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One Saturday morning, the hangar phone rang and Col Dick Harper answered it. Helen Hall explained that her mother had been a WASP (Women's Airforce Service Pilot) in 1944, and had mentioned that she wished that she could fly in an AT-6 again. Helen had searched from Missouri to Virginia to Florida, but had no luck. Someone suggested that she check with the CAF, and after visiting the West Houston Squadron website, she gave us a call. Dick responded, "You have the right place, the right plane, and the right pilot." Having flown with WASPs during his WWII service, Dick holds them in great respect and was more than willing to fly with a WASP again. And Dick needs absolutely no excuse to take the AT-6 up. During WWII, Dorothy Lucas (then Dorothy Smith) was a secretary in Gen. Hap Arnold's office in the Pentagon. A friend of hers talked her into signing up for the WASPs. Candidate WASPs had to have their private pilots licenses before entering the program, so Dorothy and Margaret began training for their pilots licenses. Since civilian aircraft where prohibited within 50 miles of Washington, D.C., during the war, they had to travel to outlying airports (usually Frederick, Md.) for their flight training. Once they received their licenses, they were ready to become WASPs. However, Margaret's parents were having second thoughts about their daughter's safety, and they asked her not to join up. Margaret complied with her parents' request, and so Dorothy headed off to Avenger Field in Sweetwater, Texas, alone. Margaret went on to become an airline stewardess after the war, and ironically was killed in an airliner crash a few years later. At Avenger Field, Dorothy joined Class 44-W-7 and began her WASP training. First came the PT-17 "Kaydet", followed by a brief transition course in the AT-6. This was followed by instrument training in BT-13s, and finally advanced training in the AT-6. During her training at Avenger Field, she received a call from her brother Courtland, who was in the Navy. He told her that her other brother, Mason, a B-17 navigator, had been killed when his aircraft crashed on a ferry flight overseas. Though devastated by the news, she flew her regular training schedule that day, and credits her instructor for support and a little extra 'stick time' to help her work through the tragedy.
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