One must be twenty-one years of age or older, possess practical field experience with things such as handling firearms, judging trophies, preparing meat and trophies in the field, and administering first aid (08.54.610). A registered guide also must pass oral and written examinations and prove that she has hunted in the state of Alaska for five years. Additional requirements include client recommendations and financial responsibility. Presently there are 476 registered guides in Alaska; 12 are women. Ellie Jones-Elg is one of these distinguished women guides. In May of 1994 Ellie and I planned to rendezvous at bear camp, near Port Moller on the Alaska Peninsula. After a nine-hour flight (two fuel stops) to the middle of nowhere, I’m ready to stretch my legs. We walk the gravel runway carrying my tent, sleeping bag, and backpack. There’s a slight breeze blowing from Milky Valley, and Ellie’s blond hair down to the middle of her back flies behind her stocking hat. If I didn’t know better, I’d think Ellie was fifty instead of in her mid-sixties.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 80

80 Alaska’s Women Pilots

The author’s Super Cub at Ellie’s hunting camp.

On our walk we pass two hunters from Florida. One is an assistant guide who has faithfully hunted with Ellie for many years. The other is a client set on shooting a large brown bear. Both come to the Alaska wilderness to take a break from their busy law firm. It doesn’t matter to them if Ellie’s guide business is a mere semblance of what it used to be nearly twenty years ago. Back then Ellie’s partner, Jack Lee, owned Lee’s Air Service and operated a first-class guiding business, including a furnished lodge, cookhouse, and bathhouse with a gravity-fed water system that pampered guests. Two months before Ellie and Jack were to be married, he was flying his Super Cub airplane up to the glaciers of the Talkeetna Mountains. A Dall sheep hunter and an assistant guide sat in back. Jack circled above a spot where he had landed previously but was overpowered by an undetected headwind. The airplane landed short and started sliding backwards. Jack yelled to his passengers, “Jump out!” Jack could have jumped, but he tried to restart the engine and gain control. It took over two hours for the passengers to descend the rocky side of the glacier. They found Jack unconscious, hanging upside down

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 81

Big Game Guide and Bush Pilot 81

from his seatbelt in the overturned plane. A large portion of his scalp had been peeled off, and he was bleeding badly. When the rescue team arrived thirty hours later, Jack was comatose. He spent the next two years in hospitals and nursing homes. During this time, Ellie refused to give up on him. Finally, she took him home and continued to care for him at home for the next eight years, but he never recovered. Ellie leads me to a flat spot carved out of the gravel bank of a nearby stream for a campsite. The Alaska Peninsula, primarily a mountainous region of nearly fifty volcano peaks, has flat terrain on the Bering Sea side of the peninsula (Smith 165). Ellie helps me set up my tent; I’m happy for this because the wind’s starting to blow and the nylon keeps slipping from my fingertips. After we’re finished, we walk back to my airplane, dig deep into the rock-hard ground, and bury the tiedown anchors. She instructs me to make certain I secure a rope to the gear legs so my Super Cub doesn’t become airborne during the middle of the night. As we work, Ellie tells me how there used to be a furnished cabin (before it burned to the ground) with plenty of bunk beds and soft mattresses. I’ve heard this story before, but perhaps in the retelling there might be a clue uncovered that would indicate how the fire started. After Jack’s accident, competitive outfitters wanted to buy the guiding business, but Ellie wouldn’t sell. Back then premium guide-use areas were valued right up there with oil-producing land: big bucks. To this day there is no closure as to how the fire started. But who could fault Ellie for not selling the guide business and trying to hang onto a lifestyle that fit her personality and need for constant challenge? Understandably, Ellie has difficulty letting go of past memories that highlight a time in her life when she was undeniably happy. After my plane is securely tied for the night, I join Ellie and the hunters for a hot meal, then crawl into my sleeping bag. The flight from Anchorage—the droning of the engine, all those flight hours—got the best of me. But the drumbeat of flapping nylon awakens me in the middle of the night. The blast of wind is more worrisome to me, a pilot, than a brown bear lumbering outside the tent. With a bruin I have some means of protection: a .338 next to my left shoulder. But I’m completely helpless against gale-force

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 82

82 Alaska’s Women Pilots

winds ripping my tiedown anchors out of the ground and lifting, flipping, and smashing my plane into scrap. In a flash I’m reaching for my pants and boots. Ellie is already walking from Super Cub to Super Cub, shining the flashlight at the ropes and anchor points. With each gust of wind, the woven nylon pulls tightly against the wing then flexes once again. For several seconds I watch her silhouette moving underneath a starlit sky. Finally I call her name, just in case she thinks I might be a critter. As Ellie approaches, I flick on my flashlight and direct the beam of light toward her camouflaged overalls with splattered bloodstains near the collar then toward her wind-burned face. She asks me if I’m glad we tied a rope underneath the gear legs of my plane and chuckles. But it isn’t until she leads me toward the cockpit and shines a light at the airspeed indicator that I realize the real danger of the situation: the gauge reads sixty miles per hour. My Super Cub is literally flying, tethered to the ground by a few ropes. This is not my idea of fun, yet Ellie’s eyes sparkle with excitement. To her the wind is exhilarating and poses yet another much-needed challenge to test her preparedness and judgment as a guide.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 83

Ellie Jones-Elg When I was a child, we lived in the Sierra Nevada mountains in California. I used to watch the eagles and just marvel at them soaring over the big tall pine trees, oak trees, fir trees, and cedar trees. Somewhere in my childhood I had this dream that I became a bird; I was soaring over the trees, looking down from about the same height. It was such a vivid dream that I haven’t forgotten it to this day.

I never dreamed about flying in little airplanes until I was invited to an Alaska Airmen’s Association fly-in breakfast in early spring of 1954. The snow looked old; it had a lot of leaves and debris on top. I had absolutely no winter clothes, so I borrowed a parka, fur mukluks, and fur mittens to keep warm. We took off on skis from Merrill Field, which was a very small airport at the time. The flight was a real thrilling experience because in a J-3 Cub you have so much visibility with tandem seating. You’re sitting right there next to a window on each side of you, and you can look straight down. I wasn’t frightened though. Once we took off, I got used to the feel of the lightness of being airborne and eased in. We flew over Cook Inlet, flew on north right up to Skwentna, and landed after circling the field a couple of times. Parked the plane. There were a lot of other people there with planes. They had their pancake breakfast, which I thought was really nice. It wasn’t a real cold day, thank goodness, but the parka and the mukluks really felt good. I first wanted to learn to fly when my husband and I homesteaded. The only way we could get there, except by boat and walking, was to fly in. So my husband said, “Well, we’re both gonna start taking flying lessons.” We contacted Bud Rude, who was a captain 83

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

Ellie Jones-Elg.

12:46 PM

Page 84

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 85

Ellie Jones-Elg 85

on Northern Consolidated Airlines and had his own little airplane and gave lessons. We started taking lessons in a ninety horsepower Aeronica Champ. It had no electrical system at all. You had to hand prop it to get it started. No radio, no lights, nothing. Bud was a very good instructor but tough. That’s why he was good. He didn’t allow you to get away with anything. I mean, if you did something wrong, he stayed right on you until you did it right. I remember that he was teaching me to do steep turns. I had about four hours of time and didn’t quite understand what he meant by “keep the nose up.” He kept saying, “Keep the nose up.” I hadn’t quite got the feel of it. It was wintertime, and I had a parka on. Of course he’s sitting in the backseat in this tandem; I’m sitting in the front seat. He grabs the hood on my parka and starts pulling back. “When I say ‘get the nose up’,” he says, “pull the stick back.” He pulled the hood on my coat, which pulled me back. Of course I’m hanging onto the stick, so I’m pulling the stick back. I’ll never forget that as long as I live. He didn’t yell being mean. He just didn’t want me to learn improperly or get bad habits. Once you repeat a mistake, you keep doing it wrong, and it’s harder and harder to do it right. So if you do something wrong once, he doesn’t want you to do it wrong twice. That was his theory of teaching, and it was a good theory. I guess I was a good student, because it didn’t take long for me to catch what he was trying to say. I had about six hours total time and he soloed me. I was so astounded. We went around the pattern—I don’t know how many times, that particular day—doing landings. He says, “Well, I’m ready for a cup of coffee. I’m gonna rest a little bit. Pull over here by the tower.” So he climbed out. I started to get out, and he said, “No, you stay in there. Go around the pattern once.” And I—I’m shocked because I had no idea that I was ready to solo. Just around the pattern. Not to go out and fly, but just around the pattern. My words to him were, “Do you think I’m ready to go by myself?” He said, “You think I’d turn you loose in my airplane to wreck if I didn’t think you were ready?” I remember it made my husband so mad because I soloed way before he did. Of course he was a real macho-type person, and it just bugged him no end that I was soloed out first. It was simply

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 86

86 Alaska’s Women Pilots

because he was too hardheaded to listen. Same instructor. Same airplane. This Bud, who’s our instructor, was trying to teach him like he was trying to teach me. My husband didn’t like being talked to that way. So he would flare up and get mad. When you get angry at things, you don’t learn. He must have had twelve to fourteen hours before he soloed, simply because he wouldn’t listen. After soloing, I don’t remember how many hours I flew, forty hours maybe. I just got my solo cross-country out of the way and a few more hours dinking around, when my husband and I decided to buy our own airplane. We bought a brand new 1957 Super Cub for $6,500. It was an agricultural model and still had the spray booms attached. They removed all the dusting and spraying equipment so we could use it for our homestead. On our homestead, the first strip we cleared was 450 feet. It was right at the corner of the 160 acres and near a natural clearing. We bought one of those surplused Army weasels, which is a track machine that the Army had for cross-country, an all-terrain type vehicle. We hauled in building material and made a little twelve-bysixteen cabin. That was when I still had a student license and learned how to land on this short runway. We had tundra tires on the airplane, which helped. That winter we put the airplane on skis, and we started landing on the frozen swamp behind our cabin. And I remember our airspeed indicator got water in it, froze up, and quit working. I flew all winter without an airspeed indicator, landing on the swamp in the back. That was kind of where I learned to feel what the airplane was doing. That’s critical in learning to fly small airplanes. You don’t fly it by the numbers; you fly it by feel. Seat-ofyour-pants. So we homesteaded, and I went in and renewed my student license and was working on my second one when I decided, “I’d better get my private pilot’s license.” My new flight instructor looked in my logbook, and said, “Well, you haven’t had crosswind landings. You haven’t had soft-field landings, short-field landings.” And I said, “We bought our own airplane, and I’ve been doing short-field landings. And I’ve been doing crosswind landings, but I don’t have anything logged where I’ve been instructed.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 87

Ellie Jones-Elg 87

So we got all that done. He recommended me for my test flight. I had this FAA flight test man by the name of Goobler. I’ll never forget it. Anyway, we went out, and we flew around, and everything went fine. We came back and landed. I’m tying the plane up. He said, “I don’t see anywhere in your logbook that you had instruction in hand starting.” I said, “Is that required?” “Well, I require it. You’ve got to be able to hand prop that airplane by yourself, from behind the prop and from in front of the prop.” So my instructor gave me thirty minutes of hand propping the airplane, which I was able to do. Thank goodness I was strong enough because that 150-horsepower engine is pretty tough sometimes from behind the prop. Front is not so hard because you can get your leg up in the air and get a good whip at it. Right away I went back to the FAA with my logbook. They signed me off for my private pilot’s license. But in ‘59, ‘60, ‘61, and ‘62, I just flew intermittently. After my husband got his private pilot’s license, he didn’t want to sit in the backseat. He wanted to do all the flying. So I didn’t get a lot of flying during those years. Then I got a divorce. After the smoke settled, I ended up with the airplane and half of the homestead. To make a long story short, I didn’t really have the money to fly, to spend on gas and maintenance. So I didn’t do much flying then. Then, lo and behold, I got married again to a man that liked boats, hunting, and fishing. We had a lot of things in common, but he wasn’t a pilot. So my flying still took a backseat. But I still had the airplane. Well, I went to get the plane annualed, and it wouldn’t pass the fabric-punch test. It had to be recovered. So I pulled the wings off, took it home, put the wings up in the attic of the garage and set the fuselage out in the yard and covered it with a tarp. It sat there for a couple years. And then I said, I can’t let it sit there and deteriorate any further. So I got a job working for the city of Anchorage and earned enough money to get a new fabric job [for the airplane]. I had F. Atlee Dodge—Old Man Dodge as they call him—recover the airplane. I designed the paint scheme. He did a good paint job: the wings and fuselage, the whole thing. Put it back together. Since he

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 88

88 Alaska’s Women Pilots

didn’t have any place to store it, he told me to pick it up at eight in the morning at O’Malley Airstrip and fly it to Merrill Field. I said, “I don’t have a radio.” He told me to call Merrill Field tower on the phone before takeoff and tell them, “I’m ferrying an airplane without a radio.” So I did that. I hadn’t flown in over three years. I get in it, and I fire it up to check it out. Take off down the runway. Hmmm . . . Wobbling back and forth a little bit. But it came back quickly. Of course Merrill [Field] told me to enter the pattern a certain way, and I did, so they gave me a green light. Green light to land; red light to go around. I got over there and landed. But fixing the airplane didn’t help my marriage. My husband wasn’t fond of flying, so I had to either go by myself or not go. Turned out that he was a very jealous person, and I didn’t dare take another man with me flying. So if I could find a lady that wanted to, fine. I did have one friend who went with me once, just flew around. There again, I let a man inhibit my flying. I married in ‘63 and by ‘68 the marriage was falling apart after a lot of turmoil. I could see that the airplane was going to be a conflict. So I sold the airplane that I worked my butt off to get the fabric put on it and to get it flying. Got the same amount of money that I paid for it brand new—$6,500—with new fabric on it and very low-time engine. Anyway I sold it, and of course it didn’t help the marriage any. I mean it was naught really because the marriage fell apart anyway. After selling the airplane, I went almost five years without flying. Didn’t have an airplane. Couldn’t afford to go rent one. That was one of the periods of my life where I was in turmoil, kind of like a cork on the open ocean, floating, bobbing around, not having any real direction. I worked at a couple of different jobs. For about three months, I played the drums with a country-western group. Had a ball. It was fun for a short period of time. But that was not my type of life. I was an outdoor person. A musician’s life is night life, and it wasn’t my kind of life. But I really enjoyed the music end of it and the challenge that it presented. I’d never had a music lesson in my life. I picked up the set of drumsticks in a jamboree one time and started

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 89

Ellie Jones-Elg 89

Ellie flying for Lee’s Air Service.

beating on the drums and just loved it! But I wanted to get back into flying. In 1972 I was working in the office of Pat’s Flying Service at Merrill Field doing bookwork, just to be near airplanes. They encouraged me, saying that if I would continue my flight training— get my commercial license and flight instructor rating—they would hire me as a flight instructor. That was the encouragement I needed to continue my training. I flew there the rest of that year, ‘72 and into the spring of ‘73. Flight instructing to me was a way of learning. But I was getting a little bored with the repetition of teaching primary students over and over—turns about a point and lazy eights. Flight instructing is hours and hours of pure boredom punctuated by moments of pure panic. And you’re really not doing the flying when you’re teaching. The student’s doing the flying, and you’re just there trying to see that they do it right. That really was not my cup of tea. After 300 hours of flight instructing, I got my float rating. I loved teaching floats because students already had a pilot’s license so they knew how to fly the plane. I could just concentrate on teaching

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 90

90 Alaska’s Women Pilots

them how to get on and off the water and the safe way of doing the different glassy-water landings and rough-water landings. That was a lot more adventuresome because float flying is not landing on prescribed airports, with certain-sized runways and all that prescribed for you. It’s learning to read the water on the lakes, on the rivers. It was a lot more challenging. So little by little, I got my wheel primary students to the point of getting their checkrides. I didn’t want to take on any new students, so finally I migrated to Lake Hood and learned to fly a Cessna 180 on floats. I got checked out in that plane to do charter work. So my first, oh, I’d say twenty hours or so, was done flying freight—camp gear and rafting equipment—until I got more comfortable flying a larger plane. I got proficient at that, and finally I was flying customers and going into the rivers. I migrated then into the Cessna 185, which was a little heavier airplane, more powerful, and a bit more complicated with a fuel injection system. I got checked out in that, flying charter flights and giving float ratings in the summer. That was when I went to work for Jack Lee, owner of Lee’s Air Service and master guide. He owned a lodge up in the Talkeetna Mountains and also hunting camps down on the Alaska Peninsula. During hunting season, the charter business was closed down, and he would concentrate on flying hunters into his hunting camps and lodge. Of course I went right along with the troops. My stepdad was a hunter. As a child, I remember we lived on a lot of deer meat. Well, it was back in the later part of the Depression and money wasn’t very plentiful. So having deer meat to live on really helped. But he couldn’t afford for all the kids to have rifles. So we’d go along on the hunt, and we would play dog. We’d walk through the brush piles and chase the deer out. My first year at Lee’s Air Service, I got my assistant guide license because Mr. Lee thought it would be advantageous to have another assistant guide in camp. I just did a little bit of guiding to start with, not much. I was basically hired to do the flying. I just loved it. Every flight I made was a new challenge and a new experience. I really excelled at it because I enjoyed learning so much. And I’ve always had a good sense of balance and a good sense of judging

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 91

Ellie Jones-Elg 91

distance. I was able to get into some of the small lakes that Mr. Lee, at first, didn’t want to let me go into because he wasn’t sure of my ability. Little by little I proved to him that I could do it. I was flying in and out of all the places that he took his clients. After a couple years, I was basically doing most of the flying, and he was doing the P.R. work at the lodge and running the business. I’ve got many, many hours flying in the Talkeetna Mountains, landing on all the little lakes and streams and the Talkeetna River. Through the charter work, I was taking float trips up to float the Deshka, the Talachulitna River, Lake Creek, Alexander Creek, all the rivers that were being floated at the time. Got a lot of experience with river landings. During the fall and the spring, we’d put the Super Cubs on big tundra tires. We’d fly down to his hunting camp on the Alaska Peninsula, between Port Heiden and Port Moller on the Bristol Bay side. Got a lot of experience there flying the Super Cubs, landing on small strips anywhere from 300 feet to 800 feet. That was flying camp gear, hunters, and guides into these places. A lot of these places were untried. You’d fly over it and make low passes, doublecheck your distance, say, “Okay I can get into that one,” and make your approach and land in a place you’d never been before and neither had anyone else that you knew of. So it was all trial and error. The challenges were just tremendous. I guess that’s where I thrived. If I had to go in and out of the same airport day after day after day, it would just become so boring to me. I had never had the desire to fly a twin-engine airplane and go into an airline job. The airlines were a boring way to go. There are so many more challenges in bush flying. You had to make personal judgments. You had to fly over the ground and figure out things yourself—the condition of the soil, the touchdown point. I’ve flown in onto cinder bars that were good and solid on the upper end of it and so soft on the other end that you couldn’t even taxi. Cinder bars are the open patches of volcanic gravel encircled by low tundra. The whole Aleutian Range consists of active volcanoes. Right behind one of our cabins, close to the Muddy River, is Mount Veniaminof volcano. On many occasions it spouts smoke and steam. This whole peninsula is basically a bed of volcanic rock. Most of it is covered with tundra or swamp or

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 92

92 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Ellie loading her rifle.

whatever, but a lot of it is just open patches of this gravel. It’s good landing strips if you know how to read it. One time, I got tricked. I was taxiing the plane and almost buried a wheel in soft sand. It was after a rain, and the water hadn’t drained off so it was like a bog. One wheel caught, and it took full power to get out of there to dry ground. To look at it, you’d never know it was like that. It looked like all the other ground except it had a slightly darker tinge to it. That was another lesson learned. You just hope you don’t wreck an airplane in some of the lessons that you learn out there. It can be very unsettling to land somewhere and find that you’ve got soft terrain to go through to get out. Flying for Lee’s Air Service started my activities in guiding and flying. A registered big game guide is licensed to have clients and to be financially remunerated for it. In other words, they pay you to take them out, and it depends on the contract that you have with the client. Our contracts called for us to furnish everything except their rifle, ammunition, personal effects, and clothing. We also picked them up at the airport if need be. In the case of our Alaska

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 93

Ellie Jones-Elg 93

Peninsula hunters, we had them purchase their tickets all the way to Port Heiden on Reeve Aleutian Airways because that was the only commercial airline that flew into that airport at the time. We would fly in with the Cubs from camp and pick them up. That was for brown bear, moose, and caribou. We’d have the camp set up and assistant guides ready to personally guide them in the field. A tenday hunt was minimum because Alaska has a lot of inclement weather: winds, storms. And if it wasn’t stormy or windy, it was foggy. A lot of days, you couldn’t fly or even get out of your tent. So we always insisted that they book at least ten days. Then, of course, if they got their game sooner, they could leave earlier. When I started guiding back in the seventies, the price for a brown bear hunt was $4,000 or $5,000. Now they’re up to $9,000 or $10,000. Over the years they kept going up and up. People gasp when I tell them how much they are. Ten thousand dollars for a bear hunt! Unless you’ve really been into hunting, you don’t understand the costs involved. When you’re talking about airplanes, you’re talking about $40,000 to perhaps $100,000 for these tiny, two-place airplanes. The cost of insurance, whether you fly one hour or five hundred hours, is staggering. Your liability insurance is very expensive, and the guide outfitters now have to have a separate insurance policy. It’s necessary to obtain a permit to operate on any land, including campsite permits, which you have to pay lots of money for, plus the expense of shipping all of your supplies. There is no grocery store down there to run to. You have to ship every bit of your supplies via air. Shipping used to cost nearly eighty-three cents a pound. You buy a pound of margarine at this grocery story, and you’d pay, I don’t remember what you paid for it then, just say, eighty cents for a pound of margarine. It cost you eighty-three cents to get it down there. And it cost more than what you paid for the head of lettuce or whatever. I recall in later years of my guiding hardly breaking even after I covered all my fixed costs and all my operational costs. At the end, I’d pay my guides; they’d end up making more money than I made. It was very disheartening to work so hard and take so many risks with my life and my airplane and still not make any money by the time the season’s over.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 94

94 Alaska’s Women Pilots

One time I had a lady client from Texas. She was sixty-three and had arthritis in her back real bad. She told me that I’d have to get her within a hundred yards of an animal without walking very far. We had a spike camp already set up near the mountains. I said, “Okay, you and I are going caribou hunting.” (Because the caribou would just meander all around that camp.) “All we have to do is sit and wait a little while and there’ll be caribou come along.” I got her inside the airplane, threw in food and sleeping bags, and flew her to the spike camp. For privacy I set her up in a tent by herself, and I took the cook tent. During the night we heard some really strange noises. The next morning we got up, and there were bear tracks all around our tents. She told me about the noises and didn’t realize bears came so close. She was really shook. I said, “They probably smelled us and came to investigate.” But she didn’t want to spend any more nights out. She wanted me to fly her back to our cabin. I said, “Well, I’ll take you back, but we’re going hunting today and get you a double-shovel caribou. You stay here in camp and rest, and I’m gonna go to the top of this little hill right here by the tents and look around.” So I got up there and I saw a little band of caribou. There was a fair-sized bull in charge of this group of female caribou. So I went back and told her to get her rifle. I got my packboard. The weather was kind of iffy with rain showers. So I threw our rain gear in. I had her wear hip boots because there were a couple of little creeks we’d have to cross. So I got all my skinning knives and whetstones and sharpening tools. I carried my rifle and ammo. She says, “Now I can’t walk very far. If it’s very far, I can’t go.” “It’s not very far,” I said. “I saw them right from the top of this hill.” “Well, if you’re sure it’s not very far, I’ll go.” So I started her walking. We walked slowly, and she just took her time. A couple of times she’d fall down and could hardly get up. She wouldn’t let me help her either. She had too much pride. “No, no,” she says, “I have a way of getting up by myself.” So she’d kind of roll around and get on her knees, and she’d get up. We’d get going again. I could tell she had pain in her back.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 95

Ellie Jones-Elg 95

We crept around and got up on the backside of this hill. I knew the caribou were right up on the other side. Well, what I didn’t know was that she had to shoot from a standing position. She couldn’t sit, she couldn’t kneel, and she couldn’t lie down. I said, “Oh wow. We need to get you down on your hands and knees so you can creep up to the top of the hill for a shot.” She says, “Oh, I can’t. I gotta stand up.” So I said, “You’re gonna have a hard time hitting this animal from this distance with the wind blowing from a standing position, off hand shooting [without the benefit of a hand rest]. But we’ve come this far and we’re not going home because of a little obstacle like this. We’re gonna get you where you can shoot.” So I get her there. I had her wait down below a little bit where I knew she wasn’t visible to the animals. Then I went up on my hands and knees and peeked over the edge to find the bull. I wanted to know exactly where he was before she started walking. I found him, and he was trying to chase a young bull off all the time so he was meandering around. The cows were all around him, feeding. So I went back and whispered, “The bull’s right there. I’ll get you right to the point where you can stand up and see the bull and shoot, just over the crest of the hill.” She said, “Well, I don’t know if I can do that. That’s a long ways up to the top of that hill.” I said, “No it isn’t. Just take one little step at a time. We’ve got all afternoon to do this.” I’d say, “Don’t rush. Just take your time,” because she was getting tired. I warned her that this was gonna be tough. But we’ll do it. I’m gonna get her up there. Even if we’re seen, and they start running, at least we tried. I get her up there, and she’s standing up there, and of course the wind is bobbing us around. So she gets up there, and it takes her five minutes to get herself in a position holding the rifle and everything. I can see the barrel wobbling around and everything. She finally squeezes off a shot. I hear it hit. I’m looking; I’m trying to watch the bull. Of course all the heads come up on the other animals. They wonder, where’d that shot come from? Anyway, they’re kind of curious and they’re kind of huffing and puffing and running around trying to find us because the wind was in our favor. I had the wind in our face so they couldn’t smell us.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 96

96 Alaska’s Women Pilots

She says, “Oh, I missed it.” So she shoots again, and this time it hits him, but it hits him in the back leg. The animal starts running around. I say, “I think you hit it, but shoot it again. Shoot it again. You’ve gotta kill it. You can’t let it run off wounded.” She says, “I can’t hit a moving animal.” I say, “Well, try!” I’m getting a little exasperated by this time. She’s up there; she’s trying to follow the animal with the rifle scope. You can see her. Finally she squeezes off another bullet, and it goes off in the dirt somewhere. The animal starts to run off. So I said, “Okay, you stay right here.” I left my pack frame and everything there, reached for my rifle, and took off after the animal. By this time he was heading off toward another hill to the left. He was heading between a couple of smaller hills around this other hill. I didn’t want him to get away with that broken leg. So I take off as fast as I can go. I’m wearing cold weather gear because it’s probably maybe forty degrees out there and blowing. I’m huffing and puffing, and I’m running after this animal. So I catch my breath and sneak around the hill. I come around, and it’s lying down. It looked dead so I wave back to the hunter. I had my hands full getting it gutted, skinned, and cut up so it could be carried. I was just starting to cut up the pieces when Jack flew over in our Cessna 180, and he saw us down there. He knew where we were, so he was over checking on us to make sure we were okay. He saw us out there with the animal and found a place to land on a river bar, a lot closer than going all the way back to the camp. So he lands out there and hikes over. He knows I’ve got the animal so he brings another packboard. By this time, my lady hunter comes up. Then we got the caribou packed to the 180, including antlers and meat, and walk back to camp. When we arrive, she says, “Well that was quite a ways. How far was that?” I said, “Oh, you probably walked two and a half miles.” “I didn’t,” she says. “I couldn’t walk that far.” And I said, “Well, I’m sorry. You did.” One of the most stressful hunting seasons that I remember was right after Jack had his accident, two months before we were to be

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 97

Ellie Jones-Elg 97

Ellie’s catch.

married. He was in the nursing home, and I was trying to run the business myself. So I flew the Cub to bear camp on the Alaska Peninsula with an assistant guide, three days ahead of the hunters’ arrival. Lo and behold, we had a huge storm come up, and I watched the winds pick up from twenty to thirty-five to fifty miles per hour. My plane was literally flying off the end of its tiedown ropes. I knew it was bad from listening to our portable radio. We heard that Reeve Aleutian Airways did not fly into Port Heiden for two days because of hundred-mile-an-hour winds, so strong that the buildings flipped over, right off of their foundations. Finally the winds calmed down so I flew to Port Heiden with my Cub. I arrived early because I thought, “Now maybe they shipped my stuff,” and I could get a couple flights in before the clients arrived. But the mail goes first, passengers second, and freight last. Come to find out, everything arrived all at once. So here I had three clients to haul to camp and all my freight. I made four trips and carried as much stuff as I could get into the airplane so they would have food in camp. I had small amounts of flour and coffee and sugar, things like that, in camp from the prior year. It

