22 October 1976
Today (22 October 2018) marks the final flight of WASP/WAFS
leader Nancy Harkness Love.
(14 February 1914 – 22 October 1976)
RIP
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| Nancy Harkness Love |
Other than their love of flying, in
many ways, the two women most responsible for formation of the WASP couldn’t
have been more different. Jacqueline Cochran was born into poverty, while Nancy
Love was the daughter of a wealthy physician. Cochran never went to college,
had barely two years in elementary school, and said she taught herself what she
needed to know. Nancy attended private schools and was a Vassar coed. Both
women were methodical and tenacious in their life decisions, but Jackie was
more aggressive and vocal, loaded with uncontainable personality. Nancy was
private, soft spoken, diplomatic, and gently efficient.
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| Nancy Harkness Love |
Legally, Nancy was Hannah Lincoln
Harkness, but because her father preferred to call her Nancy, the name stuck. Barely
13 years old in 1927, and while on a tour of Europe, Nancy saw Charles
Lindbergh land in Paris after his historic transatlantic flight. One would
think that she would have been impressed, but she wasn’t. Aviation wouldn’t
captivate her imagination and become her passion until three years later, when
she was 16 and took a ride with a barnstorming pilot.
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| Nancy Harkness |
When Nancy Harkness Love became
director of the U.S. Women's Auxiliary Ferry Squadron in September 1942, she
was only 28 years old. Beginning with her first squadron of women pilots at New
Castle Army Airfield, near Wilmington, Delaware, her responsibilities quickly
grew. Within nine months, she was commanding an additional three squadrons of
WAFS—at Love Field, in Dallas, Texas, Romulus Airbase near Detroit, Michigan,
and at Long Beach Army Airfield in California.
-Excerpts from To Live and Die a WASP.
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| Nancy Harkness Love |
