The Armchair Pilot, by Sherri L. Smith

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I recently did an interview in which I was asked if I had flown any of the planes in Flygirl. I still chuckle to think of it. I’m a writer, not a pilot. Now, it’s true that California is dotted with small airfields offering a chance to fly in a real World War II bomber or other vintage plane—I know someone who did it for their birthday. It’s just not me. I’m kind of a scaredy-cat when it comes to small planes, or anything with the word “vintage” in front of it that’s supposed to hold me up in the air. I have flown in a little Cessna with nothing but me, some frozen halibut, a pilot and a co-pilot in the sky, but those other two people are the minimum mandatory personnel I need to get me into the air. (The fish is optional.) Peanuts and a movie for me, I say. So then, how did I convincingly capture the joy of flight and the skills of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP)? Research, my friends, lots and lots of research.

For starters, I read several books about the WASP and the planes they flew. Their love of flying is in the details, in how well they know the equipment beneath their hands, their willingness to leave the safety of more “acceptable” women’s roles, and danger they were prepared to face. Thirty-eight WASP and trainees were killed while serving their nation. After the books, I trolled the internet and found a wealth of photographs and even schematics for some of the planes. More books from the library confirmed what the web had shown me. So, there were the technical details of piloting these planes. I also went to the Palm Springs Air Museum and poured over their World War II exhibit. From the B-17 bomber to the P-51 Mustang, it was a great opportunity to get up close and personal to some of the planes the WASP learned to fly. Armchair research can only get you so far, though. I had reconstructed the experience in an almost clinical way, but what I really wanted to know was-- how did it feel?

Cut to the writer as investigative reporter: I remember standing at the bar during a friend’s wedding reception and asking one of the groomsmen—a helicopter pilot for the U.S. military—that exact question. Unfortunately, he was the stoic, silent type and had a hard time putting it into words, but he did mention the feeling of power he got while flying, both from his control of the equipment and command of the wind. Maybe not in so many poetic words, but I got the picture. And it reminded me of something I had almost forgotten.

Like Ida Mae in the book, once upon a time, my father also wanted to fly. When I was 14 or so, he started taking lessons. One day, he took me and my brother to the airfield for a chance to climb around the Piper Cub he was learning to fly. Apparently, he had wanted to fly ever since he was a kid. (The need for glasses kept him from flying when he was drafted into the military.) He used to quote a poem he had heard while flying on business—recited by a commercial airline pilot over the loudspeaker as the jet soared over the Grand Canyon. The poem is called “High Flight” and it was written in 1941 by John Gillespie Magee, Jr., an American pilot who joined the Canadian Air Force because the United States was determined to stay out of the Second World War. The first two lines, “Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth/ And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings…” give a pretty good impression of what it feels like to fly. At least, that’s the way Ida Mae Jones feels about it, thanks to my father, a helicopter pilot, and a this poet with a determination to do his part to end the war. Not a bad set of role models, if you ask me.

Based on that one interview question, it seems that I’ve drawn a clear enough picture of what it’s like to fly these planes that you don’t actually have to go do it yourself. Find a comfortable chair and flip to the first page of Flygirl. With luck, you’ll be flying high in no time. If not, there’s always an airfield in California with a vintage bomber, waiting to take you up…

Sherri L. Smith, Flygirl, Putnam Juvenile, Penguin Books