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 98

98 Alaska’s Women Pilots

wasn’t as if they would starve. Flew right up ‘til dark but still left boxes of food and gear. And then the next day, I flew everybody over to the valley and set up tents. I took a guide first, as many tents as I could, and then hunters. You can’t hunt and fly the same day [because too many animals are killed, and authorities and sportsmen demand fair chase] so they had to overnight the first day of the season. But it ended up that we had a halfway successful season. Two out of three hunters got animals. When it was time for them to go home, I had made arrangements with an air charter service to come in with a Cessna 180 and help me transport people back to Port Heiden. I said, “Okay you guys, I’m going to start a little early getting your gear out. Now you just keep your sleeping bag, little ditty bag, maybe a change of clothes with you, and I’ll take the rest. Then the 180 will be able to take all three of you in one load.” So I load all their extra gear in the Cub. I take off, and it’s a little bit windy back in the valley, maybe fifteen miles per hour, which is no wind at all basically. I get over the ridge coming out of Milky River Valley, and I look down at Sandy Lake, and it’s just black. I said, “Wow, it must be a pretty good wind.” By the time I get over the ridge, I start rocking and rolling with the gusts. I’m flying along, and I’m just bouncing and bumping, looking down at the terrain. My ground speed is not going very fast. Under normal circumstances, I’ve got plenty of fuel to make Port Heiden. But with such a strong headwind, I won’t have enough gas to get there. At this point I’m flying over the flats where the calving grounds are for the caribou. It’s real flat country, and I’m looking down at these caribou. I’m flying along just hanging there, bouncing around, and I look down and see the same caribou! Gosh, they were right there, and now they’re still there, and I’ve been flying for five minutes. What’s going on here? I look ahead of me and there’s dirt blowing up off of the Muddy River flats coming down off the glacier. Just blowing dirt. I said, “Oh my gosh! I’m really heading for some wind.” So I struggle for like thirty minutes more and I get to the other side of the Muddy. Up ahead I see our cabin and strip where I had flown the hunters into at the beginning of the hunt. Of course the little

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 99

Ellie Jones-Elg 99

cabin is still pretty far away, and I’m a long ways from Port Heiden. So I’m bouncing along, crabbing into the wind. Near the cabin, it’s blowing about ninety degrees opposite to what it was coming down out of the valley. I’m looking at the waves on the lake and realize the wind’s blowing directly crosswind of the runway. Then I remember some places that I had picked out and marked with surveyor tape years ago. I always said, “If I ever get in a bind here, get here with a real bad crosswind, I can set it down.” So I’m looking for my markers, and I’m bouncing up and down. I’m playing the throttle, and I’m playing the controls, and I’m just kind of hovering. Finally I spot one piece of surveyor tape. It looks like the smoothest spot so I aim for that. So I kept nursing it down, playing the throttle, playing the controls, and I land in about thirty-five feet, right in the tiedowns. The wind’s blowing so strong that once I’m on the ground, I’m afraid to get out of the airplane. So I taxi real carefully, real slowly, a little past where the tiedowns are because I know it’s gonna roll back. So I wait for a lull in the wind, jump out, and just barely get a rope on the right wing. I’m running around trying to grab the other strut, and the wind is pushing the plane around. I have just enough rope to get it through the tiedown ring and get a hold of it. Then I start cinching it down. Every time a lull would come in the wind, I’d pull the wing forward a little bit more. Finally all the ropes were attached and the plane secured. I ended up spending the day there. When the wind started dropping, I thought, “Well, maybe I still have enough daylight left to get into Port Heiden.” But the sun was getting pretty low in the sky. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I’m walking around out there, and I’m depressed because I’m under a lot of stress with people depending on me. I’m wondering, “Well, what are they gonna think? I didn’t get their gear to the airport.” I was walking around, trying to figure out what to do next. This is the part that to this day I’ll never forget. It was a very spiritual experience. I was on my knees. I was pounding a stake into the ground to put a piece of surveyor tape on it to mark my crosswind runway. That flight I had made just sapped me of all my strength. I was at an emotional low point. And I looked up over the Aleutian

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 100

100 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Range, and here was a set of praying hands: the thumbs, thumbnail, the knuckles, everything in this cloud above the mountains, in the perfect shape of praying hands. I even put my hands together and held them up and compared it. It was like, “I must be dreaming this. I have to be dreaming this.” I mean, I had goose bumps all over me. I turn around, and I looked all around me, and I couldn’t find another cloud. I turned cold; I turned hot. I started crying. And when I looked up and saw those praying hands, I almost melted. It was like, “Oh my God!” I literally yelled. There was no one around—me and the birds maybe. I yelled, “I know you’re there, God!” I just yelled it because I was so keyed up. It was like, “Can I keep going? Can I keep up this pace? Can I do everything I know I gotta do?” And there too, I was thinking, “God, why are you putting up obstacles for me? Why are you making it tough for me? Why did you bring this wind up? I didn’t need this wind!” All of these questions were going through my mind, and then I looked up and said, “Well, I know you’re there, God.” And the praying hands said, “Pray about it.” And you know what? The most perfect calm came over me. I said, “I know you’re there God. Why am I worrying so much? Why am I so distraught? Why don’t I just lean back and let what happens happen. Just be as safe as I can possibly be. I know how to fly. I know when to fly and when not to fly. Just do what I gotta do.” And I became so peaceful that I went back to the cabin, fixed some food, and slept like a baby. I just felt like God had put his hands out to me or something. It was a turning point, where I just started having a different outlook and was better able to deal with problems. I think I got my adventurous blood, if you want to call it so, from my mother. She was one of thirteen children who lived on a farm back in Missouri until she moved to California. She was the most adventurous of all the thirteen kids. She was the first one ever to take a motorcycle ride. She was the first one to ever get in an airplane and take an airplane ride. She was the first one to ever learn to drive. She was the middle child. She had six children older than her that never learned to do any of these things. None of them was adventurous. They were kind of, I don’t know, stick-in-the-muds.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 101

Ellie Jones-Elg 101

I’m not much into horoscopes and things like that, but my mother and I were born under the same sign. We’re both Aries: aggressive, outgoing people, supposedly leaders. I have a sister who was born in November, and she and I are completely different. Just almost 180 degrees. Although she was a hunter. She liked fishing. She was an outdoor person. Liked horses. I always envied my sister because growing up she had horses, and I always wanted a horse of my own. When I was about thirteen, fourteen years old, my father gave me five dollars a month to buy a horse. My uncle had some horses, so I bought a yearling and kept it at his ranch. Now I had a horse, but I was living in Alameda, California, in the San Francisco Bay area, and going to school. One Easter vacation we were headed up to where my uncle had his ranch. He saw us coming up the road. He was in his big truck and stopped. He said he had some bad news for me, that my horse had been shot by somebody. It was on open range, and they had shot it from the highway. Must have thought it was a deer or something because they shot it at night and left it lay alongside the road. I was crushed: my one and only chance to have a horse of my own. So I grew up without a horse. But when I came to Alaska and started flying, I said, “You know, now I have a lot of horses—150 horses—under the cowl of my airplane.” I never looked back and felt bad about not having a horse. In Alaska I used my airplane like a cowboy might use his horse. [The airplane] took me places that I wanted to go. And if any inanimate object has a soul or feelings, I feel close to my airplane, like it was part of me. If it wasn’t for my airplane, I couldn’t have done all those things. It always bothered me to “ride it hard and put it away wet,” like the old saying you ride a horse to death. Well, I didn’t like doing that. I liked to take care of my airplane. If you take care of it, it’ll take care of you. That was the theory of the old cowboys. The cowboys took care of their horses before they ever took care of themselves. They made sure their horses were rubbed down and fed and put to bed before they ever took care of themselves. That’s how they were able to keep going and keep a horse on its feet. I look at my airplane just as if it were my horse. Make sure it’s tied down good. Check its oil. Make sure I don’t ask it to do

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 102

102 Alaska’s Women Pilots

something it’s not capable of doing. When I was flying daily—air taxi during the summer and guiding during the fall and spring—I felt very confident. I didn’t attempt to do something I had no experience in. I didn’t jump into a twin-engine airplane and say, “Oh, I know how to fly this.” I didn’t. At one point in time I would have put myself against any bush pilot in Alaska. I felt that confident about my flying abilities. The advice I’d give to women today is to stick with a goal and not let other people discourage you. The influence of other people is very important. Stay with people who are positive. If you get around negative people, you’ll cave in eventually, somewhere down the road unless you really have a lot of perseverance. It’s so easy to be influenced, and you might as well be influenced toward the positive.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 103

Private Pilot Since Kitty Hawk, December 17, 1903, Americans have been obsessed with recreational flying. The Wright Brothers—who designed, manufactured, and sold bicycles—offered the freedom of the air and adventures around the globe with their flying machine. One of these adventurers was la Baronne de Laroche of France, who in 1910 became the first licensed female pilot in the world. A year later an American named Harriet Quimby earned her certificate and successfully flew the English Channel. Before the event, an Englishman who acted as her advisor offered to dress in Harriet’s purple outfit and take her place in the pilot seat, but she refused (Lopez 64–65). Harriet later joined the exhibition team of the Moisant International Aviators and subsequently died at a BostonHarvard meet when severe turbulence pitched her out of the cockpit. Recreational pilots each possess amazing aerial recollections. One of my most exciting happened during my first week of private pilot lessons. One afternoon shortly after my instructor signed me off for solo flight, I practiced slow flights and stalls over the practice area. Fruit trees, barns, and horses dotted the countryside. The instant I felt the airplane shudder and drop off to one side, I knew I was in trouble. 103

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 104

104 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Harriet Quimby.

As the windshield became one blob of green patchwork revolving in circles like a kaleidoscope, I realized the airplane and I were wound together in a tight spin. The small of my back pushed against the seat. Blood rushed toward my head. The spinning world outside the cockpit slowed down to one, two, three revolutions. My flight instructor’s voice came to me: “Fly the plane. Neutralize the yoke. Opposite rudder.” I did these tasks, trembling. My heart raced. This is not a maneuver I’m supposed to practice alone, not with only fifteen hours of flight time. Fear, that old ally that protects us from danger but prevents us from getting what we want, kicked in. As the wings leveled—throttle back, airspeed dropping—I climbed once again to 2,500 feet and executed a series of stall-spins until my stomach quieted and my shoulders relaxed. I was safe for the moment, but the truth is, as a pilot the simplest of aerial maneuvers can put us in precarious circumstances. Gravity is always waiting to bring us back to earth—to take away our wings. This is evident in the life of Bessie Coleman, the first African-American woman aviator.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 105

Private Pilot 105

Bessie Coleman.

Bessie must have felt some fear when she died in a practice parachute jump in 1926. Did she try pulling the ripcord again and again to no avail? Perhaps she accepted her fate with the utmost courage seconds before hitting the ground. Then again, maybe she regretted jumping out of a perfectly safe flying airplane. We may never know what she felt in these final moments, but we do know

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 106

106 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Patrice Clarke-Washington.

she received her pilot certificate in 1921 and that she went to France to get it because of discrimination in the United States against her gender and race (Russo 11). She later returned to America and joined the show circuit as a barnstormer, flying a World War I trainer Curtiss JN-4 called “Jenny.” Carolyn Russo’s Women and Flight: Portraits of Contemporary Women Pilots features Patrice Clarke-Washington, the only AfricanAmerican woman flying with the rank of captain for a major airline in the United States. Patrice flies a DC-8 for United Parcel Service (UPS) and is based in Louisville, Kentucky. In her interview with Russo, she states the following: The Organization of Black Airline Pilots addresses some of the special needs of black pilots in the industry. The group is small. There are only about six hundred black airline pilots nationwide, at the major airline level. The first woman was not hired by the airlines until 1973. Blacks just got the right to vote, you know, not

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 107

Private Pilot 107 too many decades ago. It takes time. Not that it’s right, not that it’s acceptable, but it’s just the way it is. Quite frequently blacks are told, no, they can’t do it. There are ten or eleven of us, African-American females, flying for the major airlines today. Most of the discrimination is extremely subtle. For the most part, I’ve never had anyone come to me and say, “You are female and/or you are black; therefore, you can’t do this.” (51)

It is unfortunate that my research at universities, schools, and aviation training facilities—even as we head into the twenty-first century—has not uncovered any African-American women pilots (recreational or commercial) residing in Alaska at this time. The history of certified women pilots in Alaska begins with Irene Ryan, who once worked as a waitress and bank teller to earn money for flying lessons. On July 26, 1932, Ryan soloed at Star Air Service at Merrill Field. Despite ample opportunities for bush flying in Alaska, she decided to remain a recreational pilot, earn a degree at the New Mexico School of Mines, and work as a geological engineer in the Far North. In the fifties, she worked as a state legislator and became Alaska’s first woman senator. A day or two after Ryan soloed, Mary Worthylake not only soloed in a Fleet bi-plane at Star Air Service, but completed the task after only seven hours of instruction. Soon after, she became the first licensed aviatrix in Alaska. In an excerpt from her interview in Gerry Bruder’s Heroes of the Horizon: Flying Adventures of Alaska’s Legendary Bush Pilots, Mary talks of the early days of aviation: Six weeks after [her] first lesson, a federal inspector arrived in Anchorage on a periodic visit to the Territory and administered written exams to her and other students. She passed easily. “He said he was going to be there two weeks, and I thought, well, I’ll have that much time to practice before the flight test. That morning Steve called and said, “Mary, I want you out here at the field to take your test.” I said, “Oh no, I need some more solo,” and he said, “I’m coming to get you right now.” It happened that the first four fellows had flunked, and he figured that if I knew that, I might chicken out. The first one was a blustering German who

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 108

108 Alaska’s Women Pilots had thirty-five hours of solo, and he was very cocky and sure he was going to be good. He was the first up for his license and he had failed it. “The inspector told me to go up and make I’ve forgotten how many spirals and come down and land right in front of the McGee [Airways] hangar. When I came down and got out, he started to write a Letter of Authority and I said, “You mean I passed?” and he said yes. That was when Steve told me about the others. Only four out of twelve passed altogether.” (230)

Even attaining the certification for private pilot is not a simple task. According to the Federal Aviation Regulations Part 61.103, a private pilot must be at least seventeen years old; read, speak, and understand English; hold a third-class medical; and pass a written, oral, and flight test. A total of forty hours of flight time, including twenty hours of flight instruction and twenty hours of solo time, is needed before a fly-girl achieves eligibility status for a private pilot license. “One flight of at least 300 nautical miles with landings at a minimum of three points, one of which is at least 100 nautical miles from the original departure point” (61.109). To accomplish these requisites in Alaska, most Anchoragebased students living in the largest city in the Far North tend to depart Merrill Field, fly to Homer, Skwentna, and return or fly to Talkeetna, Glennallen, and return. Unlike the Lower 48, where the possibilities are limitless because of a plethora of road systems and paved strips, Alaskan student pilots have fewer options. Most flight schools do not allow students to land their planes on unimproved strips or even gravel runways because the wear and tear on the planes is cost prohibitive. To replace a prop that has received multiple nicks, costs $2,000. For a majority of pilots in the Lower 48, night flying means that time of the day between sunset to sunrise (91.209). In Alaska night refers to any time “during the period a prominent unlighted object cannot be seen from a distance of 3 statute miles or the sun is more than 6 degrees below the horizon.” This means that if students in Barrow decide to fly between November 20 and January

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 109

Private Pilot 109

23, they will have to learn how to fly at night because the sun does not peek above the horizon for 63 days straight. Or they can receive a certificate with a restriction of “night flying prohibited.” According to the Federal Aviation Administration, Alaska Region, 8,711 registered pilots reside in the state; 639 of these are women. In the Far North, one in every 58 residents flies. “Alaska is the ‘flyingest’ state in the Union; the only practical way to reach many areas of rural Alaska is by plane” (Smith 10). This vast state has six times the pilots as the Lower 48 and attracts independent and adventurous individuals. Sanna Green is one of these adventurous individuals. She is also a pilot, a retired school teacher, and the executive director of the Professional Teaching Practices Commission, which is the state ethics board for educators. She sometimes jumps inside an airplane, starts the engine, and takes off just to explore unfamiliar territory. She, like thousands of other recreational pilots who have careers in other professions (doctors, lawyers, engineers, accountants), uses the airplane as an automobile, an essential tool that transports friends and family to exciting places. In Sanna’s childhood, there is no vivid memory of looking to the sky, wanting to pilot a plane, or pursuing aviation as a career. Her choice to move to Alaska, which has few roads and limited accessibility into the pristine wilderness, directed her toward the opportunity of flight she might not have ever pursued in the Lower 48. Sanna’s house is hidden from the road, wedged between birch and spruce in mid-town Anchorage. No matter how many times I visit, this time is like many others when I drive past the angled driveway lined with birch and brush and have to turn around to find it again. It is a lovely retreat close to schools, shopping, espresso, and bike trails. I park next to her white Subaru and walk on a planked sidewalk leading to the front door. There are flowers everywhere: poppies, geraniums, nasturtiums, begonias, fuchsias. Off to one side, a Japanese garden sprawls out the length of half the house where a park bench beckons and trickling water flows over rocks. When Sanna opens the door, she smiles and her eyes crinkle around the corners. She looks like a Girl Scout counselor who plans

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 110

110 Alaska’s Women Pilots

to take me for a hike: khaki shorts, matching shirt, tanned legs, tennis shoes. We walk around the yard. A gnarly trunk of dark driftwood towers toward the sky. “Laurita and I picked that up off the beach,” she says. “That was quite a flight.” Sanna sketches the episode in: unexpected snow, keeping warm next to a campfire, holding mugs of steaming coffee, while underneath the airplane wing, their frost-covered tent is covered with tiny icicles in the shape of tiny trees. As we walk inside the house, Sanna points to a string chair from one of their excursions to Copenhagen, a tapestry from South America. On the far wall hangs a primitive carving from Africa, a scenic painting from France, and a long shelf filled with ore samples and antiques from McCarthy, a small town near the Wrangell Mountains southeast of Glennallen. It is a house filled with memories; each item is the physical remembrance of adventures she shared with her companion, Laurita, who died a year ago after a courageous battle with lung cancer.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 111

Sanna Green My impression of Alaska was a line which led down to Homer, and then a line which led back to Canada toward the highway which we came up. With a few little spurs, that’s the only part of Alaska that I had in my mind. Then in 1966 we decided, “Let’s learn to fly.” We had driven the highway five times by that time, and one of the impulses to learn to fly was, I don’t want to drive that highway again.

I came to Alaska in 1956 because I wanted an adventure. I was a teacher, and I thought it would be nice to come to Alaska; it was still a territory at the time. I applied at both Fairbanks and Anchorage, and in those days there was quite a teacher shortage so they both offered me a job, and I took the one from Anchorage. I found out that this teacher I knew was also going to Anchorage. Her name was Laurita Hefner. We put everything we owned in an old Mercury, including one television set, and started up the highway. It was very rugged in those days. Not much of it was paved, and it was very rough. We didn’t make very good time, but we weren’t in any hurry. It took us two weeks to get here. We camped along the way; the campgrounds in Canada were very nice, and when there weren’t any, we would just find an isolated place—like a gravel pit that was abandoned— and build us a little fire and camp. We had a bear visit us one time, and we had to scare it off. Actually, Laurita scared it off; I was heading for the car. Along the way, people were frying fried potatoes and onions in their camps. That smelled so good that I cooked fried potatoes and onions for two years after that, just because it was such a fun trip and such good memories. 111

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 112

112 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Sanna and her partner Laurita.

We got to Anchorage at the end of August and checked into our schools. We wanted to buy an airplane to learn in. There was an airplane for sale, a Cessna 172 that a man had won in a raffle. Laurita got on the phone and offered him $8,000, which was a lot of money to us at that time. And he said, “Oh no. It’s worth a lot more than that. Thank you for calling.” Then later he called back and said, “Are you still interested in the airplane? I’d like to sell it. What can you offer me?” She said, “I still have $8,000.” And he said, “Well, no, that’s not enough.” This went on for three weeks. Finally, he said to her, “What made you think I’d take $8,000 for that airplane?” She said, “Because that’s all I’ve got.” “Make me an offer over $8,000.” “$8,050?” And he said, “Okay, I’ll sell you my airplane.” So we had a brand new 172 to learn to fly in. At the end of the summer we had both got our licenses, and we looked at each other and said, “Where shall we go?” Well, one of our friends, Helen Beirne, had told us about a little ghost town called McCarthy,

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 113

Sanna Green 113

Sanna and her Cessna 180.

which she had said was very interesting. So I said, “Let’s go to McCarthy.” So we gassed up the plane, and we got out the maps and made our plan. We headed toward the Copper River: new country, no roads, and an area with which we were unfamiliar. We were very intrepid fliers. One of us was flying and the other was glued to the map. We did time distance checks every fifteen miles and eventual-

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 114

114 Alaska’s Women Pilots

ly located McCarthy. We landed at the small strip; we were so glad to be there we didn’t even see the big strip, which was 4,000 feet long. We landed at the city strip, put on our backpacks, and walked down the hill. It was one of those magic days. The sun was shining with the rays gleaming through the yellow leaves. You could see it; it was dead still. You could hear the creek burbling. We walked up this hill, and there was the old Golden Hotel, which was abandoned. It had a big wooden sign out that said “The Golden,” and it would go coooo in the wind. We looked in the window—big plate-glass window— we were amazed how they could get it into that remote area. There was a windup Victrola, and records had been scattered all over the floor. And a big, heavy bar with a big mirror behind it. We wandered on and a gentleman came across the road. We were surprised to see him. He had guns strung on both hips and a cowboy hat. He asked us, “What are you doing here?” We said, “Well, we’re visiting. We’re just looking around.” “You’ll have to go see Maxine. She hasn’t seen a woman in six months.” So we located Maxine who lived there year-round. She was homeschooling two kids, and her husband flew and maintained the strip and did various things like that. He was quite a handy person that fixed up their place. We were so excited when she invited us in for coffee and doughnuts, which she had made. She said, “Well, this little cabin next door’s for sale.” It’s just a darling little cabin. An old-timer had filled it up with everything from that era. It still looks like a museum. We went back ever since and took our friends when they visited from the south 48. That was our first major, big cross-country trip. After that we explored Alaska. We really liked the ghost towns. We went to Iditarod and Flat. Flew along the Yukon. The summer while we were teaching, we would take off when the weather was good and fly wherever we wanted—wherever we thought would be an adventure. One time we were flying from Iditarod to Flat. We landed in Flat, and since we were just tooling around, we always decided, “Where are we gonna go next?” We had

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/9/04

12:37 PM

Page 115

Sanna Green 115

the maps out. I had been flying and was sitting on the left-hand side and looking at the map, and some guy came up and knocked on the window. I opened it and he said, “Are you lost?” And I said, “Is this Flat?” “Yes.” “Then I’m not lost,” I said. When we were on the Slope we were going through Anaktuvuk Pass and landed there. Everybody in the village came out. It was still so unusual—the planes coming in—that the village would come out to see it. We were talking to people, and we saw one guy looking around the airplane. He looked in the airplane; he went around the other side, looked in the window. We just thought he was curious. Finally he came to us and said, “Where’s the pilot?” We got used to being treated like that. We saw so many villages and towns in Alaska: Nome, Kotzebue, Unalakleet, Point Hope, Bethel, Goodnews Bay. On one of our explorations, we watched a whale harvest in Kivalina. We also flew across Canada to Boston in four days with the help of a tailwind. It took us two weeks to get back, having to wait out weather at every stop. We later went commercially outside to Oklahoma City and bought a 180 and flew it back up the highway. We used it for fishing. We had a fish site up on the Kvichak, which is on the opposite side of Bristol Bay from Naknek. No roads in there; you have to fly your fish out. We didn’t fly the fish, but we used the airplane to get in and out for our gear and crew. Laurita did the flying off the beach, as I was chicken. I’d say, “Okay, you get me back to the runway and then I’ll fly somewhere.” She was a very good pilot and got a job flying copilot on the Lear jet for the BLM. They did a scientific study at that time. They were flying very high with electronic gear to detect storms. When they had a big electric storm, which meant there was probably a lot of lightning, they would send in low-level planes to check for fires and then do some fire fighting. But she would get up, fly the 172 into Anchorage—we were staying down at Alyeska at a cabin that we owned at that time—then catch the Lear. They would fly all over the state and be back for dinner. It was amazing.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 116

116 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Sanna in the cockpit.

She told a lot of different stories about how they were flying out of Merrill Field, and they weren’t used to those kinds of planes. It was funny. The tower would say, “Report at 5,000.” She’d say, “Roger, 5,000.” And they’d say, “Report at 10,000,” and she’d say, “Roger, 10,000.” They could hardly get it out before she’d report in at that altitude, but they finally got used to controlling with a Lear. We had a very, very exciting time flying. One time we flew our friends from Shageluk to Anchorage to have their baby. We flew them and the baby back up north. After a visit, we were flying back home to Anchorage when we stopped at McGrath and continued flying through Rainy Pass. I was flying. It was beautiful weather. We got the weather report, and it was supposed to be very bad in Cook Inlet. One thing I’ve learned, when the weather’s really beautiful, you’ve got to remember it can be bad somewhere else. I said, “Well, Rainy Pass is open. Let’s go through and we’ll land at Skwentna and wait it out.” Skwentna’s right past the pass and you can follow the river down. You can’t get lost; just follow the river. Laurita says, “Okay.” So I was flying. We flew through beautifully, got to the other side, and they were right. The weather was bad. I mean it was really

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/9/04

12:37 PM

Page 117

Sanna Green 117

bad. I was following the river and getting lower and lower. Finally I said, “You know, I don’t think we can do this. I’m going to go back.” So I turned around, and I started back through Rainy Pass. The clouds were real low and the mountains were . . . you couldn’t tell one mountain from another because the tops were all obscured. Rainy Pass is not a very good pass to begin with. We entered the wrong canyon. We were just flying, following this canyon that we were going up. I said, “Laurita, we’re turning right too much.” And she said no. She was navigating. I always have to say that because if we were lost and I were navigating, I’d have to admit it. But she was navigating. She said, “No, we’ll go up here, and we’ll find a lake and it’ll drain out the other side.” Sure enough, we came up, and it drained out the other side, so we followed it out of the mountains, and it was terrible weather. I thought, “How could this have happened on this side of the mountains so quickly because it was so beautiful when we left.” So we were trying to call Farewell Radio, and Anchorage answered us. We said, “Anchorage?” They said, “Yes, this is Anchorage Radio.” We said, “Well, where are we then?” The OMNI [very high frequency navigational system] wasn’t working, and it turned out the OMNI at Talkeetna was out for repair. They said, “What’s your compass heading?” which we had not paid much attention to, obviously. So sure enough, we’d gone right back into Cook Inlet where the weather was terrible. I said, “Well, I’m going to turn around and go back because I know I can follow this same river back over Rainy Pass, and I can land at Rainy Pass Lodge. It may take forever to get off because that’s an awful short strip. We may have to wait for a very strong wind. But we can get down.” The guy at this flight service station said, “No, keep on going and tell me what you see.” We looked at each other to decide whether to do it or not, and we had the three C’s: Climb, Communicate, and Comply. Well, we couldn’t climb. We had communicated, and I thought, “I guess we’ll comply.” So I said, “All right.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 118

118 Alaska’s Women Pilots

And then he said to me, “How much gas do you have?” And I stopped to think for a minute, “How long had I been in the air?” There was a pause in there, and I heard him say, “55 Lima?” with some panic in his voice. Up until then he’d been so calm. I thought, “He’s worried.” I mean, I was worried, but I didn’t want him to be worried. I said, “We have an hour left.” He said, “Follow the stream and tell me what you see.” He got back to his normal tone of voice. I found out later that he had called everybody at the station, and they were all standing around looking at the map. As I gave a description of what we saw, they would try to locate it on the map. I’d say, “Well, there’s a braided stream beneath us. There are mountains on both sides, but they’re rising into the clouds. We can’t describe them.” They’d say, “What’s your compass heading?” Then we’d give them the compass heading. So then they said, “Well, we think you’re on . . . ” and I can’t remember the river, one of those names like Tacha-haka-hooka or something. He said, “If you just follow it, it’ll take you to Skwentna, and you can go right on in. The weather’s getting better in Skwentna.” Sure enough, it wasn’t too long until we found the bigger stream, and then we could see Skwentna where we landed and waited for a little while. Then we headed on down toward Anchorage. They said, “You can come into the flight service station, and we will welcome you.” We said, “No, thank you very much.” That was very nice, but I was too embarrassed. It turned out that Don Sheldon, Alaska’s most famous bush pilot, had stopped at Skwentna because the weather was so bad. I thought, “They’re probably saying the weather’s so bad out there that Don Sheldon won’t fly, and we’ve got those two dumb school teachers out there flying around.” All’s well that ends well, I guess. We wrote a nice letter to the FAA and told them how much we appreciated this nice voice that got us through this. I found out later that he’d gotten an award for it. We didn’t have our picture taken; we were still embarrassed, knowing that we’d been so foolish.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/9/04

