Free Women Aviators by Karen Bush Gibson Page A

Thankfully, she had goggles on, as a lot of dirt and even a couple of dead mice rained upon her face. But Edna didn’t quit. She kept trying and worked up to 38 loops.
    In 1915, the Stinson family opened the Stinson School for Aviation at San Antonio’s Kelly Field. They trained pilots for the US Army and Canada’s Royal Flying Corps. Perhaps as a nod to Katherine’s nickname, people began calling Marjorie “the Flying Schoolmarm” until 1918, when the school closed.
    During World War I, Katherine participated in fund-raising tours for the Red Cross and drove an ambulance in Europe. A bad case of influenza weakened her health and ended her aviation career. Marjorie changed careers in 1928 and became a draftsman for the Aeronautical Division of the US Navy.

    Katherine Stinson.
Courtesy of Chicago Daily News negatives collection, Chicago History Museum
    After transferring to the US Naval Hospital in Washington, DC, Edna entered an air race that offered $300 to the winner. Although she won the otherwise all-male race, she noticed the group of male officials huddled together. She figured they were trying to find a way to disqualify her. Two other pilots stepped up and told the judges that she had won fair and square. The race was advertised the next year with a sign that said, MEN ONLY.
    Edna’s mother, now recuperated from her bout with tuberculosis, saw an article in the newspaper about her daughter, “the Flying Nurse.” She sent for Edna and promised to puther through medical school (another ambition of Edna’s) if she would quit flying. Edna tried, but she just couldn’t stay away from flying. Knowing she wouldn’t be happy unless she was flying fulltime, Edna lost her mother’s financial support and resigned from the navy in 1935. Years later, her mother enjoyed taking flights with her daughter and even served as copilot for about five races while in her 80s.
    Edna approached commercial airlines, such as Chicago and Southern Air Lines and Braniff International Airways, for a job as a pilot. They were hiring her students, so why not hire her when she had ten times as many hours? One airline refused her for being too short, even though she was half an inch taller than a student of hers whom it did hire.
    Finally, the man at Braniff asked, “Do you think people will get on an airplane if they see a woman as the pilot?”
    â€œI don’t know why not,” she answered. “People get on my planes all the time.”
    â€œWell, I’m sure it hurt business. The interview is over.”
    Moving to New Orleans, Edna started a flight school, Air College Inc., and taught students how to fly for the airlines. When World War II arrived, she sold her school to the US Navy and went to Fort Worth, Texas, to get instrument ratings. At the end of her career, she had eight pilot ratings. She volunteered to fly for her country. Not surprisingly, she was turned down. However, the government did ask her to train male fighter pilots at Meacham Field in Texas. Her knowledge of aerobatics came in handy, because military pilots needed to know how to evade the enemy with tricky maneuvers.
    When military pilot training was discontinued in February 1944, Edna fell back on her nursing skills and left the United States to work in an army hospital in the Philippines. Again, shelooked for any opportunity to fly. She was recognized for flying injured soldiers out in B-25s.
    After the war, Edna started another flight school, Aero Enterprises, in Fort Worth. It began as a flight training school for veterans coming back from the war. One of the flight instructors she hired was George Whyte. They fell in love and married when Edna was 43. When not teaching, she continued to enter the occasional contest. She won the Women’s International Air Race in 1953. The Whytes continued to run Aero Enterprises but often talked about building their own airport.
    George died before they could