They were crop dusters and debutantes, college girls and performers in flying circuses – all trained as pilots. And because they were women, they were denied the opportunity to fly for their country during WWII. But Great Britain, desperately fighting for survival, would let nearly any pilot transport warplanes – even American women.
In her latest book, Spitfires: The American Women Who Flew in the Face of Danger During World War II, Becky Aikman tells the story of 25 daring young aviators who travelled to England in 1942, becoming the first American women to command military aircraft. These “spitfires,” as they became known, lived like women far ahead of their time, risking their lives in one of the deadliest jobs of the war, flying barely-tested fighters and bombers to air bases and returning shot-up wrecks for repair.
Becky Aikman is the author of Saturday Night Widows and Off the Cliff: How the Making of Thelma & Louise Drove Hollywood to the Edge. Her work has appeared in Newsday, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, among other publications.