12:38 PM

Page 119

Sanna Green 119

I hate to say it, but these things always seemed to happen when I was flying and not Laurita. We were coming back from McCarthy. It had been beautiful there, too. Gorgeous day. I think it was early October. It was those golden leaves and the sun was shining. We’d gone around with one of our friends, Dick Crick, in a jeep and looked over at May Creek. Oh, it was just so lovely. So we got started a little late. In those days, there was no telephone in McCarthy, and you couldn’t get any radio communication until you got almost back to Chitna. We were flying, Laurita and I in our plane and Dick in his own 172. We got out as far as Chitna, which is almost an hour out of McCarthy, and got Gulkana Radio. They said, “There’s a bad snowstorm in Anchorage.” We talked over all of our alternatives. We could go back to McCarthy and spend the night, but then we’d be back out of communication, and we would not know when the weather got better. We could go over to Gulkana and stay at a motel. The weather was still good at Palmer. We could go on and land at Palmer and wait until the weather got better or have one of our friends drive over and pick us up. We decided to go to Palmer. We were tooling along, and we were almost to Palmer when we found out that the snowstorm had just gotten there. You could look there and see it. It was just like a blanket, just like a complete cloud right to the ground, covering Palmer. We could turn around and go back to Gulkana, but then it was getting dark and the gas would be marginal by the time we got back. And all of the little runways between there and Gulkana were covered with snow. So we thought, “Oh, this was a very bad decision on our part.” So I flew into this snowstorm and visibility was zero, so I turned around and came right back out. It was good again the minute I got out of the snowstorm. So we were talking on the radio about it, and Dick said, “Well, I’m going in.” So he took his plane, and he went on in. Then he didn’t communicate anymore so I was saying, “Where are you, what are you doing?” He didn’t answer and he didn’t answer, and I thought, “Well, I’m not gonna wait anymore,” and I just got on the radio and I said, “I’m coming in. I’ve gotta get out of here.” I flew into the snowstorm. Completely no visibility again and fearing a midair, I thought, “God, I hope Dick’s plane isn’t around

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 120

120 Alaska’s Women Pilots

here somewhere.” In a few minutes, which seemed like an hour, I saw runway lights from Palmer. I couldn’t tell which runway it was. I just knew I could see it and turned—did a kind of a ninety-degree turn—and put it down and got out. There was Dick. I said, “Why didn’t you answer?” He said, “Well, I was busy landing.” But anyway, we were both on the ground safe. We called some folks who drove the forty miles and picked us up in a car, and we drove home. The next day we rode back over and picked up the airplane. Those were the two times that I was flying that got us into some little bit of trouble. Normally, I am a very cautious pilot and don’t take risks, and I have learned about the weather, too. Now. Those were the two scariest times while we were flying. We had a bad time when Laurita was flying one time too. We’d flown up to a hunting camp up in the Brooks Range. We flew up in there and had a marvelous four days of beautiful weather and wildlife and fishing. I mean, you didn’t even fish: we caught grayling almost without getting our lines wet. Then we were leaving, and we were trying to think about how we would take off. There was a little bit of a tailwind downhill, but to take off uphill was even more difficult, and there were the mountains there at that end. So we decided to take off downhill with a little tailwind. I was supposed to call off the speeds to Laurita as she was taking off. We were gonna wait, gonna hold it on the ground until we reached eighty so we’d make sure we’d get off. Unusual for her because she got anxious. She pulled it off below seventy, and I think that for some reason she dropped the flaps or somehow they got dropped. So we were not getting flying speed. We were heading right toward this creek. She had real presence of mind; she hit it down real hard and bounced us up, and we bounced up and got flying speed and just barely, barely meandered down this stream that we almost went into. Both of us just went, “Oh, what in the world. You know, how did we ever do that? Oh my God, this plane finally got flying speed.” Then we got up to our normal speed. We were flying. We were getting in toward Kotzebue, and we had to cross this body of

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/9/04

12:38 PM

Page 121

Sanna Green 121

water. I think it’s an inlet there of some kind. I said, “Laurita, I swear this plane sounds different.” She goes, “No, it sounds the same. You always say that when we fly over water.” I said, “No, it sounds different.” She was so sure and was so much more with it than I was as far as airplanes. So we flew across this water. We landed at Kotzebue. We got out of the plane, and we saw that the propeller was bent on both ends. When she had jammed it down, it had gone kling kling, and both ends hit. They were both bent at the same amount so we didn’t get any vibration. Then we had to leave the plane there. They had to put a new prop on it and check to see that we hadn’t ruined the engine, which we hadn’t, fortunately. But we had to fly commercially home, take a flight back up after we got a new prop. But that could have been really dangerous, although we didn’t know it until we were back on the ground. The takeoff scared us to death. But while we were flying, I understand that if the propeller hadn’t been bent evenly on both ends, it could have been quite serious. A vibration could have dislodged the engine. Flying over water, also. I’ve stuck in some sort of education for all these years. Flying has been a fun pastime. I’ve had most of my exciting adventures, and I’ve seen more of Alaska. As I once pointed out, before I learned to fly, it was all lines going along a road; from here to there was all my impression of Alaska. Once I learned to fly, I saw it from above and saw the ghost towns, and I saw the mountains. And I saw the whole place: the Yukon, the villages . . . and so flying has been part of Alaska for me. In my life I’ve had people who influenced me and helped me along the way. My mother was my major enthusiast. She was my confidant and my consultant and my encourager for my first years. As far as flying is concerned, Laurita was my mentor. Although we were learning together, she was the one who had the feel for it. She was the one who always had so much courage and confidence. She was very good at keeping track of all of the things that were done to the airplane and doing the close observation and care that

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 122

122 Alaska’s Women Pilots

was necessary for maintenance. She also was very good in making sure that I got my hours in and my time done. As far as my career in education, it’s interesting. The counselor in college told me that I’d have to choose between a career like medicine and having a family. If I wanted a family, then I would not be able to go into that demanding of a career. And I took him seriously. I decided he was right. At another time, I was thinking about going into administration. I had to make a decision whether to go back to get my master’s in psychology for counseling or whether I wanted to go into administration. The principal at the time told me, “You’d better think about counseling,” he said, “because they’ll never have a woman as a secondary administrator in this district.” Of course, now there are many, but the advice then was . . . you know, probably he was right. Also, in my career, I always loved sports so much. When I was a kid we didn’t have very much available because I lived on a ranch. When I was in college, they had nothing for women in sports. We had play days where everybody got together and would choose up teams and play volleyball. But there were no competitive teams. If you could set, nobody could spike. If you could spike, nobody could set. We never had any real competition. We would just get together and bat the ball around. When I came to Alaska, I skied competitively. Just loved it. I won the alpine championship for Alaska two years in a row. I skied every weekend. It was a way of life rather than a sport for awhile. I liked . . . well, I liked everything about it. I liked the outdoors. I liked the beautiful environment that it was in. I liked the thrill of speed. I liked the group we had. A real camaraderie developed. We had a group that lived at Alyeska. We had a ski cabin and went down every weekend. We were building, and all of our friends were building. We borrowed tools and ideas. We had a game called, “If I was you guys.” You’d go over to where they were building, and you’d say, “Now if I was you guys, I’d do this,” and then they’d come over to your place: “If I was you guys, I’d put this in there.” I also played basketball in the city league, and we had real good teams and had good competition. At that time, the rules were changing. We’d gone from the rules where you had one dribble and you

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/9/04

12:39 PM

Page 123

Sanna Green 123

played half a court because girls weren’t supposed to be of constitution strong enough to play a real game. And then they upped it to three dribbles, and they had one rover who could play both ends of the court. The other two could only play half court. You were supposed to trade off so the rover didn’t get too tired. I used to rove the full game. So then finally we got the rules changed to where we could play real basketball. In the meantime, I just loved it. I think had sports been available, I might have gone into it for a career if I could have back then. It was just not available until Title IX came in. When Title IX came, the school district asked some of us to conduct Title IX workshops, which was mainly to explain that Title IX was about how girls and women were to be given equal opportunity in sports and in administration and that sort of thing. Also, to do little exercises having to do with attitude and your own consciousness about these things. We had materials that were available, and it was interesting. It was really an eyeopener for me. We’d go to a faculty meeting at one of the high schools, and we would go through these exercises. There were usually about four of us: two men and two women. We’d go through what the changes were and then do some exercises on attitude and that sort of thing. I remember one very clearly. It was at Dimond High, and we came into it, and the men were all sitting at the very back row with their arms crossed, in their seats leaning back against the back wall. The women were all sitting down in front. We went through some of these exercises. The other leader, who was male, said, “How many of you women at one time or another wished you were a man?” And oh, about half of them raised their hand. Well, when my brother could do these things and I couldn’t, and when I wanted to go into a certain school and I couldn’t, and when I wanted to do these things that I couldn’t do . . . They all had a reason why they, at one time or another, wished they were a man. And then he said, “How many of you men ever wished you were a woman?” Their arms hugged tight to their sides. All the men looked at the floor. The male leader said, “Oh, come on now. Wasn’t there a time, like when they called you up to go to Vietnam, or wasn’t there a time when you had to get out and change a tire, or wasn’t there a time when somebody expected you to be in charge,

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 124

124 Alaska’s Women Pilots

and you thought, ‘God, I wish I were a woman?’” None of them nodded their head. I was just startled. It isn’t that bad being a woman, you know. The men were guffawing, and their attitude was really, really something. I felt so bad, I went home and cried afterwards. I heard later that the principal called them in and said to them, “I don’t want you to ever talk to me about disruptive students in your classes again. I’ve seen you as disruptive as I ever want to.” Which I was very pleased with. It was a lot harder changing attitudes than I thought it would be. But Title IX made so much difference. I’ll tell you one thing especially I noticed: When I was teaching at Central Junior High, I had a little girl’s basketball team. They had to wear their gym suits, which none of them liked. They wore a pinney, which is a little thing you pinned on with your number. It was a like a little bib that had a number on it. They looked like a little ragtag team. The coach used to ask me to come down and referee because they didn’t have regular referees. They’d bring in the girls, maybe from an adjoining junior high, and they’d have a little game, and it would be kind of fun. Well, Title IX came in about that time. The next time I saw this same school, the girls came out onto the court. They had on spiffy red warm-up suits, and they had nice uniforms with numbers. They played a game with referees from the referees association in the black-and-white striped shirts. Their attitude was different. They walked onto the floor differently. They played differently. It was very noticeable. Some people wonder why a person stays in Alaska when a lot leave. In Alaska, when I first came, and it still is, people were so far away from their actual relatives that their friends became family. We developed that sort of relationship so I have the actual feeling that my family is here. Although they’re not my name, they’re friends. My neighbor, two doors down, we used to take them and go with them and their kids skiing. She calls me her sister, and her kids are my nieces and nephews, and they come for Christmas. I have other great friends that make sure, since I’m living alone, that I’m not alone. I love Alaska. I called into the office today and talked to my assistant down there. We were talking about what we’d done for

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/9/04

12:39 PM

Page 125

Sanna Green 125

Memorial Day. We both agreed that we live in paradise. The weather’s nice. The mountains are gorgeous. We look at everything and think, “It couldn’t be any better.” I even said, “I hope heaven is like this just in case I get there.” So I’m not going to leave Alaska. I even like winter. I don’t mind the dark. I have a fire in the fireplace. I liked it more when I skied. My knees are now so bad I don’t ski. I still like winter. I just love this country and the people. I will not go outside when I retire; I’ll just live here. When I grew up in Montana, we lived in a little town called Ashland, which had about a hundred people who got their mail there. It had a bar and two churches and an elementary school and a gas station, and then a few houses, and a little dirt road that was not very well maintained and was sixty-five miles from the nearest pavement and sixty-five miles from health care. It was very isolated. I didn’t know it then. My dad owned a ranch, which he had [had] for a long time. He and Mom hadn’t homesteaded it, but they bought it from a homesteader. They lived on it before their house burned down, and they moved into town just before one of my brothers was born. Then the rest of us were born in that house where I lived up until I left to go teaching. My dad also bought a bar, and he ran the ranch during the day and tended the bar at night and hired a bartender in the day. He worked the whole time. He was a gruff person, but he wanted everything right for us. He worked hard always. During the war, when my brothers were gone, my dad and I did the roundups that six people used to do. We’d go out early in the morning. Some of the happiest days I remember, the sun would just be coming up through the pine trees, and my dad would be in a good mood. I loved the horses, and I loved going out with him. But he was gruff. We were working, and we’d bring all the cattle down from the hills. We’d have a pretty good gather: it wasn’t as good as if we’d had some more help, but good enough, and we’d have them on this kind of a little plateau area. He’d be cutting out those that he wanted to send to market. So he’d go into the herd, and they’d all scatter. It was my job to keep running around and around and around to keep

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 126

126 Alaska’s Women Pilots

them back in there. And I was hot and tired, and I’d say, “When are we gonna be finished?” He’d say, “I’ll tell you when we’re finished.” On the way out in the morning, we’d put two beers in the creek. Then on the way back where it was cool, we’d sit under a tree and have a beer. I didn’t like beer, but I felt so good sitting there having a beer with my dad. Then he’d say, “Sanna, you’re the best cowboy I’ve got,” knowing that I was the only one he had. That was his humor. Now, times are tough for kids. It’s very difficult for kids growing up, I think. There’s a lot of distractions and a lot of pitfalls, but for a girl growing up, there are also lots of opportunities that we didn’t have. But they have to be ready to take advantage of them. For one thing, no matter what you want to do, you’ve got to get an education. There’s nothing out there that you can do now without a good education, and so high school really isn’t enough anymore. And yet we see kids dropping out of high school. They need at least some training past that, and preferably college, if they want a life like mine. The thing about it—the pitfalls the girls fall into now, of course, is to have a baby before they’re ready. If they get pregnant and have a baby, they’re just bound to be in poverty for a long time. It’s just one of those things that I see again and again. If you want to learn to fly now, it’s expensive. You have to have a good-paying job or you have to have something like the military where they will do the training for you. Flying is an extremely exciting and fun thing to do. It takes some discipline, and you have to really want to because it’s going to be expensive. When I learned to fly, I’d been teaching for fifteen years. I had $4,000 to put into an airplane; my partner had $4,000. You have to work to accumulate funds in order to do it, as far as I can see. Unless you have parents that can afford it or some other means. You can do it on your own, that’s the thing. It’s even actually more satisfying if you do it on your own. You feel like, “I’ve done it and I’m glad.” I think that you should always follow your dreams. I really do. If you dream and want it bad enough, the motivation will get you a long ways. You know, sometimes you might not reach the dream because there are lots of pitfalls along the way, but the fact that you had a dream and that you pursued it, will take you some good place.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 127

Helicopter Pilot Of all the basic classification of aircraft—airplane (fixed-wing), rotorcraft (helicopter), glider (sailplane), lighter-than-air (balloon)—nothing vibrates your body from the top of your skull to the arch in your foot like a helicopter. Horizontal rotors (wings) churn like eggbeaters and generate the whop whop sound of chopper blades. Perhaps Plato best described how a helicopter auto-rotates or lifts skyward when he said, “The natural function of the wing is to soar upwards and carry that which is heavy up to the place where dwells the race of gods. More than any other thing that pertains to the body it partakes of the nature of the divine” (English 5). Wings are steeped in metaphors of spirituality. Christians call the Holy Spirit “dove,” and when the presence of God descends, some people feel sheltered from harm: under His wing, under His protection and care. In Exodus 19:4, God instructs Moses to exhort the Israelites: “You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings, and brought you to Myself.” According to Native American folklore, man communicates to the Creator through things in nature such as animals and birds. The magnificent eagle symbolizes courage and bravery—human characteristics that many people want to emulate. Feathers from these 127

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 128

128 Alaska’s Women Pilots

aerial hunters are worn into battle. Others are used for powerful medicine by healers who believe in the power of the Great Spirit and the human soul in flight. Many people associate “eagle” with landing on the moon or as a symbol of the United States. Eagles’ wings, similar to airplane wings, are extraordinary marvels of efficiency that represent physical or spiritual flight. The famous Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci captured the divine in his art and longed to fly close to the heavens. He said, “When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return” (English 5). Few words ring truer than the words of regret that he spoke in 1519 on his deathbed, grieving over the fact that he had not flown with the birds. His passion—helicopters—took the form of a “lifting airscrew” (also called a helix) that looked very much like a helicopter on paper (Lopez 173). In aviation there is wing area, wing chord, wing fence, wing fillet, wing flap, wing heavy, winglet, wing loading, wing nut, wing panel, wing rib, wingspan, and wing-tip vortices. According to Webster, Middle English winge, of Scandinavian origin, is akin to Danish and Swedish vinge, wing and Sanskrit vAti, meaning “it blows.” Birds and bees and bats have movable feathered or membranous appendages by means of which they are able to fly. Hummingbirds flap their wings ten times per second and fly at sixty mph. Similar to the rotor of a helicopter, hummingbird wings move back and forth, pushing the air toward the ground to achieve vertical lift. Honeybee wings flap 11,400 times per second, enabling these extraordinary insects to travel at nearly fifteen miles per hour. The world’s smallest bat is called the Bumblebee Bat and weighs less than a penny. Yet the largest bat boasts a nearly six-foot wingspan. Wing can also signify an appendage of furniture, a sidepiece at the top of a Lazy-Boy recliner, upholstered and soft, made to cushion the boniest of elbows or protect the skull of a toddler resting in a mother’s arms. Wing can denote the left or right section of an army or an offensive position on a football field. In politics the leftwing viewpoint is often referred to as liberal, whereas the right wing

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 129

Helicopter Pilot 129

is referred to as conservative. A wing commander is the one in charge, the officer—highly visible and out front—who determines where and how a mission will be flown. In contrast, a wing area of a stage is kept hidden from the public eye, out of sight. It may well serve as the changing area for cast members stepping into and out of Shakespearean garb or a storage place where props are stacked until the curtain falls and reconfiguration is possible. In the language of helicopters, the wing area is the rotor that churns the air above the cockpit and with enough horsepower, creates vertical lift. According to the Federal Aviation Regulations Part 61.113, a private pilot with a rotorcraft category rating must have at least forty hours of experience: twenty hours of flight instruction of which fifteen hours must be in a helicopter; three hours of night flying in helicopters including ten takeoffs and ten landings; twenty hours of solo time of which fifteen must be in a helicopter; three hours of cross-country flying in helicopters, including one flight with a landing at three or more points, each of which must be more than twenty-five nautical miles from each other; and three takeoffs and landings at airports or heliports with operational control towers. I will never forget my first helicopter flight on the North Slope. In the early eighties when I worked for ARCO, flying a Twin Otter back and forth to Prudhoe Bay some thirteen times or more a day, I was invited to help load a Bell 206. I marveled at the experience a Vietnam veteran pilot demonstrated in picking up a sling load. Instead of having a loadmaster, as one would have on an oil rig, I gained experience climbing out the cockpit door onto the tundra. Once outside, I searched for the hook and cable attached to steel ship parts. Between the noise from the beating blades and howling wind, I spotted the cargo of what roustabouts call “hot parts,” or emergency parts necessary to keep a company involved in oil exploration operating round-the-clock. With beginner’s luck and good eye-hand coordination, I was able to get it attached in minimal time. We lifted off, and as we crossed a pond the size of five football stadiums, the parts swayed back and forth. The wind was under ten knots or else the cable might have swung higher and higher, building

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 130

130 Alaska’s Women Pilots

momentum. Below the skids, caribou dotted the landscape. We dropped the sling load off at the drilling pad, loaded groceries and mail into the back, and took off. We flew twenty minutes north across the Beaufort Sea to find the Crystal Sea. The Crystal Sea is a seismic ship. This one-hundred-foot landing craft thumps the ocean floor, listens for oil, and uses Juggie phones similar to old-fashioned suction cups. A deck hand waved us toward the landing spot, which seemed no larger than a Post-it note. The nose of the helicopter raised then lowered at the moment of touchdown. Outside the ocean moved past the ship at roughly seven knots. Two men began unloading boxes from the cargo hold. Nothing needed to be explained; they had been loading and offloading helicopters for nearly three months straight. They only stopped and stared once at me, a stranger. We exchanged nods. It was likely I was the first woman they had seen in weeks, yet no one stopped working long enough to chat because helicopters and gas cost big bucks and the boss was watching. When they finished with the unloading, we lifted off once again and headed for the shoreline. With every passing swell, I found myself wondering what it would feel like to lose an engine over frigid water that freezes the human body in a matter of minutes. In a helicopter, gravity dictates. There is no “gliding” to safety—only what helicopter pilots called a controlled crash. I knew this fact from first-hand experience. Three years earlier I was considering getting my rotorcraft rating and becoming dual qualified, even though helicopter training was three times the expense. From the backseat I watched my friend giving flight instruction to Carlos, a student from South America who didn’t speak English very well but could afford a multi-engine helicopter rating. Sitting in the backseat and not being at the controls may have been my biggest obstacle to having a good experience. Language may have been another factor or the large size of a Bell 212 helicopter. In my mind, nothing is more uncomfortable than engine-out procedures in a rotorcraft. Free-falling from a thousand feet bests Magic Mountain at Disneyland hands down, for the best carnival ride: your spit catches in your throat, your stomach sticks to the cockpit ceiling and stays there, and your eyes widen because you

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 131

Helicopter Pilot 131

know the fuselage can’t possibly withstand another impact. Perhaps Carlos didn’t execute the maneuver correctly three times in a row. Perhaps helicopters aren’t supposed to hit the ground so forcibly and still be considered airworthy. All I know is this: the moment where out of control becomes reality and overrides the blur in your head is one of the most helpless feelings imaginable. So flying a helicopter over the churning seas of the Arctic Ocean made me think: “What could I do from the passenger seat? How could we glide back to the Crystal Sea or somewhere at least close to a lifeboat?” My life definitely would have been different if I had decided to get my rotorcraft rating and fly sling loads on the North Slope, single-pilot. Just as there are many regrets in life, there are many moments when a realization hits: if I wouldn’t have had a bad first experience in a helicopter, and if I could have been the one flying instead of sitting in the backseat, then perhaps I would be flying helicopters. A feeling of loss washed over me, and I understood more clearly the significance of the first flight, the first experience in any air machine. I kept looking forward, out the windshield in front of me. For decades people have been resistant to the idea that a helicopter could safely fly. In 1909, Wilbur Wright said, “We soon saw that the helicopter had no future, and dropped it. The helicopter does with great labor only what the balloon does without labor, and is no more fitted than the balloon for rapid horizontal flight. If its engine stops, it must fall with deathly violence, for it can neither glide like the aeroplane or float like the balloon” (English 53). And yet, “The idea of vertical flight dates back at least to twelfth-century China, where a toy helicopter was fashioned from a pair of wooden slats mounted on top of a stick: when the stick was twirled between two hands, the toy rose in the air” (Chaikin 110). Early inventors Sir George Cayley and Thomas Edison failed at their attempts at vertical flight due to insufficient horsepower (Lopez 173–177). It wouldn’t be until November 13, 1907, that Paul Cornu barely had enough engine power to overcome the effects of gravity and rose five feet above the ground for twenty seconds. Then in 1921 a boost to helicopter development came with

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 132

132 Alaska’s Women Pilots

the U.S. Army’s vertical flight program. George de Bothezat, a Russian pioneer, was the visionary leader in charge. At the advent of World War II, increased engine development and horsepower made vertical lift possible. But soon after its introduction, the helicopter became indispensable. According to Igor I. Sikorsky, who was nicknamed “father of the helicopter,” “The helicopter has become the most universal vehicle ever created and used by man. It approaches closer than any other to fulfillment of mankind’s ancient dreams of the flying horse and the magic carpet” (English 37). Sikorsky developed and produced 600 machines in a period of nearly four months (Lopez 175). Helicopters in the Korean War as well as Vietnam were used as essential tools for search and rescue, medivacs, reconnaissance, staff limousines, mail, and cargo flights. The development of the helicopter is credited to various inventors: Boris N. Yuriev (two rotors), Raul Pateras de Pescara (cycle control), Juan de la Cierva (autogiro), Raoul Hafner (hinged rotors) (Chaikin 110). Rotorcrafts as we know them today can launch straight up in the air, move sideways and backwards, and quickly land in strategic places that an airplane couldn’t park in. Yet this great air machine is mocked more than any other flying machine invented: “Hovering is for pilots who love to fly but have no place to go.” “Helicopters can’t really fly—they’re just so ugly that the earth immediately repels them.” “Helicopters don’t fly. They beat the air into submission.” “Never fly in anything that has the wings traveling faster than the fuselage” (English 124–127). The history of women in helicopter flight is sparse, but nonetheless exuberant. In the early 1930s Hanna Reitsch flew gliders, helicopters, and rocket planes as a military test pilot for the Luftwaffe. As a German test pilot, Hanna described her first helicopter flight this way, “Professor Focke and his technicians standing below grew ever smaller as I continued to rise straight up, 50 metres, 75 metres, 100 metres. Then I gently began to throttle back and the speed of ascent dwindled till I was hovering motionless in midair. This was intoxicating! I thought of the lark, so light and small of wing, hovering over the summer fields. Now man had wrested from him his lovely secret” (English 11).

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 133

Helicopter Pilot 133

Another early helicopter pioneer was Nancy Livingston. In the article “Alaska’s Whirly-Girl,” Herbert E. McLean talks about this second woman in the United States to receive her commercial helicopter rating in 1947. Around the same time, she became a member of the Whirly-Girls, an organization of international women helicopter pilots that promotes women in aviation through scholarships and networking. Nancy worked in the Civilian Pilot Training Program [a program during WWII in which civilians trained pilots for the military] as a flight instructor. She later joined the Air Transport Auxiliary and ferried Spitfires, AT-6s, F4Fs, and Hurricanes. Nancy moved to Alaska in 1959, the same year that Alaska became a state. She and her husband, Arlo, flew a crimson Hiller 12-E. Based in Juneau, she became the first woman helicopter pilot in the Far North and an integral crewmember of the “Flying Livingstons.” On any given day Nancy could be counted on to fly skiers to Douglas Ski Bowl, glaciologists on ice studies, U.S. Forest Service workers for crew changes, weather bureau personnel for meteorology tests, and search-and-rescue teams to crevasse fields. “But the real hazards,” she explained, “are the thick masses of swirling fog and clouds that blanket Southeastern Alaska a good amount of the time, the severe winds that sweep up the channel and down from the ice cap, and the snow whiteouts, where a pilot sometimes can’t tell whether he’s a foot or a thousand off the ground” (McLean 42). As time passed more opportunities opened up for women helicopter pilots, especially in the military. Today in the U.S. Navy, U.S. Air Force, and the National Guard and Reserve there are 795 women helicopter pilots (3.88%) compared to 690 women fixedwing pilots (2.54%). One of these contemporary military pilots is First Lieutenant Krista Bonino of the United States Army. In Women and Flight: Portraits of Contemporary Women Pilots, Carolyn Russo documents how Krista flies an OH-58D Kiowa Warrior, a front-line helicopter, for the U.S. Army (53). In high school Krista participated in the Civil Air Patrol and later graduated from West Point. Normally she is based in Germany, but she has been flying helicopters during the U.S. peacekeeping mission in Bosnia.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 134

134 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Krista Bonino.

Another woman military pilot is Linda V. Hutton, a captain in the United States Navy (25). Linda has logged over 385 aircraft landings in a Grumman C-2A Greyhound (COD) and shares her experiences flying on and off carriers: “A lot of people say that landing on a carrier is the most fun you can have with your clothes on, and that’s pretty close. The first time you go out to a carrier you see how small it is. Lineup is very critical for my aircraft. I cannot drift

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 135

Helicopter Pilot 135

Linda V. Hutton.

more than two and a half feet off the center line, because there are aircraft parked on the other side of that landing area, and your wingtip in most cases is only a few feet away. I have the largest aircraft on the carrier to land” (25). Not all women helicopter pilots choose the military as a career path. Patricia Jenkins owns a Hughes 300 helicopter and works as an aerial cowgirl on her ranch in Oregon. She and her husband trade beef for flight training. She fell in love with flying and the freedom it gave her: “I was raising children and doing ‘housewifely’ things and hated it. I was bored to death. So the airplane was a good brainteaser for me” (181). Very different from Patricia is Caroline Lachmann-Spivak, a wife and mother who is presently very content to stay on the ground and raise a family. Caroline is one of the most charismatic pilots around; her laughter is infectious. When she invites people to a church revival meeting or a Rainbow vacuum cleaner demonstration, it’s hard to turn her down. In the summer of 1997 I attended

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 136

136 Alaska’s Women Pilots

an air show near Anchorage in high hopes that I would meet one of Alaska’s few women helicopter pilots. Without exception, there was one female helicopter pilot that fellow pilots kept talking about: Caroline. A few months later, I had the opportunity to meet Caroline. Tall, slender, and wearing a tailored outfit, she could pass for a model rather than a helicopter pilot on the North Slope of Alaska. Caroline was born in Schafhausen, Switzerland, but spent most of her life in Pennington, New Jersey. She graduated from Hopewell Valley Central High School in 1983 and studied aviation at Mercer County Community College, where helicopters became her passion. During her training as a commercial pilot, she joined the Whirly-Girls. Her number, 587, includes her in the roughly 2% of helicopter pilots (1,281 in 41 countries) who are women. Today Caroline finds meaning and purpose by having children and being a stay-at-home mother. Still, when she sees a helicopter flying near the Chugach Mountains or picking up a sling load, she knows that she could be in the cockpit, the one doing the flying.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 137

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak I first thought about flying when I was five. My parents sent me to Germany to stay with my grandmother for a month. I flew over with my aunt, who’s been with Pan American for about twentyfive years. She was our flight attendant on the same flight over and back. So I served those really hot towels, and I thought, “I want to do this!” One of my uncles worked as a captain for British Airways, also. So I figured, well, this is my calling.

