During World War II, Texas was flooded with young people training to serve their country in the war. Included in this group were over 1,800 young women pilots from the age of 18 1/2 to 35 who learned to fly the Army way first in Houston then in Sweetwater, Texas. These women came from all walks of life – from college students in West Texas to dancers with the Zeigfield Follies in New York City. They all had two things in common: they loved to fly and they wanted to serve their country. Dr. Katherine Sharp Landdeck, author of The Women With Silver Wings: The Inspiring True Story of the Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II, has spent over thirty years studying and writing about the women. She had the great fortune of knowing many of them and will share stories of their training and their work after graduation including personal anecdotes, inspirational efforts, and even some good old fashioned gossip.
Author of The Women With Silver Wings: The Inspiring True Story of the Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II, Katherine Sharp Landdeck is a Professor of History at Texas Woman’s University, the home of the WASP archives. A Guggenheim Fellow at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, a Normandy Scholar, and a graduate of the University of Tennessee, where she earned her PhD, Landdeck has studied the WASP for over two decades. She is a producer and consultant on several Emmy Award-winning documentaries and has appeared as an expert on NPR’s “Morning Edition,” PBS, the History Channel, and the television series “Mysteries of the Abandoned.” Her work has been published in The Washington Post, The Atlantic, and Time, as well as in numerous academic and aviation publications. Landdeck is a licensed pilot who flies whenever she can.
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