10 Gertrude had applied for the air force fighter pilot school conducted at Brownsville, Texas, but upon graduation from advanced training her orders sent her to the army air base in Pecos, Texas, instead.
She was pleased to be assigned to be a test pilot in AT-6 Texans, the same plane she had flown and adored in advanced training. She loved the power and speed of the little Texan, and she wanted more. She held out hope that soon she would be assigned to fly the fastest single-engine fighter planes, then called pursuit planes. Some of them were three times more powerful than the AT-6.
Other members of her graduating class would tow target banners far behind their planes, providing gunners on the ground with marksmanship practice. Most would be ferrying planes wherever they were needed: bombers to the east and west coasts and trainers to various air bases. Some women would fly transports and light aircraft for military officers. Gertrude embraced her flying life with enthusiasm and was pleased to learn Mickey Axton would join her at Pecos flying AT-6s.
At about this time, Gertrude’s friend Henry Silver, who hadn’t given up on winning her over, told Gertrude that her father wanted Henry to join Smooth-On Company after the war ended. Gertrude was aware from her father’s letters how much Vreeland liked Henry. It felt like her father loved Henry like the son he and Laura had lost in childbirth. But according to Elizabeth, Gertrude may also have felt like Henry was operating behind her back.
A WASP at the controls of an AT-6 Texan. Gertrude was a test pilot of AT-6s after being assigned to Pecos army air base. Courtesy of the WASP Archive, Texas Women’s University Libraries
But Gertrude would have had little time to worry about Henry Silver. Pecos Army Air Base kept her in the air and very busy. Here the men of the air force were being trained to become pilots, and Gertrude’s job as part of Flight 17B was to test aircraft to be sure they were safe. Several times each day she climbed into AT-6s, either new or recently repaired, and put them through their paces. She took off, flew a tight course of turns, then stalled and dived them, testing out various maneuvers and spins.
In 1939 America’s air force had only 2,000 airplanes. By the time of Pearl Harbor’s bombing on December 7, 1941, America was already increasing military aircraft production. In 1942, 47,800 planes were built. In 1943 the number jumped to 86,000. By war’s end in 1945, America had built 296,429 warplanes.
As America assembled a 12 million-man army, the country turned to its corporations. More than 2,700 large cargo ships, called Liberty ships, were built. The record time to construct one, the SS Robert E. Peary, was just four days, 15 hours, and 29 minutes. Chrysler made tanks instead of cars. Ford’s huge Willow Run plant turned out one B-24 Liberator bomber every hour. General Motors built everything from airplanes to machine guns.
For millions of Americans the war was a financial bonanza, providing jobs and money and bringing down the curtain on the Great Depression. It gave rise to women in the workplace, and Rosie the Riveter, the symbol of working factory women during the war, became an American icon.
“If the wings stay on and the engine still runs,” then she would certify it, she told Elizabeth, who was now living in Southern Pines, North Carolina. She had returned to America from Egypt, leaving her husband in his job in the war-torn Middle East.
She was joking with her sister. In truth, Gertrude was diligent in her work. She frequently refused to certify planes that she felt were dangerous. She had flown in too many substandard planes at Sweetwater, and she made a nuisance of herself agitating for new planes for the male student pilots at Pecos.
The dust in Pecos was worse than in Sweetwater, and the base was alive with nearly 5,000 officers, enlisted men, and trainees who took lessons in the planes she tested. About 200 Women’s Army Corps (WAC) administrators and secretaries and another 23 WASPs were the only women on the base.
During their time in Pecos, Gertrude and Mickey took up wearing Ray-Bans, the dark glasses made famous by aviators. They were lucky to get them. The Christmas of 1943 was meager all over America. A rationing system had been put in place by the government. There were no outdoor decorative lights, and tinsel for Christmas tree decorations was unavailable. There were no turkeys or cranberries, and sliced bread was almost impossible to find (the metal used in slicing machines was going to war production). Butter and whipping cream were impossible to buy. Beef and gasoline were sold on the black market. Silk stockings were unavailable. You couldn’t buy elastic anywhere, and Gertrude was glad she still had silk underwear from before the war. Bobby pins were gone. Radios had virtually disappeared from the shelves. Metal, rubber, chemicals, and food were all going overseas to help fight the war.
Although she was busy, and good at her work, Gertrude’s stay at Pecos seemed interminable because she anticipated being reassigned. Each morning in the mess hall there was war talk. Big news came on June 6, 1944, when the invasion of France by Allied troops—D-day—was announced. Many thought the war would be over by Christmas. Gertrude must have wondered what that meant for her future.
During the Depression, 19 out of 20 books cost $2 or more and were too expensive for most Americans. In 1939 Pocket Books and Penguin Books introduced paperback titles at 25 cents a book.
In the middle of World War II, in 1943, publishers decided to practically give away 122 million paperback books to American military men and women with the idea of enlarging the reading market. The proposal by the Council of Books in Wartime to sell paperbacks to the military for six cents each initially worried some publishers. The military then gave them free to fighting units all over the world.
America embraced the paperback, and today it provides the single most popular form of book reading.