A friend of mine, an instructor from Anchorage, called me. He said, “I think you might want to come up to Alaska and have some fun. We’re having a kayak trip. There’s eight of us—four doubleman kayaks—and we’re touring Prince William Sound.” And I was like, “What? Prince? William? Who? I’ll come meet him!” At the time I was flying copilot on the Sikorski S58T for New York Helicopters. We would take off from Manhattan [34th Street Heliport] with fourteen passengers, fly over Central Park, talk to traffic on the Hudson, fly around the Statue of Liberty, and return. Your head’s on a swivel: two o’clock, three o’clock, there’s one; four o’clock, eleven o’clock . . . It’s like being in a war zone. We were allowed four days off maximum at New York Helicopters, and I decided to go to Alaska. Four days? My friends warned me that I’d never get back in time for work. And I said, “I’m going. I don’t care.” Actually jump seated [took the observation seat in the cockpit] on TWA, then Alaska Airlines over to Anchorage. The kayak trip was incredible. My friend’s like, “Well, just to warn you before you leave, you’re gonna want to come back. Alaska does that to you.” 137

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 138

138 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak.

And I thought, “Well, maybe.” But after kayaking, I said, “You’re right. I’ll be back.” In February of ‘90 I was back. My friend had suggested that I bring some resumes with me. He worked for Alaska Helicopters. I told him I’d talk to them. The company wanted more flight experience and didn’t really have copilot positions at the time. So I went next door to ERA, who later purchased Alaska Helicopters. They said, “Yes, you’ve got enough experience. We’ll probably take you.” But it wasn’t confirmation. And I asked, “Well, when do you start your hiring? When do you start training?” “April and May.” So April came around—of 1990—and I had kept in contact with the chief pilot, Mr. Ron Smith. He was a wonderful man, a very nice gentleman. He said, “Yes, we’ll hire you.” I said, “If you’ll put that in a letter, in writing, and send it to me, I can get my instrument rating and be back in a month.” So he put it in writing for me, and I quit New York Helicopters. Just pure faith. I went to a training school in Massachusetts and stayed with a friend of a friend there for two

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 139

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 139

Caroline flying for New York Helicopters.

weeks, and got my instrument rating. That was about two weeks and $5,000 later. Pretty spendy. It’s about $180 an hour for instrument training. Grand total, it cost about $25,000 for everything: private, commercial, and instrument. Two days later I flew to Alaska. I packed all my belongings and FedEx-ed twenty-two boxes to Anchorage and showed up. The weird thing was that there was no one else in my class. There were two weeks of training. I was like, “Ah, what’s going on here?” I just figured ERA doesn’t have much of a turnover. Well, I found out later through the assistant chief pilot how I got hired. He said, “Well, you must have impressed Smith because we were finished training, totally. We were done. I mean, the books were away; pilots had been hired. We were finished. And you came in and he had a special class just for you.” I had no idea. The first pilot I flew with was from Canada. He was hilarious. I’d never seen a bear in the wild. I mean, I’ve always seen them in zoos. I drank at that time (I don’t drink anymore) but at the time if you saw a bear, you had to go, “Beer bear!” And whoever had the most “beer bears,” at the end of the day had to buy the other person

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 140

140 Alaska’s Women Pilots

that amount of beers, or whatever. I always won, but I didn’t drink all the beers. But it was funny because he’s like, “Man, you spot ‘em all!” I don’t know what it was, just seeing the bear running wild and free, a grizzly with golden hair glistening in the sunlight, was amazing. I was training to be copilot on the Bell 212. Basically a copilot position means that you’re sitting in the left pilot’s seat. I know it’s reversed on fixed-wing. But we’re right. The copilot does everything the captain does, but of course, the captain is final authority and held responsible for everything that happens. What was nice with these guys, too, in Alaska, is that they treated you like you were part of the team. In New York they really didn’t. It was just like, “Sit there, be quiet.” Sounds kind of gross, but they’d call copilots “meat in the seat.” I kind of got the same feeling up here with women in aviation: that they really shouldn’t be flying. Not from the chief pilot or the pilots, but from the management, upper management. In New York they would do silly things, and one captain said something really nasty to me. I didn’t say a word until we got into the helicopter together, and then I basically let him have it. I said, “Don’t you ever say anything like that to me. I’m not that,” and da ta da. It was bad; it was a real bad word. One of the pilots told me later that if I had just walked away and not said anything that the captain would have picked on me forever and ever. But luckily it happened the way it did. Then after that, not a word, and I guess that was my indoctrination. It worked, whatever it was. I wanted to blast him there in front of everybody, but I didn’t. Then everybody after that respected me. It worked great. Another gal came on board, and they treated her like a crud. I tried to help her out, but she just kind of dug herself deeper and deeper, and there was nothing I could do to help her. She was very shy, too. Real quiet. They thrive on that stuff, believe me. Pilots love that. In Alaska the pilots give you more respect. It sounds weird, but when I think back on it, you really do have to prove yourself as a woman. Almost twice as much, three times, maybe even five times more than the men. You’re different. I mean, you’re the minority.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 141

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 141

There was another gal who worked for ERA, too. There were two of us out of, I think, a hundred and fifty pilots at the time. I really get along with guys; I’m very comfortable around them. That’s because of the environment I’ve been in for so many years. And now, of course, I attend church and it’s hard to sit with the ladies. It’s like, “Ah, sorry. I don’t knit or sew, and I definitely don’t crochet, so we don’t have much to talk about. Wanna go for a helicopter ride?” In the beginning flying in Alaska was kind of hard. Of course it’s a new environment and all the captains at ERA were really patient, and that was nice. They’re not there to instruct because they have a job too, and we have our job. But when you’re brand new, they are almost your instructors for a good couple weeks until you know what you’re doing. I heard some bad things about some people, and I’m like, “Hmm, I never had trouble with that guy.” Plus, you get to know what they like. Like one guy likes Lifesavers. Well, if you’re smart enough, you’ll bring two or three packs of Lifesavers with you. Or you find out, “How’s your wife or your kid?” or you know. It’s politics. It really is. If you do the right thing, then you’ll fit in okay. I just heard horror stories. “Oh, this guy’s such a jerk, and he tells me what to do.” I never had that problem. You just have to build up their egos a little bit, that’s all. If you can live with that. The instrument rating helped me. In the winter up here most people get laid off. I just always assume I’m on, no matter what. That winter they laid off almost half, and I was like, “Uh-oh. Maybe they’ll lay me off because I’m a woman.” I don’t know. I’ll take advantage of whatever I can. They said, “No, we’re keeping you on because you’ve got good qualities and you’re a good pilot.” So I said, “Great!” They put me down in the Gulf of Mexico, and I flew out of there to the oil rigs back and forth and got some good instrument time. I probably got forty hours in a couple weeks of instrument flying. Scared me to death. I felt like I was upside down and all over the place. When you’re simulating it, you know you’re okay. When it’s the real thing, actual IFR [instrument flight rules], oh my goodness! But it was great. It really got your mind working, instead of

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 142

142 Alaska’s Women Pilots

just sitting there and going, “Da ta ta da, nice day.” This really gets the mind working: “If I don’t do this right, we’re dead, basically.” We had weather radar in the helicopters, and once you get to, let’s say, five miles of the rig, then you’re strictly on weather radar. You’re looking at this little dot, and that dot is the rig. If the captain’s flying, I’m telling him, “Come left two degrees. On course. On heading. We’re four miles coming down now to five hundred feet.” So we’ve got the IFR stuff, all the paperwork. It’s life or death. But it’s fun, if you’re doing it right. You’re constantly talking to the other person: “On course. On heading. You’re a hundred feet high. Come down another hundred feet.” There might be thunderstorms or whatever else out there. People in the back are just chomping their gum. They don’t have a clue what’s going on up front. We call those folks in the back “Bubbas,” by the way. Bubbas are the oil rig workers. So the Bubbas in the back are just enjoying their time, and we’re up now about two miles. Then a mile, and now we’re down to fifty feet. It’s like, “Come left. Come right.” If you’re within half a mile and you don’t see the rig, then you have to break and execute a go-around and try again. Most of the time, we make it. At a half mile, it’d have to be really bad weather not to see something. I remember one time on the North Slope. I was flying with one of the guys I used to fly with a lot; we got along really well. He was kind of like my mentor too, and he was a really good pilot. He told me stories of Korea and all that stuff. He was flying in Vietnam, so we had some good war stories going on between us. That was the first time I flew actual IFR. It was really bad weather. I was flying down to two hundred feet and still couldn’t see anything. So we went around. He said, “Do it again, you’re doing just fine.” My mind was all over the place. I had no idea where I was, what direction I was going. We finally broke through the clouds and landed. I felt so overwhelmed; I told him I was gonna quit because it scared me so bad. And he says, “Yeah” and started laughing. I said, “It’s not funny. I’m just about ready to bawl.” Actually I almost was. “No, no way,” he said, “you’re not quitting. Do you think you’re the only one that’s done this? I was scared my first time, too.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 143

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 143

Caroline on an oil rig platform.

I said, “Are you sure?” “Oh don’t be ridiculous. You’re ten times better than most guys I see do this; you’re gonna be good.” From that point forward I said, “Okay, I can do this.” I had a couple months off in the winter. What they do here is every day you work, you basically have a saved day in the bank, so a day for a day. So if I work seven days a week, I have seven days saved if I needed to take the time off. So in the wintertime when they lay you off, they have what they call “comp time.” If you have three months of comp time saved, you can take three months off and still get a paycheck, which is pretty nice. So I did that for a couple of months. The next spring they said, “We’re gonna make you captain.” I’m like, “Uh-uh. No. I don’t want the position.” I didn’t say that, but I was thinking, “Oh my goodness! what a responsibility.” But I went on, completed the training flights and written tests. I just went for it. I mean, I just studied, studied, studied and did the best I could. I became an Anchorage-based pilot. Anchorage pilots get paid the least amount of money because if you work somewhere else

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 144

144 Alaska’s Women Pilots

such as Juneau, you’re away from your family and earn comp time, overnight pay, and per diem. But when you’re in town, you don’t get overnight pay and you don’t get comp time, so if you work all summer in town, and you don’t work for the winter, you lose. You’re doing the same exact thing someone else is doing, but you’re in Anchorage. I enjoyed my summer though because I did flightseeing tours through the Chugach Mountains, which was fantastic. Had crab lunches. We did two-hour tours, and that was I think the best summer I ever had, even though I didn’t get paid very well. But I got good tips. In the hangar about 8:00 A.M. First flight not until about 9:00 A.M. or so. Typically, they’re two-hour tours. These are not people off of a tour bus. These are private individuals that just call. They have a lot of money because the tours are about $275 a person. So if you have a family of four, that’s expensive. We’d fly around the Chugach Mountains and land next to a glacier. You’d see bear, goats. You’d see moose and ice calving off. And then we’d fly over the glacier. Oh, it’s incredible! It’s blue, and they’ve got streams. You think it’s all frozen ice, but of course in the summertime, the top will melt. Parts of it, actually, are streams, and they flow into big holes—caverns—that drop a hundred feet below. You can look down in there, and it’s incredible. On cloudy days it’s the best flying because the ice is so blue, a real solid blue. One day we were flying under the clouds, and there was this one little mountaintop and it had a little “U” near the top. We flew right through it. The clouds were just right above it so it was just like a keyhole. The passengers were just like, “Whoa! Wow!” It was great. We flew right over some tourists who were on a hike. They must have wondered what the heck we were doing. And then there’s the bore tide at the Knik River. That’s amazing to see, too. All I know is that the Knik Arm, the tide just comes in so fast that you can’t outrun it. I’ve heard that the front of the wave can be as high as six feet tall. It’s just a rush of fast, fast water as the tide comes in. You don’t want to be caught in it, that’s for sure. It’s like one big wave. It’s just a moving wall of sand and silt that makes this sshhhhh sound as it comes in. Of course, the

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 145

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 145

wider the Knik Arm becomes, the smaller the wave gets. It’s really wild to see. Got to do some other neat trips because being the Anchoragebased pilot, you get to do all the little trips close-by. Went out to Red Dog Mine once, then down to Seward. That was fun. I was flying single-pilot captain at the time in a 206B Jet Ranger and 206L Long Ranger. Of all my passengers, I think I only had one guy say, “Oh, woman pilot, huh?” And then of course, when we were done, he was like, “That was the best flight I ever had.” He tipped me well. I mean, I never had to worry about him again. But, no, the response was always good. It was very pleasant, especially in Anchorage. Just good people. A couple times I got a couple hundred-dollar tips. You talk a little bit about the wildlife and history of Alaska. The mountains, Mount Susitna, stuff like that. It’s a tour, you know, people ask you questions and ask you the same question over and over and over. You’ve gotta get used to that. I worked in Juneau doing flightseeing for two summers. The second summer was really bad. The first flight was the worst. I felt like I’d been there forever. It was hard doing the same thing, seven flights a day, day after day. Being there overnight, we’d get per diem for food and comp time. You get $10 per flight hour. Well, you might spend two hours on the tour but only make $10, so $5 an hour wasn’t good. And they didn’t allow us to take tips. We’re in the tourist business. If you give a good tour, then you deserve what people give you. Actually, most of the people on the tour boats didn’t give any tips either; they’re pretty cheap. The flying just got to be pretty boring, and we’d go on our own little routes. Of course there’s six of us pilots, and it’s like, “Well where’s so and so? I’m right behind you.” And we’re all on the frequency. Oh, it got pretty crazy. A couple real close calls: really, really, really close calls. I even had a few with airplanes. One incident happened when I was landing. I was only fifty feet off the glacier, just ready to park, and this blue thing—aircraft wings—just filled up my whole windshield. It was bad. I’m like, “What’re they doing?” I’ve landed on ships a couple of times. It’s weird because the ship—or the boat—it’s in the water, so if it goes up, you have to go

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 146

146 Alaska’s Women Pilots

up with it, and if it comes down, you have to descend. If it comes up and you’re coming down, boom! It’s pretty hairy. I was really nervous. But these guys were waiting for me. I had to. They’re paying for us to pick them up off this boat. But it wasn’t really rocking and rolling, so that was nice. It was just kind of a little roll back and forth. I just watched as it came up and then that’s when I—bump— landed on the skids. At least they didn’t see me sweating. That was neat, though. Right into the wind. We parked on some big ships, too, up on the North Slope. That’s pretty incredible. I flew up there probably a total of two months: two weeks on, two weeks off. Talk about instrument flying. We did IFR flying and sling loading at the same time. I think there is only one other company in the world besides ERA that is IFR and sling-load rated. One time, one of the exploratory rigs was losing pressure. We were flying back and forth all day long, hauling these pallets of cement-like mixture. It was like dry mud, and we had to bring it out there. It was almost a twenty-four-hour thing, bringing it out, bringing it out. We were flying fourteen-hour shifts. One of the gals, Diane, was the operations manager. We’d depart in the middle of the night. We flew, I think, eight or nine sling loads out there. She’d come out, and we’d lift up over the load ready to go, and she’d hook the load to the belly of the helicopter. You’re ready to go, thumbs up. And then whoever’s not flying would help the other pilot by saying, “Come left, come right, or straight up.” Then off you go. We’d land right on the rig. Of course, you had to watch for all the antenna and things around the rig, too. It was teamwork. The first time I ever did a sling load was here in Alaska. It wasn’t really a sling load; it was what they called a “Bambi bucket” for putting out fires. Our chief pilot, Smith, took me out and said, “Let’s go for a flight.” I was like, “What’s a Bambi bucket?” I’d never heard of this stuff. He goes, “Well that’s if we need you on fires, then basically this little bucket, you scoop water out of a lake, and then when you’re over the fire, you punch the button and the bottom opens up. The water puts out the flames.” I said, “Yeah, sure. Let’s go do this!”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 147

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 147

He showed me how to lay out the bucket properly. Then we picked it up. It’s considered a sling load. It’s just something that’s hanging from underneath the helicopter. We picked it up and flew over to Fire Island. There’s a little pond over there. He said, “Well I’m gonna show you the first one. I’m telling you, you’re gonna have a lot of fun.” We went down really low, about three feet off the water. Then the bucket just automatically scoops in the water and fills up. So now it’s pretty heavy, and we’ve got this huge thing— kind of like a balloon—underneath us, full of water. And he goes, “Now see that spot there? We’ll pretend that the fire is right there.” He flew over it and hit the button—psshhh—and the bucket emptied right on top of the target. I’m like, “Wow. How can you judge that?” “I’ve just been doing it so long. Give it a try.” So I flew over the pond, scooped up the water, and took off kind of slow because it’s heavy. It’s just so neat! Then he said, “Right on that little bush there. Just empty it. Just go right at it, and then hit the thing.” When the water emptied out, I missed it by about five feet. He goes, “Not bad. That’s pretty close. It’s better than most people.” I said, “Oh, can I do it again?” So we did it two or three times, and each time after that first try, I hit it—boom—right on target. He goes, “You’re good. You’re just a natural.” “This is a blast!” He signed me off. If there were any government jobs for fire requirements, then I could go do that. Actually, one of the scariest flights I ever had was up on the North Slope. I was flying a Bell 212 with Joe Moys, one of ERA’s very experienced pilots. We were bringing back and forth things from the rig, like explosive caps and steel pipes. This one must have been about ten feet long, and it was packed with dynamite. If it fell, I don’t know if it would explode or not. We were really tired; we had already been working thirteen hours straight. If you’re with a two-man crew, they make you work fourteen hours of duty time and fly ten hours. We were at nine hours of flight time. It was a really long day. We had to do this one more time. The winds were blowing, head on. We were climbing, but right when we took off, the load

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 148

148 Alaska’s Women Pilots

didn’t stabilize and started to swing. We couldn’t keep it under control. We had to slow way down to sixty knots, and then we’d slow down to fifty knots, almost forty, to get this under control. All I remember is in the clouds, and this thing, I can just see it right out the side of my window. Your peripheral vision, you’re like, “What was that?” And then it goes, whoooo, up to here. I’m just yelling, “Punch it off! Just punch it off! Get rid of the load!” Joe said, “No, no. I’m gonna get it under control.” We’re IFR, and I thought, “Phew, this thing is gone.” And we’re doing this, and the HSI [horizontal situation indicator, used for navigation] is going wacky, sideways to the right, sideways to the left, all over the place. There’s nothing I can do. “Punch it off, Joe! Please punch it off.” It’s just swinging higher and higher, and I’m praying that it won’t hit the blades. But he got it under control. He slowed way down, almost to a hover, to get it under control. We both said, “Forget it. We’re going back home.” Turned around and just went back. Talked about what happened later. He said, “We were both tired; we shouldn’t have accepted the flight.” At least everything turned out okay. We were tired; we took off in IFR conditions, and this thing just got out of control and got worse and worse. That’s how pilots get into accidents: they just keep going. But we decided, “Forget it. Just turn around. It’s not worth it.” The sling load was like a pendulum, but off balance. Instead of the explosive cap flying straight underneath you, it started swinging back and forth, building momentum. The faster it went, the worse it got. When we slowed down it became more stable. Oh, it was bad. He later told me he didn’t want to punch the load off because it was packed with dynamite. There were buildings underneath us and we were only half a mile from the airport. He didn’t know if the buildings had people in them. He said, “I don’t know if this thing’s gonna explode. That’s the reason why I didn’t punch it off.” In Juneau they really pushed you hard to fly in crappy weather. “Get the tourists out to the glacier no matter what” was their motto. If you canceled one flight—there were six of us—at about a

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 149

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 149

Caroline on the Norris Glacier, Juneau.

hundred and fifty a person, that’s a lot of money. If you canceled all six flights, nearly six thousand dollars gone. That’s a lot of seats to say goodbye to. So they pushed us real hard to get out to the glacier, even if we were down to a hundred feet over the water. A couple times I turned around, went back, and the other guys still kept going. I didn’t care. They got stuck out there once, too. Stupid. It’s not worth it, risking your life. The tour’s supposed to be an hour total. They’re stuck on the glacier another hour because the weather rolled in on them. The best, best flying was seeing all the wildlife. Near Seward, I’d take my binoculars and walk around the beaches. The eagles and seals don’t even know you’re there. The whales go by, the humpback whales. We saw a pod, about fifteen of them; they were breaching and jumping way out of the water. We’d see killer whales too. Another flight we flew into Kodiak. We’d park out on the beach and watch the whales. We’d see wild fox, red fox, just run by like you’re just part of the scenery. They weren’t scared because they’d probably never seen a human being before. The birds would park right next to you. The volcano was steaming off in the background.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 150

150 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Another memorable flight was when we witnessed the northern lights, the aurora borealis. It was one of our night flights. We were IFR sling loading, picking up pallets of mud and slinging them out to the oil rig. Captain Moys and I were flying. “Basically,” I said, “you’re flying and I’m enjoying the view.” Red, purples, blues, yellows, greens. The display lasted three hours. Some big white thing came streaking right at us, too. I don’t know what it was. It just raced toward us, exploded, and was gone. It was so neat. It was the most incredible flight ever. All night it was just aurora borealis. Back and forth, and back and forth. Turned all the lights off inside, pretty much most of them, and we just enjoyed the scene, the view. It was amazing. My mother grew up in England, so it’s a totally different life. My dad in Germany. Everything was extremely strict. My father would just come home, eat, be served, and read the newspaper. No social life with the family or anything. I don’t remember a cookout, ever. After my brother and I were out of the house, my parents divorced. There was nothing there. It was just toleration, basically. I should be thinking back to happy, fun times. It was tough. My father always told me that I would be no good. “You’ll amount to nothing,” he’d say. Sometimes he’d quiz me on math and ask, “What’s the percentage of this or that?” I’m like, “Ah, I don’t know.” “Ah, you’re stupid,” he’d say. Maybe that’s why I quit a lot of things I started. I’d think, “Oh, I can’t do it. I’ll fail.” That’s the feeling I had. Making captain was difficult. At times I thought, “I’m just no good at this” or “I simply can’t do it.” Then I’d say, “No, I’m going to succeed. I need to treat myself right.” A few years ago, I did confront my dad. I said, “You know, we never had a family life. There’s nothing positive about our family.” I was hoping he’d ask me what I needed or how he could help. But he didn’t ask any of that stuff. He said, “I only knew what I knew. I did the best I could.” He’s still real stubborn, but I forgave him. My mom just told me to do whatever I wanted. Have fun. That’s about it. Even if she didn’t like something I was doing, she

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 151

Caroline Lachmann-Spivak 151

probably wouldn’t have said anything. Her motto was “Do whatever’s best for you and I’ll support you.” I thought that was a great mom. Maybe. I don’t know. She was always there for me, no matter what, and the one I could always count on for advice—still is. I guess I have my dad’s drive. If I really want something, I go for it. Hardly anything gets in the way. And I think, too, that one of the reasons I married was to get my feet on the ground. I mean, really, aviation for me was eight, nine, ten years of living out of a suitcase. I wanted to stop denying the things that I really wanted, like having a family. For me personally, flying wouldn’t allow that. Nowadays people take jobs and drop their kids off at daycare. I didn’t want someone else raising my children. The advice I’d give to young girls who are interested in aviation is this: if it’s flying helicopters or fixed-wing, get in with a good group of people. In Alaska they have the Civil Air Patrol. You can gain flight experience without cost. You don’t have to have a pilot’s license to join search and rescue. Get in a good group like that. Get your feet wet and see if you like flying. Have fun. If you don’t have fun at what you’re doing then don’t do it. That little inner voice always tells you what’s right and what’s wrong. If somebody wants to fly and be a pilot, I mean, my goodness, the world’s at your fingertips nowadays. So many people are retiring. Aviation is wide open. One of my friends works for Evergreen. When the company needs pilots, they pull out names from a hiring pool. From there, he can go to any company in the world. Right now the helicopter industry is begging for pilots. You can just about pick a company, and they’ll hire you. If I was to do it all again, I’d still fly helicopters. I’d like to get on with FedEx if I had my fixed-wing rating. The money is there. It sounds kind of strange, but the freedom’s in the helicopters. But making $30,000 a year in a helicopter compared to over $100,000 for an airline is a big difference. One day I was jump seating to Seattle. The captain says, “Why would you ever want to fly for an airline? Look at this.” After takeoff, he punches the autopilot. He says, “This is so boring.” This is an Alaska Airlines pilot telling me this. He says, “I’d rather have your job any day. The money’s not worth it for what I’m doing.” He

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 152

152 Alaska’s Women Pilots

hated it. Three hours, six hours, sitting there in the night. Excitement’s five to ten seconds for takeoff and five seconds for landing. For helicopters, it’s fun all the time.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 153

Aerobatic Pilot Knife-edge flight. Lazy eight. Tail slide. Hammerhead. Spin. Immelmann. Split S. Avalanche. These highly specialized words of aerial dancing—turning, tumbling, twirling—are familiar to professional aerobatic pilots. With only one chance at winning the U.S. Aerobatic Championship each year, aviators perfect these flight maneuvers and demonstrate them inside cockpits that fit like second skins. Perfection is the goal. One mistake, like flying outside the designated box of cubic airspace, and they’ve lost their chance at first place. According to FAR 91.303, “aerobatic flight means an intentional maneuver involving an abrupt change in an aircraft’s attitude, an abnormal attitude, or abnormal acceleration, not necessary for normal flight.” Pilots may not practice aerobatic flight under the following conditions: over any congested area of a city, town, or settlement; over an open air assembly of persons; within Class B, C, D, and E airspace designated for an airport within four nautical miles of the center line of any federal airway; below an altitude of 1,500 feet above the surface; or when flight visibility is less than three statute miles. Of course, pilots on the U.S. Aerobatic Team discard these rules like chewed sunflower seeds— in the trash. 153

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 154

154 Alaska’s Women Pilots

In the world of competitive aerobatics, pilots exchange good fellowship and camaraderie for cutthroat rivalry and competition. In the United States aviatrices have to forget about being nice and having people like them if they plan on making the U.S. Women’s Aerobatic Team. In front of the judges these best-of-the-best team flyers—only five women—forget about drinking and laughing together a few days earlier and become fierce opponents. Do they each want to win first place? You bet. One of the many attributes that top aerobatic pilots possess is self-discipline. Once a goal is set, such as practicing outside snap rolls or reverse Cuban eights three times a day, there is no question they will achieve their goal. These Olympic-caliber aviators possess attributes such as self-motivation, self-confidence, and self-control inherent to any professional athlete. In practice as well as in competition, aerobatic pilots learn to separate their stressful feelings and thoughts from the reality of performance. This valuable technique—compartmentalization—is the same tool of detachment that professional soldiers face on the front line during war. In Russo’s Women and Flight: Portraits of Contemporary Women Pilots, U.S. Navy captain Linda V. Hutton talks about the technique of compartmentalization: “One thing we look for in a successful aviator is good compartmentalization. You’ve got to have somebody who’s got a lot of things going on, but when the chips are down and everything is going wrong in the cockpit, they can compartmentalize. I’m not going to worry about the fact, say, that I’m going through a divorce right now. I’m not going to worry about the fact that my kid is dying of measles. I’m not going to worry about the fact that I’ve got an electrical problem in the back of the airplane, because right now I’ve got an engine on fire. It’s the ability to put things in the proper department and close the door” (26). In many respects, the focus and precision required of Linda, a Naval aviator who flies a Grumman C-2A Greyhound on and off carrier decks, is very similar to the demands placed upon professional aerobatic pilots today. U.S. Women’s Aerobatic Team members and Hollywood stunt pilots don’t quit, no matter what. Not even after one of the best pilots in the world, Art Scholl, crashed while flying for the movie Top Gun. Art’s last words were, “I’ve got a problem

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 155

Aerobatic Pilot 155

[uttered at 3,000 ft. while in an inverted flat spin]. I’ve really got a problem [at 1,500 ft.]” (English 218). But the incident must not be dwelled on. The pilots for the aerobatic team must will themselves back into the cockpit. For them, taking control of the situation forces them toward the belief that crashes don’t include them. “It won’t happen to me. It won’t happen to me” becomes their daily mantra. Their choice to face danger—head on and with full power— makes them the incredible aerial daredevils of our time. Before World War I, pioneers such as Harriet Quimby flew aerial stunts for paying audiences. It wasn’t too long before these theatrical performers joined forces with veteran aviators to become barnstormers. “Surviving on shoestring budgets, these aviators flew anytime, anywhere, charging from $2 to $25 for a ride” (Lopez 65). Women such as Blanche Stuart Scott, Ruth Law, and Katherine Stinson were part of this elite team of aerial performers. Ruth achieved two firsts for women in aviation: night flight and looping the loop. Katherine invented the dippy twist loop. If one of their teammates died in front of the crowd, these women had to find the strength and the means inside of themselves to keep flying. In some people’s minds, the term “barnstormer” evokes images of pilots sleeping in barns, chasing cows off a makeshift runway, and crash landing on top of chicken coops. Pilots such as Bessie Coleman flew war-surplus Curtiss JN-4Ds, as did Pancho Barnes, one of the most colorful and legendary characters in aviation history. Pancho, born Florence Lowe Barnes, was nurtured into the field of aviation by her grandfather. As a young girl, she was placed at the controls of a makeshift airplane, which she pretended to fly: “As she held the control stick tight and closed her eyes, her grandfather told her that she would one day soar the skies with the eagles” (Schultz 8). She believed every word and held onto this dream the rest of her life. While growing up, Pancho desperately wanted love and approval from her parents. Perhaps that’s why she agreed to marry the Reverend Calvin Rankin. This unhappy marriage to Calvin, who was rigid, passionless, stoic, and unadventurous, ended in divorce after seven and a half years and one son. Soon after, Pancho

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 156

156 Alaska’s Women Pilots

discarded her given name of Florence, suggesting flowers and femininity, and became Pancho, Spanish for Frank, meaning “uninhibited or unreserved” (Schultz 43). On September 6, 1928, she soloed. In no time, her continual hunger for excitement, challenge, and action enabled her to obtain pilot license #7196 signed by Orville Wright. (Schultz 65). Throughout her life, Pancho worked in a variety of careers: barnstorming, air racing, ranching, flight schooling, and business. At one point she operated The Happy Bottom Riding Club, a local hangout joint of Chuck Yeager, the famous pilot who broke the sound barrier. Pancho thrived on the limelight, particularly when she was flying her Mystery Ship for movies such as Howard Hughes’s Hell’s Angels. In 1930 Pancho beat Amelia Earhart’s record and earned the title of “fastest woman in the world.” Then on March 1, 1931, Pancho flew from Los Angeles to Sacramento in two hours and thirteen minutes. As she crossed the finish line, 20,000 spectators cheered and celebrated her as “America’s fastest woman flyer.” Betty Skelton-Frankman was born on June 28, 1926: too late to experience the barnstorming era and too early to join the WASPs. But that didn’t stop Betty from winning the International Feminine Aerobatic Championship in 1948, 1949, and 1950. In Russo’s Women and Flight: Portraits of Contemporary Women Betty talks about learning to fly: I was the kid that would always hang around the airport. Somebody would invite me to go up with them, and, oh, I’d get in any airplane with anybody. After you’d get up, they’d say, “Would you like to try to fly?” and pretty soon you know how to fly. . . . . . . There was a Navy ensign who was instructing us on his time off in Pensacola, Florida. Dad soloed. Mother soloed. One day he took me around the field and came back down and started getting out, and I said, “Oh, are we through?” He said, “No, you’re going to go by yourself.” And he let me go. After I had gone solo, Dad said, “Don’t tell anybody, now, because you’re not supposed to, you know. It’s not legal.” (139)

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 157

Aerobatic Pilot 157

Florence Lowe “Pancho” Barnes.

