On this day in 1916, a future aviation heroine is born. Violet (“Vi”) Thurn Cowden is best known for her service in the Women Airforce Service Pilots [WASPs] during World War II.
Vi grew up on a small South Dakota farm and would later remember her early fascination with flight. As a young girl, she’d watched a hawk swoop down to grab a chicken. Vi knew instantly: “I wanted to fly like that.”
She grew older and became a teacher, but she still longed to fly. She soon convinced a pilot to give her lessons. “[I had to] ride my bike six miles out to the airport for class in the morning,” she chuckled. “And thank goodness it was downhill on the way back. And the little kids [at school] would say, ‘You flew today.’ And I said, ‘Well, how do you know?’ They said, ‘Well, you’re so happy.’”
Vi was a licensed pilot when the Japanese struck at Pearl Harbor. She tried to join the Civil Air Patrol, but it didn’t work. She finally got her chance when the WASPs was formed.
“[W]hat better way to serve my country than to fly and do the thing that I love most,” she explained, “and I didn’t have to pay for the gas.”
Joining the WASPs proved challenging. Vi was too short, but she solved that problem with a creative hair arrangement atop her head. The bigger challenge was her weight: She weighed 92 pounds, and she needed to weigh 100. She spent a week overeating, then stuffed herself full of bananas and milk at the last minute.
The doctor asked how she managed to gain so much so fast. She told him: “Look: Just visualize this: little skinny arms, little skinny legs, and a big tummy!”
Either way, Vi was in, and she earned her WASP silver wings in March 1943. It was quite a feat. More than 25,000 women had applied for the WASPs. Of those, 1,879 candidates were accepted, but only 1,074 successfully completed training.
The women in WASPs flew every type of plane that the Army Air Forces owned, including fighter planes and heavy bombers. They made test flights and transported cargo. They towed targets while the men practiced. They were even flight instructors. As they performed these domestic tasks, they freed up more men for combat.
Nevertheless, Vi enjoyed flying the P-51 Mustang the most, later calling it “the love of my life.”
She one time raced a Navy pilot from Ohio to New Jersey, reaching top speeds of 400 mph. “I just stayed ahead of him all the way,” she chuckled. She delivered a P-51 to the Tuskegee Airmen. On another occasion, she was landing a plane in Long Beach when it caught fire. She grabbed important paperwork from the plane, but later joked that she couldn’t forget her make-up. She’d stuffed it in a sock, so she grabbed the sock before hustling out of the plane. “That’s the girl in me,” she smiled.
By her own estimate, Vi believes that she logged enough miles to wrap around the globe 55 times.
The WASPs were deactivated late in 1944. “The war was winding down,” Vi explained, “and the men were coming back and wanted their jobs back. I felt a lot of resentment.”
All this time, the WASPs had been considered civilians, not members of the military, but this changed in 1977 when the women were given retroactive veteran status. They were further recognized in 2010 when about 200 surviving WASP veterans were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.
Maybe you won’t be surprised to hear that Vi did not quit flying, even after the WASPs disbanded. As late as 2010, a 93-year-old Vi co-piloted a P-51 Mustang that had been modified with dual controls.
“I always say the worst thing about flying is coming back to earth,” Vi concluded. “That’s the hardest thing for me. I would stay up, I would—but you do run out of gas.”
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Primary Sources :
Interview with Violet Cowden (Aug. 15, 2003) (transcript and audio HERE)
Violet Cowden dies at 94; civilian WASP aviator during World War II (L.A. Times; Apr. 17, 2011)
Veteran of the Day: Violet Clara Thurn Cowden (U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs)
Violet Cowden, 1916–2011: The female aviator who longed to return to the sky (The Week; Jan. 8, 2015)
Margalit Fox, Violet Cowden, 94, piloted military planes in WWII (Boston Globe; Apr. 26, 2011) (p. B14)
Eagles Honored at Maxwell AFB (Montgomery Advertiser; June 5, 2010) (p. 1A)