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Women's Auxilliary Ferrying Squadron (WAFS)

About the Women's Auxilliary Ferrying Squadron
In the Spring of 1942 the toll of war was being felt through all levels of society and the shortages of men, supplies, and equipment were commonplace. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Major William H. Tunner, headof the newly created Air Transport Command (ATC), saw most of his qualified pilots transferred to combat positions. New military aircraft, fresh off the assembly line, were sittting on runways without pilots to fly them to military bases and transport ships where they were needed.


Nancy Love, Leader of the WAFS and later, Executive Director of the WASP in the ATC

In May of 1940, twenty-six year old Nancy Harkness Love wrote general Bob Olds, Major Tunner's superior, with a plan to use women pilots to ferry planes in the ATC. At first the idea of using women pilots was dismissed but in 1942, as the shortage of women pilots became acute, General Olds decided the time was right to put Love's plan into action. Most of his colleges, including Major Tunner, were skeptical or flatly believed that women were incapable of flying military aircraft.
In September of 1942, Nancy Love was appointed as the director of the Women's Auxiliary Flying Squadron (WAFS) under Major Tunner and given a chance to prove the skeptics wrong. Nancy initially sent telegrams out to eighty-three of America's best women pilots recruiting them as civilian pilots serving in the Ferry Command. The women had to be between twenty-one and thirty-five, have logged at least 500 hours in the air, hold a commercial license, a 200-horsepower engine rating, and have recent cross-country flying experience. Twenty-seven women met these rigorous standards and answered the call to serve their country during wartime.


WAFS Betty Gillies seated in the cockpit of a PT-19. Nancy Love standing on the wing



WAFS Evelyn Sharp stepping into
the cockpit of a pursuit aircraft

 These twenty-eight women, "The Originals" as they would come to call themselves, began ferrying light aircraft and primary trainers such as Stearmans and PT-19 Fairchilds. They quickly went on to check-out in larger aircraft including pursuit planes such as the P-38 and P-51. The WAFS merged with Jackie Cochran's program, the Womens Flying Training Detachment (WFTD) in 1943 to become the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP). Collectively these women surpassed all expectations and proved that women could fly military aircraft with as much sill and competency as their male counterparts.



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