Today Betty is remembered for her pioneering efforts toward women’s aerobatics. At the time she was flying the smallest aerobatic plane in the world—an S-1C Pitts Special—inverted and ten feet off the ground, enabling her to slice the ribbon for her famous invertedribbon-cut maneuver. Still, she feels a sense of loss, most certainly frustration, at the limitations placed on women aviators of her time.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 158

158 Alaska’s Women Pilots

She said, “. . . I could not get on with the airlines, and I couldn’t get in the military. There weren’t enough competitive aerobatic airplanes to do much in that area except for what I did. If I’d been born twenty years earlier, I would have been racing with Cochran or trying to outdo Amelia Earhart. If I’d been born twenty years later, I’d have been fighting Sally Ride like crazy for that first ride” (141). At Merrill Field in Anchorage, I climb into the pilot seat of a Decathlon, a single-engine aerobatic plane. A petite woman named Darlene Dubay sits directly behind me, buckling in. As an aerobatic flight instructor, she’s already instructed me on the use of a parachute (I’m sitting on it) and has drawn a series of squiggly lines on a blank sheet of paper that translate into a loop and roll. We take off and climb toward the practice area, and once there, Darlene demonstrates the responsiveness of the flight controls. At 3,000 feet she gradually dives the airplane in order to build up airspeed. As the nose of the aircraft goes up and over, I note the precision and grace with which she moves the controls. Now I try my hand at the maneuver. Beginning a slow dive, I first pull back on the stick ever so gently at the same time I’m watching the sky meet the horizon. When we return to the point of origin, I giggle like a schoolgirl. This is a blast! This aerial dance called a loop—up and over—makes me feel free and alive, like I’m skipping across the sky. Thankfully, when a loop is done correctly, the G-meter instrument registers insignificant amounts of gravitational force (acceleration of gravity). In other words, when all forces are equal, it’s no different than riding on a commercial jetliner. Throughout this introductory course on aerobatics, I experience maneuvers such as barrel rolls, snap rolls, and hammerheads that aren’t quite so tame. The G-forces that push my body into the pilot seat and make my eyes feel like they will certainly pop out of my skull at any moment aren’t comfortable. For me aerobatic training is an excellent way of building self-confidence and increasing my flying skills. What better way to educate pilots about wind gusts or mountain waves that flip airplanes upside down than aerobatic training? After a few lessons my hesitation of inverted flight, or any other unknown, is conquered, and I know I’m a safer pilot.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 159

Aerobatic Pilot 159

Yet with this increased exposure, I also come to the personal decision that I don’t want to compete as an aerobatic pilot. For me this twisting and jerking and pulling is not nearly as much fun as flying low-level over the treetops, where I can observe moose and bear, go flyfishing for the day, or have myriad other flightseeing adventures that bring me great pleasure. Feeling bloated or getting punched in the shoulder by seatbelts is hard on the body. But I certainly enjoy air shows, particularly when there’s someone I know from Alaska flying such as Patty Wagstaff. During the first week of August 1997 in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, Patty makes a low, inverted pass in her Extra 260, a red, white, and blue taildragger. This largest air show in the world draws some 800,000 spectators who come to see antique airplanes, warbirds, homebuilts, and military aircraft. But there’s no performance quite as spectacular as the professional aerobatic pilots climbing vertically higher and higher above their aerial stages. Thousands of upturned faces watch Patty complete a square loop followed by a rolling turn. This difficult maneuver requires that the pilots not only fly at a constant altitude, but also complete a 360-degree turn with rolls throughout. One can easily imagine this third-time U.S. Aerobatic champion holding the control stick, yanking or pushing, in rhythm to her choreographed program. As a young girl, Patty grew up under the influence of aviation. Her father, an air force pilot and retired captain for Japan Airlines, introduced her to the lifestyle of travel and freedom of the air. In her memoir Fire and Air: A Life on the Edge, Patty talks about her childhood with her sister, Toni: I wasn’t even allowed to choose my own clothes, so I barely recognized my innate ability to make things happen. I thought life was controlled by outside forces. Like a leaf in the wind, I gave people and situations the power to decide my fate. It took a long time for me to discover that I had a choice. Toni always knew about choice. She wanted to be a pilot like our father. Part of our differences in focus was generational, part personality, part nature, and part nurture. Dad never encouraged

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 160

160 Alaska’s Women Pilots or discouraged either of us, but Toni set her sights on airline piloting. Neither of our parents envisioned us in a career, especially an aviation career because we were women. It wasn’t even discussed until Toni had the drive, the dedication, and the perseverance to make it happen. I couldn’t have stuck with the same program that appealed to her. I took years to discover what I wanted to do and to get a glimpse of life’s possibilities. (13–14)

To this day professional aerobatics satisfies Patty’s need for nonstop adventure, challenge, and competition. Ever since 1982, when she received the same ten hours of aerobatic training that I did from Darlene in the Decathlon, Patty has been driven to become the best in the world. She thrives on flying upside down, inside out, and feeling her body nearly catapulting from the seat. Patty says, “This is where I belong and where I feel alive, even joyous. Each time I fly aerobatics, I feel more at home in my machine and in the air. I believe in the elements: air, earth, water, and fire. I believe that people are basically elemental, drawn instinctively and specifically to one or two of them, like the animals that we are. Air and fire are seductive to me. I feel them. Air and fire—my equation for the airplane” (1). Of all the famous aviators of our day, Patty can relate to the prophecy of Amelia Earhart: “Aviation records don’t fall until someone is willing to mortgage the present for the future” (English 15). For Amelia this mortgage or risk of danger ultimately resulted in her death, when she ran out of fuel and disappeared over the Pacific Ocean. For Patty, who has literally dedicated nearly a decade of lifeblood to the art of aerobatics, this mortgage of the present rings true. Her love of flying has cost her time, energy, money, and eventually, a marriage in exchange for numerous awards, titles, and fame. It is not surprising that her Extra 260 is displayed in the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum (NASM) next to Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed Vega. When Patty visits the Pioneers of Flight Gallery, she feels a mixture of humility, awe, and pride (Wagstaff 290). Similar to a mother who passes on a legacy through children, Patty knows that

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 161

Aerobatic Pilot 161

Patty Wagstaff.

her airplane and accomplishments have affected a generation of women who are beginning to live more decisively and believe in their dreams. Sometimes Patty has to pinch herself in order to believe that she really did all the things she set her mind on doing: “You do get the things you wish for, the things for which you dare to dream. If you focus on what you really want, you can get everything you wish for and more” (Wagstaff 289).

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 162

162 Alaska’s Women Pilots

The author as captain (right) and Darlene Dubay as copilot in the ARCO Twin Otter.

Patty’s first aerobatic instructor, Darlene Dubay, loves to fly— addictively, passionately. On days when Darlene’s not adjusting power levers or monitoring instruments for Northwest Airlines on the Boeing 747, she competes in marathons. Darlene set her sights on the Boston Marathon and after months of training—miles and miles of conditioning—she completed her goal while fellow runners were still deciding if they could do it or not. In the summer of 1984, I first met Darlene when I was flying for Atlantic Richfield Corporation (ARCO) as a captain on the Twin Otter. My regular route was back and forth, back and forth, from Deadhorse to Kuparuk or from Prudhoe Bay to Kuparuk, some twelve times a day. When the snow melted, the bridge would wash out, leaving oil workers stranded and dependent on one means of transportation: the airplane. For a few weeks, I had the pleasure of flying with Darlene as my copilot. Her love of aviation and passion for life was infectious. Slightly over fifty, Darlene has two children. One son commercially fishes in the bush; he epitomizes the image of the Alaskan outdoorsman splattered across the cover of women’s magazines.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 163

Aerobatic Pilot 163

Her daughter, an environmentalist with a master’s of theology from Seattle University, wrote her thesis on voluntary simplicity. Darlene is petite and muscular, relaxed yet energetic. If Darlene had decided to become the U.S. Aerobatic Champion in the early eighties instead of staying in Alaska with her husband and kids, could she have competed neck-and-neck with Patty and achieved first spot?

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 164

Darlene Dubay The first time I thought about flying was when I was growing up in northern Michigan. My oldest brother used to get flying magazines; mostly they were about building airplanes, kind of technical. From the earliest time I can remember, I was operating large equipment on the farm. I could hardly get my arms around the steering wheel of the tractor, while my brothers picked up the hay bales. So it was like, why shouldn’t I be a pilot? It’s just operating machinery, and I’ve done that before.

We moved to Alaska in 1971. My husband was a dentist in the public health service, and we had two kids, five and three at the time. Once they started school, I took advantage of learning how to fly. It just seemed that everybody flew up here. It was the only way to get around. There were so few roads, and things you could do by road were so limited. So I went to the flying club at Fort Rich and started in a Cessna 150. You know, it seemed too complicated, all the things you had to remember. But I was hooked right from the start. It is an addiction, definitely. By next spring I got my private license. I started in November, which was a very bad time to start because of winter storms and scraping off the plane. Freezing your feet. Oh, it was awful. But at the time it seemed like that’s just what people did. The strip was all ice covered and you could land sideways or straight; it didn’t really matter. You’d just continue going down the runway. Then when summer came around, I remember being really surprised on my landings, how when you touch down, it would kind of always jerk a little bit after the pavement showed up.

164

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 165

Darlene Dubay 165

Darlene Dubay.

That summer I got a float rating. We went out and did some camping trips. The neat thing about Alaska is you don’t have to go far to be out in the wilderness and away from people. My husband thought it was okay; he never showed any lack of confidence in me or was at all doubtful of my abilities. He actually learned how to fly a year or two after I did. But he was really smart because he got me hooked on flying first, and then, you know, of course we’d have to have an airplane. He knew probably that if he had started flying first I’d say, “No way, you can’t have an airplane.” After I got my float rating, we had a friend who owned a Cessna 205, a forerunner of the 206. He wanted us to be partners in the plane. We thought it was a good idea, so we bought half of the six-place airplane. That was quite a step up after flying a Cessna 150. By that time my husband was out of the public health service, but he was still doing contract work. He would load up his equipment in boxes, we’d put it in the airplane, and I’d fly him out to the villages. Sometimes I’d act as his assistant, and sometimes he’d take another assistant along. We’d fly all over the state, mostly in the

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 166

166 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Dillingham area, but we regularly went to Emmonak and Kotlik on the Yukon Delta. I remember one time coming back from one of those trips. We came through Ptarmigan Pass, the one that goes way down and back up. We got into a snowstorm. It was a terrifying experience, flying through the snow and not having instrument rating and not being able to turn around. So I decided I’d better get my instrument rating just so we’d have some more options: so I could go on an instrument flight, and it wouldn’t be quite so dangerous. After the checkride we took several trips outside with our airplane. We flew all the way to Florida one time for a family reunion. Around that same time, I took a ten-hour aerobatic course. Now that really hooked me on flying. I thought, “I have got to find a way to make this pay, because it’s so much fun and I obviously just can’t buy all my flying time, so I may as well get a commercial license.” It seemed like always one thing would lead to another, you know? So I got the commercial license in ‘76 I think it was. That summer I went out to Kaltag with my 205 and hauled fish from Kaltag to Unalakleet. They were the fish they’d catch on the Yukon River in the fish wheels, and then we’d load them up in the plane in these little totes, and I’d fly them over to Unalakleet. That was kind of a fun job, but I could see that it wasn’t the kind of thing I’d like to do indefinitely; I think it’s dangerous. You always have to be operating right at gross weight because, obviously, the more you can haul, the more money you can make. I did have a real scary incident there. I was taking off one day. I’m an intuitive person; I apply that talent in my flying. And so I was on the take off roll. Things just didn’t seem right. I can’t say exactly why, I looked at this gauge and I looked at that gauge, and this was the speed and all of that, but it like I sensed all of these things and something wasn’t right, and so I aborted the take off. Of course I had a full load of fish on the plane, and of course there were trees at the end of the runway. So I aborted the take off. We unloaded the fish. There was a mechanic there, and I had him look at the airplane. He looked at the engine, and we ran it up and everything looked normal. I mean, the oil pressure, the manifold

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 167

Darlene Dubay 167

pressure, everything looked absolutely normal. It sounded normal. I thought, “Well, it’s probably okay. It must have been something that I imagined, or maybe it’s hotter than I thought it was.” But I also thought, “I don’t think I’ll do any more fish hauling. I think I’ll take the plane back to Anchorage and have my mechanic look at it.” There was another pilot there who wanted to go back to Anchorage. We hopped into the airplane and took off. Being empty it took off a little better, accelerated a little more normally. But it would not climb out of ground effect [when an aircraft experiences an increased amount of lift near the ground]. We kind of skewed around the pattern, you know, just above the trees, practically running into the trees, and got it back on the ground. Then the mechanic opened up the cowling, and one of the piston covers had a big crack in it and oil was coming out of it. A cylinder was completely destroyed. How he hadn’t seen that before, or why the engine instruments didn’t pick it up, I don’t know. It was scary. If I had taken off with those fish, I wouldn’t be here to talk about it because I wouldn’t have made it above the trees. Certainly with all the fish behind me, on a crash they would all come forward. After I got back from Kaltag, I had a mechanic fly out there, repair the airplane, and we flew it back. I decided that probably wasn’t the kind of business I wanted to be in. So I got my instructor certificate that fall, and instructed for probably two years at Fort Rich. While I was instructing, I got my associate’s degree in professional piloting and got my multi-engine rating in a Cessna 310. That was a lot of fun. I always felt like Sky King. Then in the spring of ‘81 I went to work for AAI [Alaska Aeronautical Industries]. Flew a Twin Otter as copilot. They told me that you had to have an ATP [Airline Transport Pilot, the highest achievable pilot rating] to get a job there, and so I said, “I have one.” They were kind of stuck. But it so happened that I was hired at the tail end of a big hiring spree. When normally a person would upgrade within three months of starting work there, it took me over a year to get into a position where I could upgrade. It was the low point of my flying career. I probably shouldn’t bad-mouth anybody, but their maintenance procedures were so lax. Oftentimes we’d have holes in the panel, so we’d have to keep the

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 168

168 Alaska’s Women Pilots

curtains closed so the passengers wouldn’t see it. They actually encouraged people to leave after they had been there awhile because they would have to pay them more money. The more seniority you had, the more money you earned. It wasn’t a real good atmosphere to work in, but it was kind of like, well, you have to do this to get time, and you have to pay your dues. You flew eight hours, at least, every day. The only real problem I had was not getting enough sleep because they gave you the minimal amount of time off. But I did build up a lot of time very quickly. For the most part, the flight crews were really professional because they wanted to go on to become airline pilots. They all treated me with respect. I did have one run-in with a captain on my second day. We hopped in the Twin Otter and loaded up with passengers. He’s doing everything. He’s doing the weight and balance. He’s supervising the loading, and he’s calling on the radio getting the clearance. He’s going through all the checklists by himself. I’m not sure about procedures and what I should do or shouldn’t do. He did everything by himself. I sat there on my hands. At one time I said, “Do you want me to read the checklist or something?” “No, no, I’ve got it. Don’t worry about it.” He wouldn’t talk to me or acknowledge my presence or let me do anything. I remember we flew over to Valdez. We got into the terminal. I was getting madder by the minute. We got into the terminal, and I said, “I’m not going back with you.” His jaw dropped to about here. He said, “What do you mean?” And I said, “Well, you obviously don’t need me to fly the plane with you. I’m not gonna work like this. If you don’t need me, I’m not going to do it.” He kind of stammered a little bit. He said, “Well, would you like me to have you fly on the way back?” I said, “Okay.” And so I flew on the way back. A Twin Otter can be flown single-pilot; the military pilots do it all the time. This was supposed to be a crew situation. It obviously wasn’t on the first leg. After that it seemed like I flew with him all the time. I was on his schedule all the time. There were a few tense days. It was like he was testing me to see if I could hold up, or if I could do my part.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 169

Darlene Dubay 169

After that it was like something just clicked, and we just really enjoyed working with each other. I think it was because I was able to stand up to him and just not let him push me around like that. I have found, in a sense, being a woman in a man’s world—and it is still, I think, a man’s world—you have to prove yourself all the time. Any new place you go, any new pilot you fly with. I don’t know if it’s the same for men. It may be because pilots are so egotistical. They may have that sense, also. Partly I think it’s because I’m a woman. In some ways I don’t fit the image. I’m small, not real masculine or tough looking. I think they have to really test me. I think he was the only person that I had a lot of trouble with in all of the years of flying with men. You get that sense that they’re testing you, but it’s not real up-front. It’s like they’re sitting back, watching. Then once you prove yourself, it’s fine. As long as people are real professional, it’s a non-factor whether you’re male or female. So anyway, I worked for AAI for a year. That was in ‘82. I decided that I might like to try getting an airline job, so I got my flight engineer’s certificate. I don’t recall what the hiring situation was at the time, but I wasn’t willing to leave Alaska, so I limited my search for flying jobs to just the West Coast and Alaska. My husband had a business here, and I had kids. That was just more important to me. I know in looking for a job now, that’s a real detriment because people will say, “Well, why didn’t you pursue it actively and move wherever in the world you had to?” You know, family is really important. I love to fly, but not at the expense of destroying a family. As long as I was able to fly up here, that was fine. I tried to get on with Wien at the time and Alaska Airlines. I did actually have an interview at Wien, but it was just as they were going under. I probably would have been in the next class. In the meantime, I went back to flying part-time at the Fort Rich flying club. I started my own freelance flight instructing business and instructed people in their own airplanes. I also had a Decathlon at the time, so I was also giving aerobatic flight instruction in my own airplane. That was about the time we had an aerobatic club here, a chapter of the International Aerobatic Club. There were probably fifteen people or so that were really interested in aerobatics. We got

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 170

170 Alaska’s Women Pilots

everything organized, and we had a judging contest, or a judging school, and some sportsmen contests just to get your basic patches. That was kind of a big thing at the time. It was about that time that I gave Patty Wagstaff, the world aerobatic champion, her first ten hours of instruction. That was my claim to fame, I guess. We had a lot of fun together. She really is a genuinely nice person. I don’t think that her fame and fortune has touched her at all. She hasn’t let it go to her head. She’s worked really hard for what she’s gotten. She really does have a gift. There’s no comparison to some of the other top men or women. She’s really artistic and precise. It’s a great combination. There’s a lot of people that can fly precisely, but it’s not artistic. She puts them together really well. Not having any airline opportunities, and things falling through with Wien, was hard. I certainly didn’t want to go back to AAI. It was about that time they were going under also. I think the FAA shut them down for awhile because of all kinds of violations. Noncompliance. So I got away from flying regularly. I was instructing but not everyday. There was probably a two-year period where I just wasn’t doing much. I was in this quandary as to whether I would be continuing to try to make a career of flying or just let it go entirely. But I’ve always found—ever since I’ve started flying, ever since I took my first lesson—I’m happiest when I’m flying. If I’m not flying, I gradually start going downhill. It was about that time that Atlantic Richfield Corporation (ARCO) needed a temporary pilot. Since I was in-between things, I went up to the Slope. It didn’t matter if it lasted a week or a month or longer. I remember being so surprised at how much traffic there was. At the time I had 1,000 hours of Twin Otter time. It was nice to get back into flying, even though it was boring flying eight or twelve trips back and forth every day. Sometimes you’d forget, “Now, are we going to Kuparuk or Prudhoe? Which direction are we heading?” It was nice living quarters. I had never flown on the Slope before. If ARCO had offered me a full-time position, I probably would have taken it. And who knows, I might still be there. It would

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 171

Darlene Dubay 171

Darlene with her Decathlon.

be definitely boring. But everything in flying or in life is like compromises. Is there ever a perfect situation anywhere? Bill Overway, one of the pilots at ARCO, put in a good word for me at ERA Aviation. The company interviewed me for a job as a copilot on the Twin Otter. That seemed like just the greatest opportunity in the world; ERA really is a professional operation. Their maintenance is outstanding. Their hangar—I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it—but you could eat off the floor. They had good equipment and good mechanics. The only problem I had there was the schedule. You had to work six days every week and never knew when you were flying next. It was a little hard to have a life in addition to flying. I know there are pilots out there whose entire lives are flying. I don’t know if that’s the majority of them or not, but I’ve always needed a life in addition to flying. I mean, it’s fun, and it’s interesting. I can’t imagine being without flying, but there’s other things in life. Working six days a week and not knowing what I was doing tomorrow just got on my nerves after awhile. I flew the Twin Otter for about a year and then upgraded to copilot on the Convair. That was a neat airplane. I kind of grew

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 172

172 Alaska’s Women Pilots

attached to the Convair. It’s a really powerful airplane. It was just really fun to fly. People were always so surprised that I could manage the rudders on it because it’s a heavy airplane. Since I run marathons, I didn’t have any problem with that at all. They kept waiting for me when they did engine cuts to let it wander off or leave the runway or something. I really never had any problems with it. What was really challenging was landing in real rough turbulence or wind shears. Because the ailerons were so slow to respond you had to—and it was so heavy on the aileron control—actually have both hands on the yoke. Even the men had to do it that way. I mean, you’d have one person, both hands on the yoke, and the other person handling the throttles in turbulence. If it was smooth air, you could easily do it with one hand. That was a fun plane though. I flew the Convair for about a year, almost a year and a half, and was getting burned out on the schedule. Bill Overway had always talked about working for the FAA in flight check, so I decided to apply. But they sent back my application and said, “You don’t meet our requirements.” And I said, “What do you mean? I want to have this reviewed.” So I went in, and I talked to a personnel officer, and I said, “Look, I’ve got everything that you have listed on this sheet.” And she said, “Well, you don’t have” . . . I think it was 500 hours you needed of heavy time in a plane over 12,500 pounds. I said, “That wasn’t listed on the application or on the bid sheet.” She said, “Well, we can’t put everything on there.” So I kept working at ERA a little longer. At the same time I knew Val Aron Jokela. She was in the aerobatic club with us way back. It’s amazing how the world is so small in aviation up here. Anyway, I knew Val, and I knew she was working for the FAA, so I talked to her about getting a job. She helped me through the paperwork process, and I put in another application. Then in the summer of ‘88 the FAA called me and asked me if I wanted a job in Fairbanks as an Aviation Safety Inspector in the FSDO. So I moved up to Fairbanks and worked there for a year. It’s

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 173

Darlene Dubay 173

a really interesting job. I gained a lot of respect for a good inspector. It’s amazing what the flying public expects a FSDO inspector to know. They have to know everything about every aspect of all aviation. It’s impossible. But a good inspector knows where to look up the information quickly. I went to a lot of schools and learned how to give checkrides, learned how to write enforcement packages, and all the administrative type of things. I was the assistant to the regular principle operations inspectors for a lot of the places out in the bush. For six months I went primarily to Nome, and I worked with all the operators doing base inspections, route inspections, and giving checkrides. Then for the other part of the time that I was there, I was assigned to the inspector who worked up in Barrow doing base inspections. Then you’d have to be on accident standby on the weekends. If an accident occurred, you’d have to go investigate. That was not my favorite part of being an inspector. It was interesting, and I really learned a lot about regulations. Every place you go and every step you make in aviation, it seems there’s so much more to learn. The year I was there, the mentality of the FAA was to give everybody tickets: write as many enforcement packages as you possibly can. I didn’t like that mentality because I think I’m an instructor deep down in my heart, and I want people to do well, and I want them to learn rather than to have to hit them over the head with an enforcement action. I remember on one accident I went to talk to the pilot in the hospital. The office manager wanted me to write an enforcement action on him. He got into an accident because he was breaking the rules. But after seeing him in the hospital with broken bones, knowing he lost his plane and barely survived the accident, I thought, “Hasn’t he already learned his lesson? Do we have to really take his license away? Do we have to really fine him?” I would think anybody who’s had an accident already knows they were doing wrong. The people that you really need to hit over the head, it doesn’t faze them. There are bandits out there who will try to get away with as much as they possibly can because they really don’t believe

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 174

174 Alaska’s Women Pilots

that the laws of aerodynamics apply to them. The bottom line is, you have to make a buck. Flying is a hard way to make a living for a lot of people in Alaska. The profit margin is so low that they become bandits and cut corners and cut inspections on the plane and give pilots minimal training. In any case it was an interesting job, but a year later I got a job with flight inspection (FIFO) in Anchorage. At the time, our office had a logistics mission in addition to flight inspection. We would haul supplies out to the bush villages of Iliamna, Cold Bay, Tanana, and Bettles. They still had FAA personnel in those places, and we’d bring them their supplies and groceries and whatever. Those were the only villages that supposedly didn’t have regular air service, so we’d supply their logistic needs. I flew the Convair for about a year before I went to get my type rating in the Saberliner, which was the first jet I’d ever flown. It was a blast. Flight inspection is really a fun type of flying. Other than aerobatics, I think it’s the most fun type of flying. I think it’s because it’s not routine. We don’t do the same old, fly this route, do this approach. There’s a lot of teamwork within the airplane between the pilot-in-command, the second-in-command, and the technician. The technician, who sits in the back with all his specialized computerized stuff, he’s really in charge of the mission. The pilots simply put the airplane in a position in space where he can analyze the signal. For example, when you’re checking an Instrument Landing System (ILS), you check the width of the localizer and the width of the glide slope. You also have to check the alignment and roughness in the signal. The technician has to look at the information and say that doesn’t meet the tolerances, or it does. It’s a real interesting type of job. I fly about 400 or 500 hours a year. The flying is great. I’m getting to see all the West Coast, the western states. We spent last week in Yellowstone and Wyoming and Spokane and Palm Springs. It’s like having a tour of the United States at government expense. About two years ago I got a type rating in the Lear 60. Every time I fly it, I say, “Wow, I can’t believe it does this.” It just does everything so automatically. It’s so pilot-friendly. It’s designed for pilots.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 175

Darlene Dubay 175

Mechanics hate it because it’s hard to work on. It’s overpowered for its size. It’s got 2,400 pounds of thrust, each engine. The gross weight is like 23,500. It’s just beautiful. It’s certified up to 51,000. We never fly that high, but it easily climbs to 41,000 feet. One of the pilots in the Sacramento office said the hardest thing about flying that plane is wiping the smile off your face after you’ve gotten down. Flight inspection is a very small organization, getting smaller all the time. When I first started in AVN (Aviation System Standards), there were probably 200 or 300 pilots, so it’s a really small organization of pilots. There were probably about eight women. And now they’ve been gradually cutting back, and people who retire are not being replaced. It’s probably down to about sixtyfive pilots right now, nationwide, who do flight check of navigational facilities. I think the advice I’d give to a young woman wanting to get into aviation would be the same as I’d give to a young man: Get an education. You’ve got to have a college degree first. If you can fly a little as you go through college, fine. You won’t get an airline job or any really good flying job without a college education. It just gives you a more well-rounded approach to life. Flying is great, but it’s not the whole world. It’s not everything. I flew with a lot of young pilots who didn’t have a college education. It was like they were so narrow-minded, you know? I think that would be the best thing for any aspiring pilot to do. Then once you get into flying, just continue. Keep at it, and keep working at it. If you love it, that’s so easy to do. There’s so many opportunities in flying. It’s not just the airline pilot career field that’s great about flying. There’s instructing, which seems like the lowest, lowest position in all of aviation, but when you think about how important an instructor’s job is and what they do, I think they should be the highest-paid pilots in the entire aviation world. What you teach people at first, that’s what’s gonna stay with them. If somebody learns something wrong initially, it’s really, really difficult to ever break them of that. It somehow sticks with them. There’s just so many different avenues in aviation. I think just about anybody can learn how to fly. I’ve had all kinds of students, from those that just learn really quickly and pick

