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A Very Brief History Of Women In The Air Force

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Women in the Air Force Women have contributed to the efforts of every military branch in the United States since 1775. During the Revolutionary War, women worked in military camps as laundresses, cooks, and nurses. Two women served as nurses on the U.S.S. United states during the War of 1812. Women served as hospital administrators, nurses, cooks, and spies during the American Civil War. Some even disguised themselves as men to serve as soldiers. In the last two years of World War I women were allowed to officially join the military for the first time (The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 2008).
The United States Air Force was established as an independent military service on September 18, 1947, but the history of women pilots and early women Airmen dates back to five years earlier. In 1942 the first unit of flight nurses, who had not yet finished their training, was sent to North Africa because the Army Air Corps needed assistance with medical care and air evacuations. The first class of Army Nurse Corps flight nurses …show more content…

Twenty-eight experienced civilian women pilots volunteered to take those ferrying jobs. Those women went on to create the United States’ first female squadron in 1942. Between 1942 and 1944, nearly 2,000 more women learned to fly airplanes in Houston and Sweetwater, Texas. Those female pilots formed two programs, the Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron and the Women’s Flying Training Detachment, which later became the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots. WASP ferried every aircraft in the Army’s arsenal. The women of WASP also towed gunnery targets, transported equipment and non-flying personnel, and flight tested aircraft that had been repaired before the men were allowed to fly them again. For over two years, the program performed a variety of aviation related jobs and served at more than 120 military bases throughout the country

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