Cornelia Fort: Aviator

There was nothing about Cornelia Fort’s childhood and privileged upbringing that would have set the stage for her to become an aviation pioneer. Her father was a founder of the National Life and Accident Insurance Company in Tennessee and her mother, a socialite. The family, which included four sons and two daughters, was wealthy, respected and well connected.

Fort lived in a 24-room mansion on a large estate called Fortland. She attended private schools and like other girls in her social circle, was expected to be a debutante, on the way to marriage. Flying airplanes was never in the picture. In fact, her father disapproved of airplanes so much that he refused to let his sons learn to fly. But Cornelia Fort had a rebellious streak that began surfacing as a teenager. In 1936, she attended the Ogontz School for Young Ladies in Pennsylvania, coincidentally, the same boarding school that Amelia Earhart attended years earlier. Like Earhart, Fort was not happy there and complained about the school’s “gray and oppressive” atmosphere. She wanted out and convinced her father to let her transfer to Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York. The contrast between the two schools could not have been more different. Sarah Lawrence was a better fit for Fort’s independent spirit and interests. She studied literature and writing, joined multiple clubs and became an editor of the campus newspaper.

After graduation in 1939, Fort returned home to Nashville and fell back into the city’s high society scene. In January 1940, a friend who happened to be a flight instructor, offered to take her for a ride in his single engine plane. It was a ride that changed her life forever. She fell in love with flying instantly and wanted to take lessons right away. From all accounts, she was a natural in the cockpit and within a month she was flying solo.

In March, 1940, shortly after her first lesson, her father, who was not aware of her flying lessons, suddenly fell ill and died. After his death, Fort’s passion for flying quickly became the focus of her life. By the end of the year, she had enough hours to acquire both her private and commercial pilot licenses. And by Spring 1941, she earned an instructor’s rating, becoming the first female flight instructor in the state.

Fully qualified as an instructor, she was hired to teach at the Civilian Pilot Training Program in Fort Collins, Colorado. She was apparently the only female instructor there. When she arrived for work, the administrators said they thought they had hired a man. The program, run through colleges and universities, was aimed at students with an eye toward military preparedness for America’s potential involvement in the war in Europe. In the Fall of 1941, Fort moved closer to the action when the Andrew Flying Service in Honolulu offered her a job teaching defense workers, soldiers and sailors to fly in Hawaii. It was a job she loved, calling it “the best job I can have (unless the national emergency creates a still better one).” She described the planes as “big and fast and better suited for advanced flying.”

On the morning of Sunday, December 7, Fort and her student, Ernest Suomala, were wrapping up a flying lesson when suddenly a fast-moving plane appeared in their flight path. “It was in violation of air traffic rules,” she recalled later. “I waited for it to give way…and when it didn’t, I jerked the stick out of the student’s hand and pulled the plane up.” In shock over the close call, they didn’t realize the plane was a Japanese Zero until they looked out the window and saw the red sun on the side of the plane as it passed under them. Pearl Harbor was soon engulfed in black smoke as bombs rained down from Japanese planes. Fort managed to land the plane in a spray of gunfire and she and Ernest ran for cover.

She wrote in her logbook: “Flight interrupted by Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. An enemy airplane shot at my airplane and missed and proceeded to strafe John Rodgers, a civilian airport. Another airplane machine gunned the ground in front of me as I taxied back to the hangar.”

Pearl Harbor pushed the United States into World War II and temporarily derailed Fort’s flying career. While she became a celebrity because of her close call in the sky when she returned home to Nashville, she wanted to do more than give interviews about her experience and promote the sale of war bonds. Over the next few months, as the need for male pilots grew more intense, a fight raged within the military about using women pilots to take over non-combat duties. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt promoted the idea, but many generals opposed it, arguing that women weren’t strong enough to fly military planes or didn’t have the required experience.

But by late 1942, with men heading into battle overseas, the Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron was formed with the Army’s blessing. The WAFS, led by Nancy Love, would later become the Woman Air Force Service Pilots (WASPS). Members would ferry military planes from factories to airbases, flight test them and serve as flight instructors. These skilled female pilots freed up men to fight in the war. Fort was the second woman to join the WAFS and was assigned to work out of Long Beach, California.

Because the new planes had never been tested in the air before, Fort often was flying bare bones open cockpit planes. There was no radio communication and she had to navigate using landmarks for guidance. It was dangerous, but Fort loved it and was proud to be contributing to the war effort.

In March 1943, as she was guiding six planes from Long Beach to Love Field in Texas, one of the other planes piloted by a male officer with less than 300 hours flying experience, collided into Fort’s plane. Whether it was due to his inexperience or deliberate, Fort died in the crash. At 24, she became the first woman pilot in American history to die on active duty. She was buried in Nashville.

By war’s end 37. other WASPs would give their lives in the service of their country. Overall, the WASPs would transport 12,000 planes over 60 million miles, freeing more than 1,100 men to fight in Europe. Their skill and bravery proved their male doubters wrong.

Fearless, brilliant and bold, Cornelia Fort was among the most remarkable women in the history of aviation.

©2023 Alice Look
Co-founder, Remarkable Women Project.org
Executive Producer, Remarkable Women Project