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 176

176 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Darlene flying for Northwest Airlines.

it up, to people who’ve really had a hard time. I think generally the younger a person is when they learn how to fly, the more quickly they learn. But the flip side of that is the judgment isn’t there at seventeen, sixteen years old. This instructor told me one time, “When you start out, you have a whole lot of luck in this hand. As you get more experienced in aviation, that becomes less and less. On the other hand, you have experience and wisdom, and that becomes more and more. As you gain more experience, you gain the knowledge and the wisdom, and hopefully, they all balance out in the end. You don’t run out of luck before you get the knowledge and experience because you’re running out of that as you go.” I can’t say that I’ve ever had a formalized mentor relationship. I think possibly some of my early flight instructors, just by their example. The aerobatic instructor that I had, he was a real natural pilot. He was so relaxed, and he was so competent. You’d look over at him, and it was like he was sitting in his living room watching television. He was just so at ease in the airplane. Even though he didn’t really officially give me any mentoring instructions or encouragement, it was just his presence and his example. I thought,

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 177

Darlene Dubay 177

“That’s how I want to be. I want to be just really at home. I want to know it so well that it’s like second nature to me.” My husband, of course, has been the greatest support. And that’s one thing. I think he realizes that we need to develop ourselves. One of the most important things in my life, not only in flying but in everything, is learning and growing. Now that I’m fifty, a lot of people think, “Well, you’ve learned everything and you just kind of coast, you’re on a plateau.” I do a lot of physical fitness type of things. I like to do races so I can challenge myself. I do actually quite well in my age group all the time. I think I just like challenges and competition. When I look at the person I was before I started flying and who I am today—of course, any life experience would have hopefully helped me to develop into a fuller, more complete person— flying has been such a great opportunity. And it’s fun. I mean, it’s really fun. Some of the life lessons that people learn are done in just awful circumstances. I’ve been fortunate to have them in great surroundings and doing things that I wanted to do and learning and growing at the same time. Today it’s unusual to see a woman in the cockpit, but not as unusual as it was when I started twenty-five years ago. Being one of those people who can be a role model for younger women I think is really neat. That’s a spiritual thing. I think that’s what older people should do. They should give what they have become.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 178

Aviation Safety Inspector Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche once said, “The higher we soar, the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly” (English 36). This rings true for aviators who quest after freedom, danger, power, control, and adventure. Yet not everyone involved in the aviation industry is compelled to fly. The FAA attracts varied professional people: aviation medical personnel, urban planners, economists, management analysts, transportation officers, lawyers, purchasing clerks, accident investigators, weather bureau consultants, mathematicians, and statisticians. Think of a job title and most likely the FAA will include it in its plethora of job opportunities. One of the most crucial and influential career choices in the FAA is that of aviation safety inspector. These guardians of accident prevention nurture pilots and operators toward safety on the ground and in the air by enforcing the regulations, educating the public, and eliminating cutthroat competition. Throughout history pressuring pilots or airplanes past their limits has been a common practice in bush Alaska. Yet operators who push pilots into marginal weather conditions for the sake of money or ego or schedule commit an unforgivable act. Death is final. That is why today aviation safety inspectors advocate change. Through increased public education and decreased aircraft accidents, they change old-school philosophies. 178

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 179

Aviation Safety Inspector 179

According to the FAA Aviation Career Series: Government Careers, Aviation safety inspectors develop, administer, and enforce regulations and standards concerning civil aviation safety in three categories of expertise: operations, airworthiness, and manufacturing (GA-300-125). In operations, an aviation safety inspector administers regulations and safety standards to airmen and operators. To qualify for this position one must have experience as a pilot or copilot, flight instructor, flight test pilot, or flight inspector. A current Commercial Pilot Certificate, Instrument Rating, and Flight Instructor Certificate—all with single- and multi-engine land—is required. In airworthiness, an aviation safety inspector specializes in the airworthiness and maintenance of aircraft. To apply, one must have experience involving technical supervision or management of the maintenance and repair of aircraft, engines, electronics, and navigational systems for airworthiness. All qualified applicants must hold a current FAA Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) license. In manufacturing, an aviation safety inspector applies knowledge and skill pertaining to the design and production of aircraft, aircraft parts, and avionics equipment. Requirements for the job include experience with quality control or manufacture of aircraft and components. For GS-11 and above, the applicant must demonstrate the ability to evaluate and provide technical guidance and direction in the production of aircraft and components. Carolyn Russo’s Women and Flight: Portraits of Contemporary Women Pilots features Ellen Paneok, a Native American pilot once considered a renegade by the FAA who worked as an aviation safety inspector in operations until June 2003. In her interview with Russo, Ellen talks about her bush piloting days: The elders call me Owl Eyes because I can see and fly in any type of weather. The Eskimos, they’ll hop into the airplane with me without any hesitation. They trust me implicitly. Weather is the biggest danger of all in Alaska. It can change so fast, you can be out on a perfect day, going through a mountain pass, come around the corner, and the whole pass is just socked in, clogged

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 180

180 Alaska’s Women Pilots up with a big cloud. If you don’t have any room to turn around, you’re dead. . . . Let’s say there’s blowing snow at Point Leahy [Point Lay], and you can’t see anything. Sometimes, when you’re landing the only way you can find the runway is because it has strobes on the end of it, and in the wintertime they paint the middle of the runway hot pink, so you can see it in the blowing snow. I’ve landed there when I’ve been at one runway light and could just barely see the next one, and that’s pretty crappy. . . . I was born in the town of Kotzebue, thirty miles north of the Arctic Circle. It was mostly a subsistence type of lifestyle, with a lot of fishing and beluga whale and seal hunting. I grew up with fourteen people in a house the size of twenty by twenty feet. We didn’t have running water then, so we had to go out to freshwater lakes to get ice. We bought clean trash barrels from the store, and we put ice in there and let it melt inside the house, and that’s what we had for water. (17–18)

Before government regulation, thrill-seeking barnstormers and WWI Army pilots flew mail routes or air shows (any reason to fly). According to the FAA website, the history of government regulation of civil aviation started on May 20, 1926, with the Air Commerce Act. Then in 1938 the office transferred the responsibility for civil aviation from the Commerce Department to the Civil Aeronautics Authority. Two years later President Franklin Roosevelt split the organization into separate entities: Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) and Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB). In time the increase of commercial jet traffic caused an increase in midair collisions. As a result, the Federal Aviation Act of 1958 was passed in order to combat aviation-related accidents. It wouldn’t be until 1966 that Congress implemented a Department of Transportation (DOT) that would oversee what we now know as the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Throughout history, writers have expressed their frustration with government bureaucracy. In Inside the Sky: A Meditation on Flight, William Langewiesche discusses the challenge of air traffic growth and discontentment among controllers:

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 181

Aviation Safety Inspector 181

Ellen Paneok.

Since 1979, when President Jimmy Carter deregulated the airlines, unleashing competition among them, the number of scheduled flights in the United States has grown by nearly 70 percent. . . . At New York Approach, a controller with tattooed forearms and a ponytail told me his insider’s history of the Newark sector. He meant it as the insider’s history of all air traffic control. He said, “For years you’re sitting around Sleepy Hollow eating your brown bag lunches, then one day you look up and, Jesus, you’ve got a hundred airplanes inbound and every one of them is low on fuel.” This happened with the deregulation of the airlines, when People Express, then Continental and others, rushed into the Newark void. The controller said, “The managers and headquarters types, the paper-pushers, they would have run away. The only reason the system survived was the skill of the guys working the mikes. They dropped their sandwiches. They threw away their manuals. They stood up to the traffic. They managed to patch things together.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 182

182 Alaska’s Women Pilots The real history is less tidy, because nationwide in 1981 most of those same valiant controllers went on strike and lost their jobs. . . . . . . [Today] Neither the union nor the FAA will admit that an invisible war has broken out. Air traffic keeps growing, and everyone fears a loss of control. (162–189)

My experiences with air traffic controllers and flight service station personnel have been extremely positive. In November 1981, Captain Duane Marvin and I both worked out of Umiat, a blue dot on the sectional chart located on the northern slope of the Brooks Range—one hundred miles southwest of Prudhoe Bay. Not only did Umiat have a reputation for making national news as having the coldest temperatures in the nation (minus fifty was fairly common), but the gravel airstrip was the hub of Geophysical Survey Incorporated (GSI), a seismic company in search of precious oil. In 1944 Navy engineers discovered the North Slope’s first big oil field in Umiat: seventy million barrels. From Umiat, our flight in the Twin Otter was northeast, above the snow-covered hills that were bare and highly polished by the wind. For twenty minutes Captain Marvin and I scanned the horizon, not saying much. It was a silence born of geographic awe. Off in the distance, eight bulldozers pulled single-wide trailers and 2,400-gallon fuel tanks on sleds. A GSI camp was on the move, and D-7 dozers navigated across the tundra like a band of gypsies that used longitude and latitude coordinates to stay on course. If the men pulled their sleeping and eating quarters with them, they could eliminate commuting time. Flying was pretty much routine that day except for an unexpected blizzard. Captain Marvin and I had been flying together for several months, and normally we could land just about anywhere, but this snowstorm reduced visibility to just about zero, with wind gusts exceeding fifty knots. Deadhorse Airport was our best bet because it had an Instrument Landing System (ILS) [an electronic beam and glide slope to the end of a runway] . Captain Marvin called the tower, “Deadhorse, 540 November, fifteen miles west, inbound.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 183

Aviation Safety Inspector 183

“Roger, visibility now one-sixteenth of a mile,” the controller said. His voice was garbled and didn’t sound like either of the controllers we knew, Tim or Allen. “Airport below minimums.” I was flying and glanced at the fuel gauges one more time. We were sucking fumes and could perhaps go around once but not twice. Not very often did I request something from flight service, but I was going to ask tonight. Captain Marvin was training me for the captain’s seat, and I was going to exercise good judgment. “Deadhorse, 540 November,” I said. “Who’s working tonight?” “Tim,” the controller answered. “He’ll be back in a minute.” “Roger that,” I said. “Have him give me a call.” “Wilco.” An instrument landing approach reminded me of a hunting scope, where the object was to keep everything centered. If the line moved to the right, even one tiny dot, it was my job to guide the airplane gently a little to the right. If the horizontal line started to climb above center, which it did, I added a little power and tried not to descend quite so rapidly. Five more miles to the outer marker. “540 November, you on?” “Hey Tim,” I said, “Good to hear your voice. Any chance of getting a new weather report?” “No problem, Jenifer. Standby.” Three and a half miles to the outer marker. I had the throttles back and the Otter slowed up with twenty degrees of flaps. “540 November, Deadhorse.” “Go ahead.” “Visibility now one-eighth, variable to one-half.” The word “variable” made it legal for us to attempt an approach without declaring an emergency. “540 November requesting ILS, Runway 4 approach.” “Roger, 540 November cleared for the ILS approach, Runway 4. Missed approached procedures as published.” “540 November cleared for the approach,” Captain Marvin said as we passed overhead of the outer marker. “Outer marker inbound,” Captain Marvin called. “Five miles to go.”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 184

184 Alaska’s Women Pilots

I kept the tiny target lines centered and the miniature airplane wings fixed on the artificial horizon. The engines throbbed, and I felt the vibration inside my headset. “One hundred twenty knots, sink rate four hundred feet per minute.” I kept my head glued to the panel, my eyes darting from artificial horizon to airspeed indicator to vertical speed to compass and back to artificial horizon. “Five hundred feet, radar altimeter alive,” Captain Marvin said. “No lights.” Decision height was coming up at 200 feet above the ground, something that legally meant that pilots had to go around and try it again if they didn’t see the runway. But we didn’t have enough fuel to try it again. “Three hundred feet,” Captain Marvin said. “Still no lights.” Captain Marvin and I knew each other; we had been flying before as a team. I knew the Twin Otter, and we were most certainly on course tonight. “Two hundred feet, airspeed ninety, five hundred feet per minute,” Duane said. “Reduce the descent.” My fingers slid around the yoke loosely, keeping my eyes glued to the instrument’s tiny crossbars, centered and steady. “One hundred feet, airspeed seventy,” he said. “Good job; Runway light to your left, obscured.” Captain Marvin flicked the landing lights on, and I kept my eyes forward until I could see the white runway lights outside the cockpit window. Feeling the wheels of the Twin Otter touch the icy pavement, I gently pulled the power levers back and kept my head forward, trying to see the runway through the blowing snow. Now the hard part: taxiing. The wind blew across the runway, and the airplane kept turning into the wind. I used the tiller bar and added power on the upwind engine. There was a directional arrow to my left, the exit to ramp parking. Shortly the outline of the flight service station appeared. As soon as I shut down, tied down, and threw blankets over both engines, I ran up the stairs and thanked Tim for his help.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 185

Aviation Safety Inspector 185

Around the same time as I was flying in Umiat, I met Val Aron Jokela. Nowhere in the FAA or private sector will you find a person more dedicated to safety. Val is a morning person. On any given day she rises at four, takes care of her dog team, and begins work at the Federal Building at 6:00 A.M. sharp. If she calls you at 7:30, enthusiasm for her dogs, job, life, and aviation comes across the line at the same time you’re having a first cup of coffee. Over the years, Val has held several aviation positions: flight instructor, air taxi pilot, 121 pilot, ground school instructor, simulator instructor, career FAA inspector. Before moving to Alaska, she lived in Washington D.C. and taught at the University of Maryland. Her first flying lessons were at College Part Airport, the oldest airport in the United States. Over Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, she crossed Chesapeake Bay and flew over sailboats and shoreline. Skyscrapers and traffic jams dotted the pavement below. Between working at the University of Maryland and paying for flight lessons, Val received her private pilot’s license. Her goal was to get into Navy flight training. In retrospect, had she applied to the military before starting flying lessons, she would have made the age requirement cutoff—twenty-six and a half. But she missed it by a week. Even her congressman from Minnesota couldn’t secure a waiver. Val became even more determined to become a professional aviator. To complete her goal, she secured a loan, relocated to Tulsa, and attended Spartan School of Aeronautics. Today Val lives in a small community near Eagle River. Chugiak, situated between the Knik Arm of Cook Inlet and the Chugach Mountains, could perhaps be considered Shangri-la during the summer months. The trees spread before you like a forest of green velvet. The fireweed sways in the breeze and lose their purple petals before the onset of winter. Yet in Alaska, summer seems to last no longer than a blink of an eye. Winter returns with all its darkness (a few hours of sun at twilight), including fierce winds, subzero temperatures, and snow. It’s a harsh climate but good dog-mushing country. Iditarod celebrities such as Susan Butcher, Martin Buser, and Dee Dee Jonrowe live close-by.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 186

186 Alaska’s Women Pilots

The first time I met Val was in the summer of 1983. Val was walking near the Seair hangar near Lake Hood. She was wearing her AAI clothes: white shirt, black tie, black pants, and black shoes. She struck me as being one of the most genuine people I’d ever met—and the most fun. When it came time for our interview, I was looking forward to seeing her again. To find Val’s log house, I turn at the North Birchwood exit and head toward Knik Arm; I know if I pass the railroad tracks I’ve gone too far. I arrive by late morning. The low clouds have lifted and sunshine streams through spruce that line the driveway. On the right is a garage. The door is open, so it’s easy to notice bags of dog food, harnesses, sleds, and fourwheelers. A dogmobile complete with a wooden topper parks nearby. The cube-sized compartments, retrofitted with breathing holes, house her dog team before practice or competition. Before I get one foot out of the driver’s door, fifteen dogs are talking—not barking or howling according to Val—just talking. They see me, yet the person foremost in their minds is their mistress, Val. Already she’s soaked their food to insure that each dog is well hydrated and now takes a minute to pet and play with each one. Two or three times each day she picks up after them, then goes back to add more water to their food. Feeding time requires but a few minutes. She has a twenty-minute routine, and her dogs know the rules: eat fast. Unlike a domestic pet, mushers can’t afford to gift their team with leisurely mealtimes. “Shhhhhhh,” Val says, when the whole group finishes eating in a split second and starts talking. “Everybody can hear you.” She hands me a couple of dog dishes, which is the sincerest form of acceptance, and we walk toward the garage together. The sparkle in her hazel eyes is still there since she saw her first Iditarod in May 1985. That year, Libby Riddles won and put Iditarod on the map forever. It wasn’t long before Val was apprenticing under Jerry Raychel, feeding and cleaning and harnessing his team. She even gained experience exercising six of his dogs, which is a lot for a beginner. Many people cannot handle being in the wilderness alone, much less maintain a sense of direction. Most definitely,

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 187

Aviation Safety Inspector 187

navigating on the ground is different from navigating via airplane. For Val, searching for Mount McKinley as a guidepost and being alone for hours without another soul in sight is a healing experience.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 188

Valerie Aron Jokela I remember growing up in Minnesota, standing in the backyard and hearing sonic booms. The houses would rattle and the ground would rattle. They hadn’t figured out how aircraft could break the speed of sound and not go through the barrier. I didn’t actually have a real airplane ride until I was twelve years old. One Saturday night we went up, and we got to go flying. I loved it. I thought, “This is great! God, you can see everything! Wow, Minnesota really is a land of ten thousand lakes.” It looked like everything was just a solid lake with little pieces of land inbetween, and the sun was setting.

I was a flight instructor in Tulsa. It was a special point in my life because I didn’t realize it at the time, but I met my future husband. Paul’s one of those storybook types, who walked into my classroom, took a look at me for the first time, and said, “I’m taking that woman to Alaska. She belongs with me in a cabin!” He immediately changed instructors and had me as his airplane instructor as well as his ground school instructor. Wasn’t this guy clever? Our relationship moved along like mach one. We realized, yes, we were meant to be together. We actually hit Alaska soil on March 13, 1980, landed—everybody remembers when they get here—in Anchorage around 5:20 in the evening. Knew immediately on stepping off the plane that I’d finally found where I wanted to live. This was home. We were literally penniless when we arrived. We came with jobs though. Paul had been here in the military. He was at Elmendorf Air Force Base as a jet engine mechanic. He worked on the 707s. The gentleman we ended up working for picked us up at 188

Alaska's Women Pilots

Valerie Aron Jokela.

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 189

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 190

190 Alaska’s Women Pilots

the airport and took us home. We spent a couple nights there, and he gave us $500 apiece, which we needed. We had to work that off. It was kind of an interesting situation because we couldn’t work it off by flying; we had to work nights and weekends, with each of us trading off working the counter at his flight school. So it took awhile at $3.50 an hour to pay him back. But that’s the agreement we made, and at that point we were not in the financial condition to argue, just did it. I thought Alaska was so beautiful. It was neat flying over Cook Inlet, around the practice area that had none of the fields that are out there now. The McKenzie farming project hadn’t been started at the time, so it was all woods over there. We worked for this gentleman for six months. Then Paul started looking around for another job that paid better and found one over at Tyonek Timber logging camp. I stayed here in town for another month and continued giving flight instruction. Did all my own ground school. Actually enjoyed that better, setting my own hours. I’d just use the living room of my home for the ground school instruction, getting students ready for their work. I didn’t need a flight school to do that. We finally got married housing over there in Tyonek Timber logging camp. So I moved over, but my students were all soloed at the time, got them all signed off for repetitive type cross-country. They did great. They actually got to learn how to land on a tougher strip. On a nice day, not a violently windy day, I’d have them come over. They’d pick me up, and we’d go do our flight instruction. Tyonek Timber. I loved it there. That strip was not a wellmarked strip on the maps. There was the Tyonek Village strip, then there’s the Tyonek Timber logging strip, which was south, around the bend you could say. There was a logging dock that the ships would park at. It was one of the deepest points along the western shore of Cook Inlet. You’d land over the top of the logging yard. It’s a pretty short strip, maybe 1,500, 1,600 feet in length. It didn’t have standard lighting, so the logging camp made their own lights. They were electric, run by generator, but they put them in barrels. It was spooky coming in there at night. If you flared at a normal point

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 191

Valerie Aron Jokela 191

[you’d flare for lights], well, I’ll tell you what, you’d fall out of the sky and bury your gear right through the runway. So you had to keep that in mind. Those lights when you landed were more up at eye level instead of down here where they’re supposed to be on the ground. We formally moved over there, and the airplane became more like an automobile. There was quite a high demand and interest in aviation and folks getting their private pilot’s certificates. So I ended up starting a ground school over there. Did that two nights a week, which was really quite a commitment for the loggers. There were a couple guys that, like my husband Paul, were putting in twelvehour days, and then they’d come to school afterwards. That was quite a sacrifice on their part. These guys were doing this six days a week. They did not have a five-day workweek. I had some loggers’s wives and a couple loggers, and all added up to be seven students. That’s pretty darn good. They all attended very faithfully. All I had was a chalkboard. I purchased the written test guides, flight computers, and did everything totally from the top of my head. I was even able to get a designated examiner to come out on Mother’s Day to give written tests to the loggers because I knew they couldn’t get into town during normal working hours. We told Bob Pearson at the University of Alaska that we’d pick him up and feed him. We’d do whatever it took. We didn’t have a whole lot of money, so we only paid him $25, but he never said that wasn’t enough. Bless his heart. For $25 and free transportation, he brought all the testing material, and he administered the test at the logging camp in the lunchroom down at the mill where they’d taken all their training. It was an adventurous time in our lives, living out there and coming here into town. I ended up taking some of the ladies who wanted to be pilots with me. We’d combine the lesson with grocery shopping. I was trying to show them the advantage of having an airplane and living in the bush. I’d say, “You go ahead. You’re gonna fly us into town. You’re gonna land at Merrill Field and do all the radio work and everything else. We’ll park the plane and tie it down, then grocery shop and run any other errands that you need to. Then we’re gonna take our groceries back to the camp. Go back

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 192

192 Alaska’s Women Pilots

and land, tie the plane down, and you can see how nice it is to have that convenience of living in the bush and flying yourself in and out when you need to.” That was a ton of fun. I really enjoyed that thoroughly. Also, at the same time I did some substitute school teaching for Tyonek Village School. Also ended up tutoring some of the students at the logging camp. If they were having problems in English or mathematics, I’d sit down and help them out. So it was quite a different lifestyle for me. I’d been used to a more rigid working lifestyle. It was nice to have the freedom to make your own work and make your own hours. That was really super. In June of 1981 I heard a rumor that a job at Spernaks was opening up, a pilot job. Rick, their full-time pilot, was moving on to something different. Paul was interested in the position. He was still flying as much as he could on the weekends, giving flight instruction, but he wanted to get into 135 operations. We both needed to start moving in that direction. I remember running down to the strip and stopping Rick when he came in. I knew what Spernaks’ schedule was. I said, “Is it true you’re really leaving? Is this all true?” He goes, “Yeah, yeah, I’m leaving.” I go, “Okay, I’m bringing you a resume for Paul.” So I go running back to camp, get out my hot little typewriter—no computers in those days. I remember how primitive that thing looked compared to today’s polished-looking resumes. But I put together a nice resume, a cover letter to go with it, and brought it down to the airport. On Rick’s next flight in, I gave it to him and said, “Here. If you could deliver this to George, that would be great.” I called George; he was very interested. On Sunday, because that’s the only day Paul had off, we flew to town. We had a talk with George. He said, “Well, we’ll have to give you a checkride and see how you do. If you pass training, then you’ve got the job.” Wow, that’s pretty cool. And now it means we’re moving back to town. Well, I wasn’t real sure about that moving-back-to-town part. I could have stayed in Tyonek, especially since at the time everybody was moving up to Alaska. In the eight months we lived at the

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 193

Valerie Aron Jokela 193

logging camp, the Anchorage traffic became astronomically horrid. It was awful, just awful. And I just said, “Gosh, we’re moving back.” The irony of the whole thing is that later, when we moved back into Anchorage, I ran into Bob at the dentist’s office. He asked, “You looking for a job?” I go, “Well, actually, yeah.” He says, “Get over to the university and see me. I think we’ve got something for you.” I say, “Yeah, all right.” Bob hired me at the University of Alaska to be their simulator instructor and also private pilot ground school instructor. I got a section of that, and for a three-week period while their secretary/receptionist was out, I got to be the department secretary/receptionist. That kept us busy and going for awhile. And I was still building time and working toward my ATP, because I wanted to work 135, 121 too. I was going for an airline job. There wasn’t a whole lot, for women especially, to pick from in 1980 to get that kind of quality time. The only company that would even possibly consider me was Alaska Aeronautical Inc. (AAI), and I knew I’d need an ATP for that. Darlene Dubay broke the ice, I believe, in 1982 and got in the door. Finally. By gosh, somebody did. So I didn’t let up on these guys. I kept working and building my time and doing instruction, doing any little kind of charter work I could do. But I was doing it. But in December of 1981, tragedy definitely struck. My husband died in the line of business, flying for Spernak Airways. The Cessna 207 actually went into the inlet and to this day not a stitch has been found of that accident. It’s like they disappeared off into never-never land. So I was glad I had a job working for Bob with a nice steady paycheck coming in, two checks a month. That was really just a low, low point. But there’s growth out of this, you know? You change, and you become actually a stronger, better person for this experience because there’s always a silver lining in every cloud. Well, I still stuck with my goals. I mean, my family goes, “Get out of the air! What are you doing flying up there? You’re a jerk.” They came up, and they’re trying to convince all my friends, “Get her out of the air, would you, please?”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 194

194 Alaska’s Women Pilots

My friends, they knew me pretty well. They said, “No, we’re not going to try to talk her out of it. She’s been our instructor, and we know she likes it, and we know she’s good. Just trust it.” It changes the way you look at airplanes because now it’s home. You’re not just reading about somebody that you don’t know in a blue-cover report. You know this person too well, and you’re like, “Holy moly.” But you know, I can look back at that accident, and with the stuff I’ve been doing for the FAA, I could see, and I kept begging him to change things. He was tired: he was exhausted the day that accident happened. And not just that day. He was flying seven days a week. He did such a good job, his boss basically let his second pilot [relief pilot] go. And Paul was tired. He was exhausted. I just kind of went on. I had my jobs and all my employers stood behind me. In fact, they held my jobs for me and made sure I still had pay coming in. When my folks came up, they insisted that I come home for Christmas time. I came back three weeks later. My whole family now is begging me to not only not fly, but leave Alaska. “Get out of here. What do you want to come up here and be by yourself for?” I said, “I’ve got lots of friends up here already.” I said, “I’ll give you a hint, guys. When I come back, I’ll know when the plane comes around the bend on Turnagain Arm if I want to be here or not.” Because that’s the way it was when I moved here. It came around the bend, and I say, “Wow, I’m home!” And I knew: I wanted to be here. So I got back up here and then the real growing process from [Paul’s] death began. All of a sudden it’s like you meet everybody that’s widowed. It was amazing! All the people that are widowed, they all draw together like flies! I can’t believe it. All these people that have lost loved ones through different methods, disease or whatever. They’re there! They’re there as a support. Anyhow, I kept knocking on AAI’s door, and finally the break came. Boy, it wasn’t exactly a good break in many ways. I’d become very attached working for my employer because he’d been so good to me. I get this call in May of 1983 out of the clear blue: “Well, we have a job for you.” I went, “Uh, well, when does it start?”

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 195

Valerie Aron Jokela 195

“Chief pilot says, tomorrow.” “But, but I need to give this place two-weeks notice. They have been good to me.” “Hey, listen. You’ve been coming to me since 1981. Now either you get over here and you take the job now, or you just don’t have a job. That’s it. Cut and dried. You don’t have a choice. You start here tomorrow or that’s it, I’m just gonna throw your file in the wastebasket. You’re done.” I went, “Oh my God! Well wait a minute. Let me call you back. Can I call you back?” “Yeah.” “Oh, how am I gonna say this to my boss?” I thought. He just knew I liked flying. I’d taken him on flights. So I go to him (he’s still a good friend to this day) and say, “Uh, um, uh I’m not gonna be working for you tomorrow. I finally got that flying job.” I can’t remember exactly what I said to him, but I was choked. He said, “You go do the flying.” “Wow,” I said. “What a break; what a break.” “You go do it. I know you’ve wanted to do it. We’ll try to figure this out. Maybe you could come to try to finish some of this stuff up.” “Yeah, that seems fair.” So there I was. Next day I’m standing at AAI. “Hi. I’m here. I’m ready to start my training.” Basically, it was, “Well, here’s the main systems you have to know.” You took your written on it and your oral. You answered some questions, and here’s a little bit of flight training, and basically you’re on the line. It was really pretty fast, a nice way to put it. I was signed off, and again, I didn’t have a lot of 135 experience, like, none. I just figured this is how everybody did it. I didn’t really think too much about it, just went along with the flow. You sometimes get pressured into doing a lot of things that you probably feel in your best judgment aren’t the right things to do. It was made real clear on the first day working for this company. They just didn’t mince words. They said, “Either you’re going to do it the way we tell you to do it, or you can just plan on leaving right now. Anytime you care not to do it the way we want you to do

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Val as first officer in the DHC-6.

