Remembering WASP Kay Gott Chaffey
Class 43-W-2
Thank you dear lady.
(18 July 1920 – 21 August 2017)
Eyes of a veteran
by Bill Miller for the Mail Tribune
November 11, 2019
Kay found her final rest just over a year ago in Arlington
National Cemetery.
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| WASP Kay Gott Chaffey's Funeral-Arlington National Cemetery |
Kay Gott Chaffey served for over two years as a WASP pilot
during WWII. She and 1,073 other women learned to control the latest military
aircraft, including bombers and fighters, flying over 60 million miles on
various missions for the U.S. Army Air Corps.
Although they could not fly combat and were restricted to
the United States, the women flew the very same missions that thousands of male
Army officers were flying at the same time — and doing it under military
discipline for less pay, without military benefits, no insurance, and even
having to pay for their own meals and lodging.
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| WASP Kay Gott Chaffey |
The WASPs (Women Airforce Service Pilots) had been promised
a commission in the Army, but Congress refused to approve it, so the women flew
as civilians, never receiving their veteran status until 1977.
I was lucky and honored to meet Kay just a year before she
died at age 98. I was giving a talk about the WASP at the Medford library and,
arriving early for setup, I found a smiling woman with sparkling eyes already
sitting in the front row. We began to talk.
Five weeks earlier, Kay had fallen and severely injured a
leg. All that time, she was marooned at her Rogue Valley Manor home. When she
heard of my talk, she insisted friends bring her. I suspect she not only wanted
to share her experiences, she also needed to see if I knew what I was talking
about.
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| WASP Kay Gott Chaffey |
During the war, when men called women girls, some wondered
why a woman would volunteer for such dangerous duty when she could have stayed
safely at home. Kay laughed at that.
“There was a war on and someone needed that airplane if we
were to win that war,” she said. “We did serve, and we served our country
well.”
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| The only woman in her Civilian Pilot Training class, WASP Kay Gott Chaffey |
Kay learned to fly in the federally funded Civilian Pilot
Training Program at the College of Idaho. The government aimed to train pilots
just in case the U.S. was pulled into the European war. Kay was lucky. For
every 10 students in a class, only one could be a woman. Kay was that woman.
While studying for a commercial pilot license, she applied
to the newly formed WASP program and, on Dec. 13, 1942, began her training in
the program’s second class. It was the same training given to male aviation
cadets — six months of flying, marching, calisthenics and classroom studies of
navigation, Morse code and military law.
“My job was to move airplanes,” she said.
Kay flew 17 types of aircraft from coast to coast, including
the P-51 fighter and the B-25 bomber.
“The danger was no less because a woman was flying versus a
man flying,” Kay said.
She was flying just behind Portland WASP Hazel Lee at Great
Falls, Montana, when Lee’s plane was struck by a male pilot’s plane, killing
Lee in a flaming crash.
Kay lived an energetic life with gusto. She flew
relief for
the Red Cross and others during the 1964 flood, graduated from the University
of Oregon with a master’s degree, taught dance and physical education for 32
years at Humboldt State University in California, and wrote three books — two
about the WASP.
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| Former WASP Kay Gott Chaffey Dances at Humboldt State University |
When my WASP talk was over, I looked over at Kay and
cautiously asked, “How’d I do?”
I’ll always remember her big thumbs up, the smile on her
lips, her infectious laugh, her shout of “Great!” — and those sparkling eyes.
Thank you, Kay. And thank you for your service.
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| WASP Kay Gott Chaffey |
RIP
Writer Bill Miller is the author of “To Live and Die a WASP,
38 Women Pilots Who Died in WWII.” Reach him at newsmiller@live.com.