Page 196

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 197

Valerie Aron Jokela 197

it, you might as well pack your bags and leave.” It was made that clear. Those were the words. But I felt lucky. I got on with the company. I have a lot of fine pilots to thank for giving me the kind of training they did. That company considered themselves the kind of a company to train people to move onto something better. They didn’t want you staying there long. They wanted you to come in, learn how to wear a uniform, work in an airline-type atmosphere, and work in a crew environment because they were proud of their folks that moved on and got something better. It was a training ground. They knew it, and that’s the way they treated it. They also ran it very strictly. Like I said, if you didn’t do it the way they wanted it done, you were fired or you walked or something. They made it a lot stricter and harder than it would be working probably in a normal environment. You had no union to protect you or anything, so you put up with whatever they dished out, and that’s the way it went. The reason I say I’m fortunate for all of that background and training was that it was good discipline. School of hard knocks, but I got to fly with some of the best. Remember I said the airlines hadn’t opened their doors for hiring? Doors were still closed in 1983 when I got on. So I got to fly with these captains that had been with AAI for a long time. They were exhausted from flying for the company, but these guys had a lot of pilot-in-command time. They had thousands and thousands of hours turbine time, experience in the Otters and the Bandeirantes. Oh man, I couldn’t have been a luckier person getting on board. So I was flying with very, very experienced people. They knew IFR. I’d never gotten exposed to hard IFR. I learned how to fly in it, handle the clearances, make changes and holding patterns. I mean, you got it all. And here I could learn under the best. We flew it just like the airlines—the majors—fly it. You take turns on the legs: captains get the first leg, and you get the next one, and so on. I never really had anyone take a leg away from me. So here I am: I’m flying, I’m flying, I’m flying, and I’m flying. I’d finally been there about seven, eight months. People below me were getting upgraded. I finally walked into the chief pilot’s office

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 198

198 Alaska’s Women Pilots

after a flight one day, and I said, “Hey, I’d like to talk to you.” They were doing captain interviews at that point in time. He says, “Well, go ahead and talk,” and here was one of the captains that was quite a few steps below me sitting in there waiting for his interview. I looked at the chief pilot and said, “I’d like to speak to you alone.” They were kind of laughing at me like, what’s going on here? I could tell. The candidate stepped outside the door, and I stepped inside the door and shut it. I said, “I want to know why I’m not here for an interview for captain.” I just caught him totally off guard. He sat there, and he goes, “Well, I just can’t do that.” “Well, why not?” “Well, you just don’t have enough experience.” “Don’t hand me that,” I said “What are we doing with all these captains that don’t have any turbine experience? They’re being upgraded, and they’ve got less time than I do?” “Well, it’s too dangerous out there.” I said, “Get with it. I’ve been flying into Kodiak every day as your top first officer in the Bandeirante, taking the most risky routes. I do the landings going in there, with tailwinds and crosswinds and everything. I’m sorry,” I said, “I can’t buy what you’re saying. I want to be upgraded. You haven’t given me a good reason.” “Well, well . . . I’m responsible for you.” I mean, this guy’s trying to draw all of these straws out of the air. I’m like, “Oh my God. I don’t believe it.” So he said, “Well, I’m sorry but we’re not gonna consider you for it. You know? Like it or lump it. Basically, you’re really not doing the right things to be upgraded for captain. You know that coat you’re wearing? It’s filthy.” First officers had to do the fueling of the aircraft, so here I had this rust-colored winter coat, and yeah, the front of it’s just dirty, and he said, “You want to be upgraded for captain? I expect that coat clean.” I thought, “Now what am I gonna wear?” I didn’t have a whole wardrobe at home. I was broke. So I ended up borrowing a coat

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 199

Valerie Aron Jokela 199

from somebody and got it dry-cleaned. I showed up only once with that coat dirty, and right away I got harassed for it. So then I ended up, strangely enough, starting to get paired with the chief pilot. He was really testing me. I could tell he was really challenging me. They were hoping I’d leave. But the more they harassed and pushed, the more I could see what they were doing and the more I just stuck there. So finally, again just like it was when I got hired, they said, “We want you to show up for captain’s interview.” “But . . .” “Yup, and we’re gonna be quizzing you over the Twin Otter.” “But I’ve been flying the Bandeirante since September.” “Tough luck. You figure it out.” And here I am. I don’t have any forewarning; I’m supposed to show up and answer questions about the Otter. Okay. So they asked ten questions. They had three of us in there and of course, separated. They put on whoever got the highest score. Obviously, they weren’t looking for perfection, which was good. One guy missed three questions. I think I missed four questions, another guy missed four questions—out of ten oral questions—so they basically said, “Well, that’s the order you’ll do your flight training in.” Okay. We all actually did it at the same time and ended up on the line within a day of each other; so it was no big deal. I went and got the training. I’d found out from one of the captains what had happened to help me get there. Talk about good support from all your friends. They all went in and put the full-court press on the management. The captains all got together. They’d worked at the company, and they went out on my behalf. I couldn’t believe they did that. That was really nice of them. They said, “Hey, she’s skilled. She can do the job. We want her. She deserves to be upgraded, and you guys need to do it.” And they went all the way to the top with it. I didn’t realize they’d all done that, but they had. Not a one of them leaked it to me. There it was, all of a sudden. I was upgraded. I’m flying Twin Otters again! The funny part is they started out restricting us: new captains can only go to Kenai, especially the girl captain. That ended after a

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 200

200 Alaska’s Women Pilots

week when all the airplanes were broken except my Otter. And so now I had to go to Homer, and I had to go to Kodiak. Then they realized, “Well, I guess she won’t be restricted to just Kenai anymore.” Basically, I ended up flying for Alaska Aeronautical for about a month and a half in the captain’s seat, then Valdez Airlines actually approached me on the ramp and wanted to hire me. They had nicer equipment, and they had all Bandeirantes, which I liked flying. Flew for Valdez until they went bankrupt. So here I was back on the street again without a darn flying job. I ended up knocking on everybody’s door. I was really looking hard at ARCO and Crowley Maritime: I really wanted those companies bad. But everything worked out. It took awhile. Bob Pearson, bless his heart, over at the University of Alaska, right away goes, “God, we’ll just double your ground school classes.” So I spent four nights at the college. I also kept pounding the pavement, and finally, about February of 1985, Airpac picked me up. This was a break. Airpac flew 121, and this was good. I got to move up into 121, and of course, I went back and tried to get on with Alaska Airlines and United Airlines. We all flew for Airpac, all six of us who were hired (three captains and three first officers) until October and then they let us go, just temporarily. Bob Pearson calls me up—I’m still working for him—and he doubles my ground school classes again. At the same time, one of my girlfriends met an FAA employee. He was coming to her to have a professional resume put together. She was able to ask the right questions, list the right stuff, and put together a nice one-pager. I don’t know how it exactly came about, but she was just mentioning me, in passing, and using my resume as an example (I told her she could use it), and her client goes, “You should tell her to apply for the FAA.” She called me up and said, “This guy says you should apply for the FAA.” He was with Civil Aviation Security, not even Flight Standards. “He says, you should take it to his boss, and his boss will make sure it gets to the right place.” And I’m like, “Oh yeah, I don’t qualify for that job.” But he wouldn’t let her off the hook. He didn’t know me from Adam. Finally she called me up again after he came in the second time and insisted that I should apply for the

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 201

Valerie Aron Jokela 201

FAA. That was June 22, 1986. You always remember your date of hire. I hit the deck running at the FAA, and I’ve been running ever since. I don’t remember where the time’s gone. There’s so much variety. You do so many different things. Your first year with the FAA is probation, just like the airlines. In the first year you make the decision and the government makes the decision if everybody’s happy with each other. There are some folks who quit. In the first few months they decide the FAA is not for them, just like anybody going for the airline. So in that sense, it’s quite a bit similar—there is no change really from working in industry. Most people are not aware of the caliber of people we’re hiring. When we’re in a hiring mode, we get some experienced, cream-of-the-crop folks. The one thing the FAA can offer—stability—is why lots of folks work here. It’s not that they can’t cut it out in industry. Number one, I wanted stability because I knew that I did not want to live in the Lower 48 states. Second, I did not want to commute from Alaska. If I took a job with United Airlines, my base would be Chicago. In the first year at the airlines, you’re on probation. They make it real clear—talk about strict standards— that if you’re late once, you’re fired. The first twelve months are pedal-to-the-metal. You are expected to do all your required coursework. In my particular case I was on the job maybe two weeks, and they said, “Oh, your courses have come open.” I’m like, “Oh gosh.” Thank goodness I had a real good friend, Jim Anderson, who stayed at the house. I had two little dogs and a cat. I certainly couldn’t take them with me. In the good old days of the FAA, the philosophy was that when they sent someone down to inspector school, you’d stay down there until you finished every single course. For me it was two months. That made it real hard on families and obligation. Plus school separated you out of reality, and integrating back to the office was hard. Besides, I was in Oklahoma City at the hottest time: July and August. When I got home to Alaska, we were already moving into fall, so I missed most of the summer and fishing. Oklahoma City is definitely a different experience. It almost resembles university days. It’s a very nice campus. Everything’s

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 202

202 Alaska’s Women Pilots

accelerated so you’re immersed in it for an eight-hour period each day. You go home, and some of the classes require studying and others don’t. They had a housing community with apartments, and they gave you an allowance. Some of the apartments have cooking facilities, so you buy groceries and do your cooking there. But once you’ve finished school, you come back to the office and begin on-the-job training. OJT is a four-step process where you actually start out with, “Here’s the skill,” and you do your reading and studying. You’re assigned to an inspector, a mentor, who’s also a training officer, and you start, step-by-step, going through these skills. The FAA has it nicely lined out nowadays. Computers were just becoming popular when I got on board. Now the process is quite automated. The satisfying part of the job is when somebody needs help with a problem, and you’re able to resolve it. Because that’s what the FAA is all about—a public servant. We’ve also got to remember that we’re each other’s best customers in-house. If I can help someone solve a problem, then I feel good, like I’ve done my job. The most difficult part of the job is the reason that flight standards has a union. Some of the past management styles—not just flight standards but pervasive throughout the agency—reflected old-time management techniques. Managers believed that they had to treat people in rather a rough manner because they were trained that way and didn’t know better. I wasn’t used to that. I was used to if you did a really good job, people basically let you do your job, and that’s not quite the way things were done in the past. I really can’t fault them looking back on where we’ve come from, and where we are now. After training, I was the safety program or accident prevention program manager. Getting on with the FAA actually brought my whole background together: aviation and safety. It all melded together for the first time. Whoever you work for, you want that paycheck coming in because it does give you stability. I’m one of these people who’s free spirited in many ways, but I kind of want to create a stable platform to put that free spirit on. For me, stability happens to be the FAA. They have been very good to me and extremely understanding, as far as my dog team goes. I’m expected

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Val with her sled leaders Rita and Freddie.

Val with fourteen-year-old, retired Sadie.

Page 203

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 204

204 Alaska’s Women Pilots

to do my job, of course. I have a very understanding boss. For the Iditarod, for example, I needed to be able to leave at a certain time in the afternoon to complete a four-hour run with the dogs. I’ve got to have that built in. So they’ve all been real good about it. Just excellent. It doesn’t get any better than this. Right now, when you reach fifty-five with thirty years, you can retire. But I will not have thirty years when I reach fifty-five. I’ll only have twenty. So I guess I’ll be here until I’m sixty-five when I have my thirty years. As far as my personal life, I’d like to find the right person again to settle down with. I think I could do that. But finding the right person gets harder the older you get. I think it’s much easier when you’re younger. It’s kind of a sad deal why it is, but frankly, the older you get, it’s harder and the more you work and achieve things for yourself. It’s harder to find somebody that’s—and I’m not looking for somebody that’s exactly step-for-step or point-for-point the same as me—somewhat philosophically close and can blend in with where you are, and you can blend in with where they are. The longer you go and you continue to grow, you’ve gotta find somebody that’s also grown themselves and progressed. I’ll tell you what, there’s a lot of them out there that are not on a growth path at all. There’s different ways of growing. You’ve gotta be willing to emotionally grow and expand yourself. To spiritually grow and expand yourself. To professionally grow and expand yourself. It’s difficult to find. I’d like to see somebody on a growth path, too, that has something to show me and offer me so that I can grow in a different way. Growing up, both my parents believed that whether you were a man or a woman, you should be educated. And plan on, when you get through with school, having a goal. What is it going to be next? Am I going to go to a technical school and get technical training and background? Or am I going to go to a college environment, or am I gonna do both? Where am I going? Not just walk out of school and not have a direction that you’re going. I think it’s important to stay focused and keep moving to get yourself prepared so that you can take care of yourself.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 205

Valerie Aron Jokela 205

When I got to the aviation stuff, my mother was pretty excited about that. She never pushed the aviation. I ended up finding that route myself. My folks were visiting me when I got my private pilot’s certificate back in Washington D.C. My dad was my first passenger as a full-fledged private pilot. If I were to give advice to young girls today, my advice would be to stay in school. Finish high school. Set goals. Either get going to college, or start in a technical field and get your training; come out with your certificate. Stay away from drugs and alcohol.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 206

Conclusion In many respects, bush piloting was the most rewarding flying I’d ever done—and my downfall. Before I started interviewing women pilots like Ellie for my project, the Alaska pilot I could most identify with was the bush pilot Don Sheldon. Don’s addiction to beautiful scenery and his fierce independence, were things I could relate to. His example of self-sufficiency and solitude coincided with my own philosophical beliefs as well as with those of Henry David Thoreau: I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan—like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion. (135)

206

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 207

Conclusion 207

In 1981 I was a Pan American stewardess and in love with the romance of bush flying. When I heard of Alaska—majestic Mt. McKinley over 20,000 feet, lush trees rising toward the sunlight, blond grizzly bears running across the forest, salmon the size of yardsticks—I jumped at the opportunity for adventure. In Bethel, a small town of 4,500 people, I would have my own red cabin, a twelve-by-sixteen structure close to the river. The fact that it didn’t have indoor plumbing didn’t faze me a bit. I had always dreamed of living a lifestyle similar to Thoreau’s at Walden Pond, and my desire for adventure overshadowed the truth that Bethel was completely flat and nearly fifty miles from the nearest mountain. In my early days of aviation, the thrilling prospect of finding landing strips near Bethel excited me. Self-sufficiency was a lure. Compared to being a flight attendant at Pan Am, the initiation into the fraternal order of bush pilots—mostly men—required different skills. Instead of using people skills—serving passengers in a courteous and friendly manner—I was expected to develop new areas of expertise. Courage allowed me to fly through rain and fog and snow. Judgment would either keep me alive or lead me to a single wrong choice that had severe, probably unforgivable consequences. Bush Air pilots fueled, loaded, and unloaded their own planes. In my Cessna 207 I hauled passengers, mail, cargo, dog teams, seal oil, cases of Pampers, and soda pop stacked to the ceiling. But flying for Bush Air couldn’t begin to compare to the many challenges of working for Seair. This outfit based pilots all across the vast state of Alaska, and I felt a deep longing to live closer to the mountains. Umiat fulfilled this need, and also my need to find purpose and meaning in my work. After two layoffs at Seair, ARCO hired me. This oil company paid three times as much as I earned at Seair, and the work was a hundred times more boring. As an ARCO Twin Otter captain based in Kuparuk, just west of Prudhoe Bay, I flew mostly shuttle flights. From my sleeping quarters in Kuparuk, I watched day after day pass and then press down against my career like snow in the hardest of winters. It gave me great pleasure to occasionally execute medivac flights and have a purpose beyond a paycheck. But most of my years working at ARCO were routine: back and forth from Kuparuk to Prudhoe Bay

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 208

208 Alaska’s Women Pilots

to Kuparuk, sometimes seventeen times a day. And the day-in and day-out monotony of flying from airport to airport, when I used to land at various ice strips near Umiat, bored me. My sleeping quarters—with the bed shoved off to one side, reading chair, lamp, and a small desk—reminded me of a Halloween-decorated prison cell. Orange, black, and brown were the dominant colors. Most hitches, I peered out of the two-by-two window of darkness, trying to focus on something beyond my own situation. This something beyond happened when I accepted a position at Eastern Airlines in 1986 and exchanged shuttle flights between Kuparuk and Prudhoe for shuttle flights between New York and Boston. Routinely I drove in and out of the city eighteen times a month for shuttle shift. As a Boeing 727 flight engineer, I sat sideways for nearly a year and watched the sea of concrete out my tiny window before I quit and Frank Lorenzo decimated the airline. But I didn’t let my apathy toward ARCO or Eastern Airlines destroy my passion for flying. My husband Arlin and I still owned our Super Cub airplane and eventually made our way back to the Far North, where I flew for fun and adventure for the next thirteen years. There’s nothing quite like flying a Super Cub on wheels and floats and skis. Witness the splash of fresh snow against your windshield, and you’re hooked. Then in 1990 I was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease and endured six months of MOPP ABV chemotherapy, one of the most rigorous regimes. Freedom of flight, that wonderful right of the healthy, was obliterated by a cancer cell. When I no longer qualified for my flight physical, I became acutely aware of its privilege, power, and impact on my life. A constant reminder of being grounded registered as I watched other pilots fly. I could only imagine: turning my little yellow Super Cub left and right to the rhythm of the wind; plunging into an open sky on a summer day when the air temperature and cockpit temperature are the same; feeling a wind gust deliciously pressing down near the back of my stomach; and squishing tundra tires into wet sand. When I completed chemotherapy and one physician visit after another, I finally held a current flight physical in the palm of my

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 209

Conclusion 209

The author fly fishing with her Cub.

hand. Framed it. Some people meditated or practiced yoga for hours. I began each summer season in Alaska by firing up the Super Cub and flying to our newly-built cabin, where twelve loons and two swans greeted me. It wasn’t unusual for me to spend several days floating around Trinity Lake in a rubber boat, reading for hours, hiking to the ridge behind our place, and looking for berries and bears. With each passing physical, I let out a big sigh of relief then held my breath at the end of six months. Most of the physicals for professional pilots expired after half a year, and now, I, a cancer survivor and recreational pilot, was classified in a similar fashion. Though strict, this time-limited certification of being fit for flight is a reassurance to the public, but a real trial to pilots. I knew a captain with a lovely house and family who suffered a heart attack and lost his physical. At the age of fifty, his arteries were so clogged that he had to have bypass surgery and change his diet and exercise routine. He still doesn’t have a flying job. Another acquaintance tested positive for diabetes and spends most of his days fixing up classic cars. I recently met a woman pilot in Missoula who used to fly

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 210

210 Alaska’s Women Pilots

helicopters for a living. Every time her flight physical came due, her stress level increased to the point that she couldn’t pass the blood pressure requirements. This anxiety of losing her FAA first-class medical, flight privileges, and weekly paycheck forced her to seek another profession. Her future career as the owner of a flight school, had everything to do with aviation but did not include what she loved most: flying single-pilot. From my experience, remission—that powerful word of hope that cancer patients long to hear—means little in the minds of bureaucrats. Rules are rules. It took nearly two years to secure a flight physical that lasted more than six months. Often the government held up my privilege to fly with the excuse of needing one more letter from my oncologist. The plethora of tests, letters from doctors stating that there was no evidence of tumors, x-rays, and more tests, wore me down. But I kept flying, in hopes that they would someday raise the restriction to a year. And eventually, they did. My next blow was when my oncologist found a melanoma mole on my upper thigh. Fortunately, it was removed before cells could penetrate the epidermis. But the FAA didn’t see it that way. According to the dermatologist, melanomas have a high incidence of returning and resurfacing on another part of the body. So I was back on six-month flight physical watch and more paperwork. As the years passed, I made a decision to pursue another type of adventure that would guarantee personal freedom in a new way. Ranching is an occupation that bureaucracies such as the FAA cannot touch. They cannot take away my exhilaration over riding horseback across the open fields because I can’t pass a physical exam. If I experience another bout of cancer or high blood pressure or chest pain, I can still climb on the back of a horse. Not only does ranching fulfill the quest for self-sufficiency that I need for happiness, but it also fulfills my desire to work independently like I did as a bush pilot. Now I move cattle with my horse instead of move cargo with my plane. I remember my first riding lesson in the heat of summer in western Montana. Lifting the reins up, I used my feet like rudder pedals and pressed against the side of my mare, Dez, until she began to trot; the ground moved away below, and I was riding, soaring

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 211

Conclusion 211

The author near her ranch with her horse, Dez.

over green pastures. To my amazement, the horse moved with me. How could a well-trained horse not turn with a neck-reining cue? Once again, I felt like I was flying, this time fast over the ground, going nowhere in particular and everywhere at once, with one horsepower. The lady pilots I introduced in this collection continue to make history. Some have pursued additional ratings and schooling, and some have advanced in their career field. Others have made the lifestyle choice to stop flying and accept non-flying challenges. In sharp contrast to my decision to quit flying, is the career progression of Tamar Bailey. Tamar grew up inside the cockpit of planes touching the controls. She is still touching the controls as a professional pilot for FedEx, and in 2003 (between flights to Asia), she collaborated with editor John Branson on the book Seversen’s Roadhouse: Crossroads of Bristol Bay, Alaska. Also in 2003, Tamar upgraded to the captain’s seat in the MD11. Some captains fly the line, some work as check airman, and some, like Tamar, pursue line check airman positions. Line check airman, commonly called LCA, undergo rigorous training standards

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 212

212 Alaska’s Women Pilots

and receive a special checkride from the FAA to achieve certification. A line check airman seems an easy job—sitting in the jump seat and observing other pilots fly—yet it can involve twenty to twenty-five days of work each month with a pittance of extra compensation. There are times when Tamar will give another captain a line check, which means she observes her fellow captain on a flight and makes certain that he or she is in compliance with the company manual. Other flights entail giving initial operating experience (IOE) to new pilots on the line. Let’s face it: pilots joke with one another about bottle-feeding the new recruits. Many wouldn’t have the patience to indoctrinate new pilots into flying a highly computerized airplane like the MD11, much less tolerate their mistakes. Some pilots don’t relish the idea of being a whistle blower and busting a fellow aviator, no matter what the blunder. Teaching is a sacrifice. For the most part, there is a calling, a desire, even a passion, to give back to the aviation industry that spurs Tamar into becoming a check pilot. It doesn’t bother her that the flight-training department schedules her trips for her. Though her choice of schedule is gone, the hope of teaching, passing on the many experiences she’s gathered from flying over the years, especially overseas, propels her forward. Caroline Lachmann-Spivak also enjoys teaching. Every time a helicopter flies overhead, she quizzes her two children, “Look, what kind of a helicopter is that?” In years to come, they will most likely win trivia questions about helicopters against the best of professionals. With each passing day, Caroline still feels the calling—freedom and excitement—to fly helicopters for a living. Since her divorce was finalized, she’s had several offers to fly helicopters on the North Slope of Alaska. She cried when the first company called and offered her a job. Just thinking about flying in IFR conditions with a sling load underneath the belly of a helicopter moved her to tears of reminiscence. Motherhood is the ultimate sacrifice, the ultimate giving up of oneself. Caroline realizes that she made a choice to have children and wants to stay home and raise them herself. Still, her desire for professional stability has everything to do with her children. If she accepted a flying job, she would have to live and work on the North

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 213

Conclusion 213

Alena and Nessa, 2003.

Slope for two weeks a month, and her kids would have a part-time mom. Precious and desirable as flying is, Caroline would rather work at a high-end furniture store (Williams and Kay) so she’s home every night. As a professional salesperson, she loves meeting people and helping them pick out colors and textures. She’s good at it. In the meantime, more helicopter offers present themselves, and the temptation to fly will remain close to the surface. Noralie Jennings-Voigt presently works for Northwest Technical Services, contracted to ConocoPhillips as a Twin Otter pilot on the North Slope. Over the years, Noralie has stayed healthy by hiking, playing racquetball, and climbing mountains below twelve thousand feet. One of her interests is alternative ways of healing. Her daughter Nessa is now seventeen and drives a car. Alena is thirteen and still wants to be an astronaut. When she isn’t working on the North Slope, Noralie flies her Cessna 170B for fun and particularly enjoys hunting for jade. She continues flight instruction and gives float ratings and biannual flight reviews. She believes Alena will take off and land the Cessna 170B before she gets her driver’s license.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 214

214 Alaska’s Women Pilots

Ellie Jones-Elg has continued with her flying. In 1990 Ellie and her husband Rod bought property in Arizona. She wanted to live someplace sunny during the winter months in order to fly yearround dressed in light slacks and a jacket—no engine heaters and no scraping of snow. So they purchased property in an airpark with runways and taxiways and hangars as the focal points. Over the years, they built their own house and are now living the life of retired snowbirds: winters in Arizona and the rest of the year in Alaska. Between the two of them, Ellie and Rod have five planes: a 1977 Super Cub, a Williams Biplane, a Corbin Baby Ace, a Flightstar Ultralight, and a Cessna 150. The 150-horsepower, red and white Super Cub is Ellie’s baby and remains full-time in a hangar in Alaska. Ellie uses this air machine extensively for take-offs and landings on tiny runways such as her homestead. She is presently developing the eighty-acre parcel into an airpark. She still loves watching the birds soaring around the sky, and on most summer days you’ll find Ellie on a sandbar, casting her line into the water to catch a silver or red salmon for dinner. Sanna Green retired in June 2000 as executive director of the Professional Teaching Practices Commission, which is the state ethics board for educators. Sanna sold her Cessna 180, but she is looking for a Cessna 172 to continue exploring the vast state of Alaska. With both of her knees replaced, she has started playing tennis again and enjoys hiking and biking and skiing the slopes. She serves as the president of an investment club and participates in the local bridge club. When Sanna reflects back on her life filled with adventure, she remembers sailing a fifty-two-foot ketch across the Atlantic; floating the Colorado River before the Lee’s Ferry dam went in; biking and touring in France, Mexico, and Death Valley; winning the Alaska alpine ski championship in two different years; riding horseback in a safari in Africa; and playing all-state basketball. Today Sanna still follows her dreams and believes “it has been a great run” so far. Darlene Dubay has been working for Northwest Airlines since 1997. She started out in Minneapolis in the right seat of a DC-9 and flew that for three months. Then she was awarded a position in

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 215

Conclusion 215

Anchorage as a second officer on the 747. She flew out of Anchorage until April of 2002, when she was moved to the right seat (first officer) of the Airbus 320, which she is flying presently, based in Minneapolis. The Airbus 320 flies domestically all over the country and into Mexico, the Caribbean, and several Canadian cities. It is a totally modern aircraft with computers, a fadec, and a glass cockpit. Darlene enjoys flying the airplane, but commuting takes a lot of fun out of the job. She is away from home at least twenty days out of every month and hopes to return to Anchorage and the 747 as a first officer. Besides writing poetry, Darlene loves to see things growing and blooming, and gardening takes a lot of her time during the short Alaskan summer. She continues to thrive on challenges and competition, and in 1999 she completed an Ironman Triathlon, winning fifth place in her age group. And lastly, Val Aron Jokela is still working for the government. She is now a technical specialist for the Resource Management department of the FAA. With her aviation safety background, she wanted to experience a new challenge and learn a different aspect of the industry. She is a member of a women’s track team and conditions by running hills and mountains, as well as competing in half marathons. She also has a new last name. On September 23, 1999, Val married Kurt Jokela. Not only does he love the dogs (a very important characteristic), he’s also an accomplished musher and cook. Val, perhaps the most romantically-minded woman pilot in this collection, finally found the right person to share her life with. One hundred years have passed since Orville and Wilbur Wright made their historic flight at Kitty Hawk on December 17, 1903. Since that time, especially in the last decade, many changes have occurred in the field of aviation. As I reflect on these changes, I remember my visit in the mid-nineties to Washington D.C. and the National Air and Space Museum. I strolled through the exhibits and absorbed thousands of words of history. Hanging from the ceiling with wings covered in faded muslin, the Wright Flyer was displayed in the gallery of “Early Flight.” The Wright brothers built this creation after years of struggle and debate. For the better part of an hour, my eyes studied the fuselage, rudder, and elevator, and I

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 216

216 Alaska’s Women Pilots

wondered what it must have felt like to be the first person to achieve powered flight. I find it thrilling to imagine women in the Wright Flyer historic narrative. It isn’t necessary to alter anything about the replica except who’s in the cockpit: instead of Orville, perhaps his sister Katherine. What was her interest in flight and in her brothers’ machinations? Did she have a natural inclination to fly, like her brothers, that was discouraged because of her gender? What would it have meant to me, and many, many other women, if she had been the one prone in the cockpit, her hand controlling the direction of flight? We don’t require aviation firsts to mark historic events, yet one look at the importance of powered flight and its considerable effect on us as a nation makes the connection clear: Roaring Twenties and Charles Lindbergh; Great Depression and Amelia Earhart; World War II and Chuck Yeager; Korean war and Jacqueline Cochran; Civil Rights Act and Neil Armstrong (Lopez 256). The National Air and Space Museum makes a point to include women pilots in their museum collection. As I continued my tour, past the Wright Flyer, Lindbergh’s Ryan, and the many wonderful displays of WASPs, I was delighted to find the exhibit “Women in Aviation.” A life-size model of Patty Wagstaff, the famous aerobatics professional who received her first flight instruction from Darlene Dubay, stood right in front of me! I can picture this athletic pilot climbing into her Extra 260, taking off and executing roll after roll above a cheering crowd. Her white jumpsuit with the USA logo below her name boasts a sharply banked airplane against a background of red and blue. The embroidered lettering of her name stands out in the spotlight. Standing next to me, a young girl reached out to touch Patty’s smiling face. As I interviewed the seven women pilots in this book, I came to realize how much women have contributed to aviation. Though they may be thinly represented in books and museums, women are flying. And for those who care to look for it, there is a significant historical record, one worth uncovering and fleshing out.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 217

Conclusion 217

There is always a feeling of loss, at least in my mind, at the end of any project. Letting go of something that I’ve held onto for so long, like the stories of these women pilots, is difficult to do. Nothing is more remarkable than writing a book. One word can be unexpected, redirecting, and shocking, yet conjure up an entire life of memories. Stories and portraits imprint themselves in our memories like tires stuck in snow, hidden under the powdery white of buried years and experiences. Through my interviews of these women pilots from Alaska, many memories came forth bit by bit. But letting go of a book is not synonymous with letting go of the very particular dream I have that one day in the near future, the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum, like the National Air and Space Museum, will be a major contributor to displaying the participation and contribution of Alaska’s women pilots. The last summer I was in Anchorage was like all summers in Alaska, passing at a fast, flying-frenzied pace. The event that every pilot waits for—flying floats—lasts but a few months before the temperatures drop, and the rivers and lakes freeze. Tour busses flocked to Lake Hood (the busiest seaplane base in the world) and a favorite tourist stop, the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum. The vast array of male icons on the walls is impressive: Noel Wien, Carl Ben Eielson, Joe Crosson, Bob Reeve, Sig Wien, Fred Chambers, Ray Renshaw, Bob Ellis, George Clayton, Bud Helmericks, Harold Gillam, Jack Jefford and many more. In the past decade, more women pilots have been included in the museum as well as at local libraries. Just recently, the Alaska 99s gathered and displayed portraits of women in aviation at the Loussac Public Library in Anchorage. This is a good start. I know, however, that more could be done, like including women pilots on the museum’s website where viewers can click on one of three galleries—“Bush Pilots,” “WWII,” and “Japan & America”—and read more about the history of aviation. Currently, these selections display actual photographs of the museum galleries and many pictures of aircraft on the flight line, but you have to strain to recognize any one pilot, much less a woman pilot. The mission statement dated 1993 is clear: “The mission of the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum is the collection, preservation,

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 218

218 Alaska’s Women Pilots

and public presentation of Alaska’s aviation history, 1897 to present.” This should include women pilots too. I trust that someday the seven extraordinary aviatrices interviewed here, as well as the numerous women pilots discussed in this collection, will be included in the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum and on their website. When this historic event happens girls and women will be able to imagine themselves into the narrative of Alaska aviation history.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 219

Glossary Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) a mechanic’s license to perform maintenance on aircraft and engines Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) the highest achievable pilot rating air racer aircraft designed strictly for speed Association for Women in Aviation Maintenance (www.awam.org/) auto-rotates an approach to landing in a helicopter where gravity is driving the rotor and not the engine avalanche in aerobatic flying a basic loop with a roll Bandeirantes a nineteen-passenger, twin-engine commuter aircraft manufactured in Brazil Be A Pilot (www.beapilot.com) Boeing 737 a twin-engine jet transport Civil Air Patrol the division of the Air Force that provides civilians a means to perform search and rescue missions Civilian Pilot Training Program a program during WWII in which civilians trained pilots for the military commercial rating the pilot rating needed in order to fly for hire commercial license see commercial rating crosswind landings landing on a runway where the relative wind crosses the runway cyclic pitch control control that banks the helicopter Decathlon aerobatic version of the Aeronica Champ, which is a two-place tandem aircraft manufactured by the Aeronica company dual rated a license to fly fixed-wing and rotorcraft

219

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 220

220 Alaska’s Women Pilots

EAA’s Young Eagles program (www.eaa.org) engine-out procedure a procedure to keep a twin-engine aircraft flying with one engine inoperative E-90 King Air a beechcraft twin-engine turbine aircraft FAA

Federal Aviation Administration (www.faa.gov), the section of government that regulates air commerce FAR Part 61.121 Federal Aviation Regulations that prescribe the requirements for a commercial pilot license FAR Part 91 the basic Federal Aviation Regulations governing private pilots FAR Part 135 Federal Aviation Regulations governing air taxi for hire operations FAR Part 121 Federal Aviation Regulations governing scheduled airline service Farewell Radio a remote communications link to the Anchorage Flight Service Station first-class medical the medical certification required to exercise the privileges of an airline transport rating feathered a propeller blade turned ninety degrees to the relative wind to reduce drag flight instructor rating a rating that allows you to teach flying fly-girl a female pilot Fort Rich Fort Richardson Army Base in Anchorage, Alaska Future Airline Pilot’s Association (FAPA) an association that helps prospective airline pilots to achieve a career glide slope an electronic beam that descends toward the runway at approximately a three-degree angle GNS 500 a global navigational system that allows the user to insert latitude and longitude coordinates for navigating to a designated point ground effect when an aircraft experiences an increased amount of lift near the ground hammerhead pulling the aircraft up vertically and then allowing it to fall off to the left or right

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 221

Glossary 221

handed off to center when an aircraft flies from one air traffic control sector to another hand-starting a process used to start an aircraft by physically turning the propeller Horizontal Situation Indicator (HSI) used for navigational purposes IFR Instrument Flight Rules IFR flying navigating by aircraft instruments without outside visual reference Immelmann in aerobatic flying a half loop to inverted flight, then reversing direction Instrument Landing System (ILS) electronic beam and glide slope to the end of a runway instrument rating the certification required to fly solely by aircraft instruments International Society of Women Airline Pilots (www.iswap.org) inverted flat spin when the aircraft is upside down and spinning around its vertical axis jug aircraft engine cylinder jump seating occupying the observation seat in the cockpit knife-edge flight in aerobatic flying the wings of the aircraft are turned perpendicular to the ground Lockheed Electra four-engine turboprop transport plane light twins twin-engine aircraft under 12,500 pounds lazy eight in aerobatic flying a figure 8 maneuver around a point localizer an electronic beam extending the centerline of the runway multi-engine land rating the license that allows you to fly aircraft with more than one engine multi-engine sea rating the license that allows you to fly a seaplane with more than one engine mountain wave strong current of wind that bends up and over a mountain

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 222

222 Alaska’s Women Pilots

nautical mile 6,080 feet The Ninety-Nines (www.ninety-nines.org) OMNI (VOR) very high frequency (VHF) navigational system outside snap roll negative G-force maneuver where the airplane is stalled during aerobatic flight private pilot rating the license that allows you to fly aircraft and carry passengers—not for hire Professional Women Controllers (www.pwcinc.org) radar altimeter an instrument that measures aircraft height above the ground radar a device used by air traffic controllers in order to track aircraft through the sky reverse Cuban eight an aerobatic maneuver that looks like a figure eight round motors radial engines in which the cylinders are arranged in a circle Saberliner twin-engine business jet manufactured by North American Rockwell Company second-class medical a medical certification required to exercise the privileges of a commercial rating short-field landing techniques employed when landing on a short runway soft-field landing techniques employed when landing on a soft surface spike camp a remote camp away from the main camp spin when the aircraft is pointing straight down and rotating statute mile 5,280 feet tail slide an aerobatic maneuver in which the airplane is pulled up vertically and then slides backward toward its tail take off roll the distance required to get an aircraft airborne Technical Women’s Organization (two.faa.gov)

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 223

Glossary 223

third-class medical a medical certification required to exercise the privileges of a private pilot three-engine ferry flying an aircraft with only three out of four engines operating touchdown point the intended point of landing an aircraft turns about a point maneuvering the aircraft around a designated point tundra tires balloon-type tires that allow pilots to land on a soft surface two-place airplanes aircraft capable of carrying two people type rating aircraft-specific rating for aircraft weighing 12,500 pounds or more and/or jet powered aircraft waypoint a given navigation point Whirly-Girls a non-profit, educational and charitable organization dedicated to advancing women in helicopter aviation (www.whirlygirls.org/) Women Air Service Pilots (WASPs) a group of women who ferried military aircraft during WWII due to the shortage of male pilots; some women instructed as well (www.waspwwii.org) Women in Aviation, International an organization of women in aviation (www.wai.org)

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 224

Works Consulted Ackerman, Diane. A Natural History of the Senses. New York: Vintage Books, 1990. Bach, Richard. Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah. New York: Delacorte Press, 1977. Branson, John, ed. Seversen’s Roadhouse: Crossroads of Bristol Bay, Alaska. Anchorage: The Cook Inlet Historical Society, Inc., 2003. Bruder, Gerry. Heroes of the Horizon: Flying Adventures of Alaska’s Legendary Bush Pilots. Anchorage: Alaska Northwest Books, 1991. Chaikin, Andrew. Air and Space: The National Air and Space Museum’s Story of Flight. New York: Bulfinch Press/Little Brown and Co., 1997. Crane, Dale, ed. Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms. Washington: Aviation Supplies & Academics, Inc., 1991. English, Dave. Slipping the Surly Bonds: Great Quotations on Flight. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1998. Federal Aviation Administration. Pilot’s Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge. Washington, D. C.: FAA, 1980. Francis, Devon. Power to Fly: A History of the Oil and Aviation Partnership. USA: Aero Publishers, 1985. Francis, Mary. “Women in Alaska Aviation-Minded.” Alaska Quarterly (AQ) (Fall 1956): 6. Gann, Ernest K. Fate is the Hunter. New York: Simon & Schuster/Touchstone Books, 1961. Greiner, James. Wager with the Wind: The Don Sheldon Story. Illinois: Rand McNally, 1974. Houston, Pam, ed. Women on Hunting. Hopewell, New Jersey: The Ecco Press, 1995. Jones, H. Wendy. Alaska’s Dynamic Women: 200 Years of Alaskan Women. vol. II. California: Detail Quality Printing, Inc., 1977. “Juanita Bailey Longtime Woman Pilot” OX5 News 39 (Feb. 1997): 1. Langewiesche, William. Inside the Sky: A Meditation on Flight. New York: Pantheon Books, 1998. Lopez, Donald S. Aviation: A Smithsonian Guide. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1995. Markham, Beryl. West with the Night. New York: North Point Press, 1942. McLean, Herbert. “Nancy Livingston: Alaska’s Whirly-Girl.” Alaska Sportsman (September 1963): 14. Merry, John A. Aviation Internet Directory: A Guide to 500 Best Aviation Web Sites. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2001. Montgomery, Nancy. “Pioneer Recalls Early Days of Alaska Flying.” WEAK insert of Anchorage Daily News (3 June 1984): O–4. Noggle, Anne. For God, Country, and the Thrill of It: Women Airforce Service Pilots in World War II. Texas: Texas A&M University Press, 1990. Noyes, Russell. English Romantic Poetry and Prose. New York: Oxford University Press, 1956: 1163.

224

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 225

Works Consulted 225 Propst, Nell Brown. “Marvel Crosson, Alaska’s First Bird Girl.” In Alaska Journal: 1981 Collection, compiled and edited by Virginia McKinney. Alaska Northwest Publishing Co., 1981: 9. Rosas, Por Maria. “Teresa Vuela Alto, Flying High.” LaVoz Latina IV, 3rd Quarter (Fall 1999): 9. Russo, Carolyn. Women and Flight: Portraits of Contemporary Women Pilots. New York: National Air and Space Museum in association with Bulfinch Press/Little Brown and Co., 1997. Schultz, Barbara Hunter. Pancho: The Biography of Florence Lowe Barnes. California: Little Buttes Publishing Co., 1996. Smith, Carolyn, ed. The Alaska Almanac: Facts about Alaska. Washington: Alaska Northwest Books, 1995. Stevens, Robert W. Alaskan Aviation History. vol. I and II. Washington: Polynyas Press, 1990. Stoops, James G., and Noel Grunwaldt. The Women of Alaska. vol. II. Anchorage: Anchorage School District, 1995–96. Thoreau, Henry David. Walden and Civil Disobedience. New York: Penguin Books, 1983. Tordoff, Dirk. Mercy Pilot: The Joe Crosson Story. Washington: Epicenter Press, 2002. Wagstaff, Patty and Ann L. Cooper. Fire and Air: A Life on the Edge. Illinois: Chicago Review Press, Inc., 1997. Whaley, Neva. “Pa Taught Me To Fly.” AL (January 1942): 4. Wilson, Bill. “Alaska Para-star Micky Sleeper.” WEAK insert of Anchorage Daily News (5 April 1980): F–30. Wolfe, Tom. The Right Stuff. New York: Bantam Books, 1979. Worthylake, Mary M. Up in the Air. Oregon: Maverick Publications, 1988.

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 226

Index aerobatic, vii, 12, 15, 153–60, 162, 163, 166, 169, 170, 172, 174, 176, 219, 221, 222 aerobatic team (U.S. Women’s), 153, 154, 155 Aeronica Champ, 85, 219 African-American, 104, 106, 107 Airbus 320, 215 Airframe and Powerplant (A&P), 22, 37, 39, 40, 41, 179, 219, 220 Airline Transport Pilot (ATP), 22, 44, 167, 193, 219 Airpac, 200 Alaska Aeronautical Incorporated (AAI), 36, 167, 169, 170, 186, 193, 194, 195, 197, 200 Alaska Airlines, 22, 45, 47, 48, 50, 137, 151, 169, 200 Alaska Airmen’s Association, 17, 83 Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum, 5, 7, 217, 218 Alaska Peninsula, 10, 79, 81, 90–93, 97 Alaska Range, 44, 75 Aleutian Islands, 10, 22 Aleutian Range, 91, 99, 100 Alexander Creek, 91 Alyeska, 115, 122 Amelia Earhart Memorial Scholarship (99s), 17 Anaktuvuk Pass, 115 Anchorage, xiv, 7, 9, 10, 16, 17, 22, 24, 25, 29, 32, 33, 34, 37, 40, 44, 46, 49, 60, 61, 65, 66, 81, 87, 107–12, 115–19, 136, 137, 139, 143, 144, 145, 158, 167, 174, 188, 193, 215, 217, 220, 224, 225

Anchorage Community College, 22 Anchorage Radio, 117 Anderson, Jim, viii, 37, 43, 201 Andy’s Flying Service, 27, 29 Aniak, 44 Arctic Circle, 180 Arrow Sport, 17 Artemis, 72 Atlantic Richfield Corporation (ARCO), 129, 162, 170, 171, 200, 207, 208 aviation safety inspector, vii, 172, 178, 179 Bach, Richard, 51, 52, 224 Bailey, Juanita, 21, 224 Bailey, Tamar, vii, viii, 14, 22–50, 211, 212 Bandeirante, 197–200, 219 Barnes, Florence Lowe (Pancho), ix, 155, 156, 157, 225 barnstormer, 56, 73, 106, 155, 180 Barrow, 67, 108, 173 Barter Island (Kaktovik), 67 Baty, Peggy, 21 Beaufort Sea, 130 Beaver, 37 Beirne, Helen, 112 Bell 206, 129 Bell 212, 130, 140, 147 Bethel, xiv, 1, 23, 33, 58, 64, 115, 207 Bettles, 174 biannual flight review, 58, 213 big game guides, vii, xiv, 72, 73, 74, 92 Bishop Brothers, 29, 30, 31, 34, 37 Bishop, Jim, 31–34 Boeing 727, 208

226

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 227

Index 227 Boeing 737, 21, 22, 219 Boeing 747, 52, 162 Bonanza, 18, 61 Bonino, Krista, viii, 133, 134 Bristol Bay, 91, 115, 211, 224 Brooks Range, 18, 20, 60, 120, 182 brown bear hunt, 79, 80, 81, 93 Bureau of Land Management (BLM), 64, 66, 115 Burnside-Ott Aviation Training Center, 52, 55 Bush Air, 23, 207 Cape Newenham, 64 Cape Yakataga, 33 caribou hunt, 79, 93, 94, 95 Cessna 150, 52, 55, 60, 164, 165, 214 Cessna 170 (170B), 14, 58, 70, 213 Cessna 172, 112, 113, 214 Cessna 180, 18, 90, 96, 98, 214 Cessna 185, 90 Cessna 205, 22, 165 Cessna 206, 27, 61, 165 Cessna 207, 23, 27, 58, 193, 207 Cessna 310, 167 Chugach Mountains, 136, 144, 185 Chugiak, 185 Circle Hot Springs, 60 Civil Air Patrol, 21, 133, 151, 219 Civilian Pilot Training Program (CPTP), 56, 133, 219 Clayton, George, 57, 217 Clayton, Virginia Merrill, 56, 57 Cochran, Jacqueline, 10, 158, 216 Cold Bay, 174 Coleman, Bessie, viii, 104, 105, 155 commercial pilot, vii, 12, 16, 17, 18, 21, 51, 55, 74, 89, 107, 136, 166, 179, 219, 220, 222 Convair, 24, 171, 172, 174 Cook Inlet, 27, 83, 116, 117, 185, 190 Copper River, 113 Cordova, 64 Cowper, Steve, 46 Crick, Dick, 119, 120 Crosson, Joe, 5, 217, 225 Crosson, Marvel, 5, 225

Crowley Maritime, 66, 67, 200 Crystal Sea, 130, 131 Curtiss Flying Boat, 17 Curtiss JN-4 (Jenny), 106, 155 Curtiss, Glenn, 55, 56 da Vinci, Leonardo, 128 Daddy’s Money, 31 DC-3, viii, 24, 29–35 DC-6, viii, 22, 31–35, 37, 39, 43–46, 49 DC-8, 106 DC-9, 214 Deadhorse, xiv, 20, 162, 182, 183 Decathlon, ix, 158, 160, 169, 171, 219 Deshka River, 91 Diana, 72 Dillingham, 166 Dimond, Dave, 27, 28, 29 Dodge, F. Atlee, 87 Dodson, Teresa Delgado, 22, 225 Doyle, Pat, 38, 40 Drift River, 27 Dubay, Darlene, vii, ix, 14, 15, 158, 160, 162–77, 193, 214, 215, 216 Duchess, 61 E-90 (King Air), 66, 67, 68, 219 Eagle River, 185 Earhart, Amelia, viii, 9, 11, 17, 36, 56, 156, 158, 160, 216 Eastern Airlines, 208 Elg, Ellie Jones, vii, viii, 14, 79–102, 206, 214 Emmonak, 166 Evergreen Helicopters, 62, 64, 65, 66, 151 Extra 260, 159, 160, 216 FAA (Federal Aviation Administration), 12, 21, 58, 87, 109, 118, 170, 172, 173, 174, 178, 179, 180, 182, 185, 194, 200, 201, 202, 210, 212, 215, 220, 224 Fairbanks, 6, 7, 8, 12, 22, 56, 57, 60, 66, 111, 172

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 228

228 Alaska’s Women Pilots Farewell Radio, 117, 220 Federal Express Corporation (FedEx), 22, 24, 45, 47–50, 139, 151, 211 first-class medical, 210, 220 Flat, 114, 115 flight inspection (FIFO), 174, 175 flight instruction, vii, 2, 8, 10, 12, 15, 17, 18, 22, 32, 37, 51, 52, 53, 55–59, 67, 73, 86, 89, 104, 108, 129,130, 133, 141, 156, 158, 162, 167, 169, 170, 175, 176, 179, 185, 188, 190, 192, 216, 220, 223 flight standards, 200, 202 Flying Tigers, 45, 47 Fort Richardson (Fort Rich), 164, 167, 169, 220 Frankman, Betty Skelton, 156, 157 Frontier Airlines, 21 Future Airline Pilot’s Association (FAPA), 48, 220 Gage-Martin tractor biplane, 7 Gay, Al, 36 Geophysical Survey Incorporated (GSI), 182 Gill’s Aircraft Service, 61, 62 Glennallen, 108, 110 GNS 500, 64, 220 Golden Hotel, 114 Goodnews Bay, 115 Granite Point, 27 Green, Sanna, vii, viii, 14, 15, 109–26, 214, 226 Grumman C-2A Greyhound (COD), 134, 154 Gulkana, 119 Happy Bottom Riding Club, 156 Hefner, Laurita, viii, 110, 111, 112, 115, 116, 117, 119, 120, 121 helicopter. See Rotorcraft. Herman Nelson heaters, 46 Hill, Virginia, 12 Homer, 28, 108, 111, 200 Houston, Pam, 75, 76, 77, 224

Hunter, Celia, 12 Hurst, Jim, 17 Hutton, Linda V., viii, 134, 135, 154 Iditarod, 114 Iditarod race, 185, 186, 204 Iliamna, 174 instrument rating, 17, 25, 28, 52, 60, 74, 138, 139, 141, 166, 179, 221 Jefford, Ruth, 17, 18 Jefford, Jack, 17, 217 Jenkins, Patricia, 135 Jokela, Valerie Aron, vii, ix, 15, 172, 185–205, 215 Jonrowe, Dee Dee, 185 Jorgensen, Holger (Jorgy), 41, 42, 43 Juneau, ix, 133, 144, 145, 148, 149 Kaltag, 166, 167 Kenai, 25, 27, 28, 31, 44, 199, 200 King Salmon, 44 Kipnuk, 23 Kitty Hawk, 7, 103, 215 Kivalina, 115 Knik Arm, 144, 145, 185, 186 Kodiak, 33, 149, 198, 200 Kongiganak, 23 Kotlik, 166 Kotzebue, 32, 62, 63, 115, 120, 121, 180 Kuparuk, 162, 170, 207, 208 Kuskokwim River, 1, 2, 23, 47 Kvichak, 115 Kwethluk, 58 la Baronne de Laroche, 103 Lacan, Jacques, 76 Lachmann-Spivak, Caroline, vii, viii, ix, 14, 135–52, 212, 213 Lake Hood, xiv, 58, 90, 186, 271 Lake Creek, 91 Lamb, Ted, 23, 34, 35, 36 Landes, Bev, 39 Law, Ruth, 155 Lear jet, 115, 116

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 229

Index 229 Lear 60, 174 Lee, Jack, 80, 81, 90, 91, 96 Lee’s Air Service, viii, 80, 89, 90, 92 Lindbergh, Charles, 8, 9, 216 line check airman (LCA), 211, 212 Livingston, Nancy, 133, 224 Lockheed Electra, 22, 221 Lockheed Vega, 160 Lorenzo, Frank, 208 Mallard, 37 Markham, Beryl, 73, 74, 79, 224 Martin, James Vernon, 8 Martin, Lily Irvine, 7, 8 Marvin, Captain Duane, viii, 18–21, 182, 183, 184 Maule, 59 McCarthy, 110, 112, 113, 114, 119 McGee Airways, 108 MD-11, 16, 24 medical. See first-class, second-class, third-class Merrill, Russel, 4 Merrill Field, 10, 17, 37, 62, 65, 83, 88, 89, 107, 108, 116, 158, 191 Milky Valley, 79, 98 Moisant International Aviators, 103 Moses Point, 39 Mount McKinley, 187, 207 Mount Veniaminof, 91 Muddy River, 91, 98 Naknek, 115 Napaskiak, 1 National Air and Space Museum (NASM), iv, xiv, 160, 215, 216, 217, 224, 225 Native American folklore, 127 Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm, 178 Nikolai Creek, 27 Nome, 42, 115, 173 North Slope, 18, 129, 131, 136, 142, 146, 147, 182, 212, 213 Northern Consolidated Airlines, 85 Northern Air Cargo, 22, 33, 34, 37, 39–42, 45, 47

Northwest Airlines, ix, 15, 162, 176, 214 O’Malley Airstrip, 88 OH-58D Kiowa Warrior, 133 Organization of Black Airline Pilots, 106 Overway, Bill, 171, 172 P-38, 10 P-40, 10 Palmer, xiii, 67, 119, 120 Pan Am Flying Club, 52 Pan American World Airways, 14, 52, 53, 137, 207 Paneok, Ellen, ix, 179, 181 Part 91, 33, 74, 220 Part 121, 16, 185, 193, 200, 220 Part 135, 192, 193, 195, 220 Pat’s Flying Service, 89 PBY Catalina, 10 Pearson, Bob, 191, 193, 200 Pedersen, Ingrid, 22 Phillips Field, 60 Piper, 21 Piper J-3, 56 Piper Super Cub (PA18), viii, xiv, 58, 72, 74, 80, 81, 82, 86, 91, 208, 209, 214 Platinum Bay, 64 Plato, 127 PNA (Pacific Northern Airlines), 14 Point Hope, 115 Point Lay, 180 Port Heiden, 91, 93, 97, 98, 99 Port Moller, 79, 91 Pribilofs, 22 Prudhoe Bay, 129, 162, 170, 182, 207, 208 Ptarmigan Pass, 166 Quimby, Harriet, viii, 103, 104, 155 Rainy Pass, 116, 117 Rainy Pass Lodge, 117 Raychel, Jerry, 186

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 230

230 Alaska’s Women Pilots recreational pilots, 12, 16, 103, 107, 109, 209 Red Dog Mine, 145 Red Shirt Lake, 58 Reeve Aleutian Airlines, 22, 93, 97 Reitsch, Hanna, 132 Richey, Helen, 21 Riddles, Libby, 186 Ride, Sally, 158 Roosevelt, Eleanor, 10 rotorcraft (helicopter), 127, 129–32, 219 Rude, Bud, 83, 85, 86 Russia, 12, 22, 132 Rust, Megan, 64 Ryan, Irene Irvine, 9, 107 S-1C Pitts Special, 157 Saberliner, 174, 222 Salerno Brothers, 34 Sandy Lake, 98 Scholl, Art, 154 Scott, Blanche Stuart, viii, 54, 55, 56, 155 SeaAirmotive, Inc. (Seair), xiv, 21–24, 34, 35, 36, 39, 186, 207 second-class medical, 16, 222 Seward, 5, 145, 149 Shageluk, 116 Sheldon, Don, 4, 18, 206, 224 Shelikof Strait, 10 Skwentna, 17, 83, 108, 116, 118 Skymaster (336), 27, 29 Smithsonian, iv, xiv, 73, 160, 224 South Central Air, 27 Sparrevohn, 44 Spartan School of Aeronautics, 185 Spernaks, 192 Star Air Service, 10, 107 stevedore, 45 Stevens, Robert W., xiv, 5, 8, 225 Stinson, Katherine, 155 Super Cub. See Piper Super Cub Talachulitna River, 91 Talkeetna, 108, 117 Talkeetna Mountains, 80, 90, 91

Tamiami Airport, 52 Tanana, 174 Thiele, Tammy, 22 third-class medical, 108, 222 Thoreau, Henry David, 75, 206, 207, 225 Tillman, Lani, 64 Title IX, 123, 124 Top of the World flying school, 57 Trading Bay, 27, 28 Trinity Lake, 209 Tsiu River, 64 tundra tires, 86, 91, 208, 222 Turnagain Arm, 194 Twin Otter (DHC-6), 4, 18, 19, 23, 34, 58, 62–66, 72, 129, 162, 167, 168, 170, 171, 182, 184, 199, 207, 213 Tyonek, 190, 192 Tyonek Timber, 190 Umiat, 18, 182, 185, 207, 208 Unalakleet, 115, 166 United Parcel Service (UPS), 106 Valdez, 6, 168, 200 Valdez Airlines, 200 Van Winckel, Nance, iv, 77, 78, 79 Vega. See Lockheed Vega Voigt, Alena, ix, 58, 68, 213 Voigt, Nessa, ix, 58, 67, 68, 213 Voigt, Noralie Jennings, vii, viii, 14, 58–71, 213 Wagstaff, Patty, ix, 159–63, 170, 216, 225 Warner, Emily Howell, 21 Washington, Patrice Clarke, viii, 106 Wasilla, 59 WASPs (Women Air Service Pilots), viii, 10, 12, 13, 57, 156, 216, 223 Whirly-Girls, 133, 136, 223, 224 Wien Alaska Airways, 8, 42, 67, 169, 170 Wien, Noel, 4, 8, 217 Wien, Sig, 217

Alaska's Women Pilots

6/2/04

12:46 PM

Page 231

Index 231 Women Air Service Pilots. See WASPs Women in Aviation, International, 21, 223 Woolf, Virginia, 16 World War I (WWI), 106, 155, 180 World War II (WWII), 10, 12, 14, 21, 132, 133, 216, 217, 219, 224 Worthylake, Mary, 9, 10, 107, 225 Wrangell Mountains, 110 Wright Flyer, 215, 216

Wright, Katherine, 216 Wright, Orville and Wilbur, 7, 103, 131, 156, 215 Yakutak, 33 Yeager, Chuck, 156, 216 Yukon Delta, 166 Yukon River, 114, 121, 166 Z. J. Loussac Public Library, xiv, 217