![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I’ve been a Women in Aviation International member for fifteen years, and for the first time this year I attended a WAI Annual Conference. I confess: I did it in my Author Hat and not in my Pilot Hat.
In our recent non-fiction book American Wings: Chicago’s Pioneering Black Aviators and the Race for Equality in the Sky, my co-author Sherri L. Smith and I told the story of Willa Brown Chappell and Janet Harmon Waterford Bragg, who learned to fly in the 1930s. These two amazing Black women ran integrated flight schools, pushed for the integration of civil and military aviation in the United States, and helped train the pilots who eventually became the Tuskegee Airmen, the only Black Americans who flew in combat in World War II.
Urged by Liz Booker, retired U.S. Coast Guard helicopter pilot and a writer herself – Liz runs the “Literary Aviatrix” book club and writers’ group (https://literaryaviatrix.com/) – Sherri and I nominated Willa Brown and Janet Bragg to the WAI Pioneer Hall of Fame, hoping that the honors would be awarded at this year’s annual conference.
Liz Booker, "The Literary Aviatrix," at the Authors Connect bookstore at the WAI conference
Our nominations were accepted, and Liz organized an education session at the conference designed to highlight the nominations, in a panel event entitled “The Race for Equality in the Sky.” The session showcased Janet Bragg and Willa Brown, as well as Bessie Coleman, who in 1921 became the first Black American woman to earn an international pilot’s license.
Liz with a carload of authors and pilots!
It was hands-down the most electrifying and well-received panel event I’ve ever had the good fortune to participate in. Sherri and I spoke to an absolutely packed audience of 250 attendees - standing room only, the most diverse and enthusiastic group I’ve ever addressed. Joining us on the panel were Bessie Coleman’s great-niece Gigi Coleman and Beth Powell, a 737 captain who grew up in Jamaica and who is Gigi’s co-author on Queen of the Skies, a fictional biography of Bessie Coleman.
The panel was moderated by WAI’s third Pioneer Hall of Fame inductee for 2025, Theresa Claiborne, the first Black woman to fly in the US Air Force. Theresa is founder of Sisters of the Skies (https://sistersoftheskies.org/), a program dedicated to diversifying aviation, and she’s a powerhouse of aviation advocacy. She’s also an eloquent and captivating speaker in her own right, and it was humbling and invigorating to participate in this hugely popular panel discussion.
In the Q&A that followed the event, an audience member asked anxiously for advice on how to remain hopeful and inspired when battling rampant and insidious institutional injustice.
Beth Powell’s answer was worth remembering: “If you feel like quitting some days, don’t quit. Rest.”
Apart from this panel discussion, the International Reception on the first full day of the conference, and the Pioneer Hall of Fame Banquet on the last evening, I didn’t manage to get to a single organized event. I was so busy talking to people and signing books with Sherri!
Authors Connect authors, pilots and volunteers
Liz Booker’s “Authors Connect” bookstore acted as a hub and meeting point, and I was astonished at how many people I ran into with whom I’d crossed paths before, many of them pilots-turned-writers: Janna Greenhalgh, a long-time fan of my books who’s currently cloud-seeding and firefighting in the air; Cady Coleman, my astronaut friend who lived for six months on the International Space Station (!); Erin Miller, who fought for years for the right to inter her grandmother, one of the Women’s Airforce Service Pilot’s, in Arlington Cemetery; Sue Tuddenham, whom I’d last encountered at the Sywell Air Show in England when she was towing gliders out of West Wycombe to build hours, and who is now flying business jets; Melinda Viteri, who worked with me fifteen years ago on a joint Ninety-Nines and WAI “Concorde” chapter newsletter (encompassing Britain and France); Lola Reid Allin, the Canadian pilot author of Highway to the Sky; Maaike Lustenhouwer, a Dutch aviation lawyer who’s an avid reader in the Literary Aviatrix book group; Janet Patton, a 777 captain for American Airlines, whose Piper Warrior G-EVIE my husband and I have become involved with in Scotland; and Suzy Morgan, a 777 captain for British Airways who’s also a Literary Aviatrix book club fan.
It felt like one of the coolest achievements of my life to be able to introduce two women who are Boeing 777 captains to each other – it hadn’t ever occurred to me that I KNOW two women who are 777 captains!
Pilots and authors: Melinda Viteri, Sue Tuddenham, Janet Patton, E Wein, and Tracey Curtis-Taylor
Erin Miller and E Wein
Boeing 777 captains Janet Patton (American Airlines) and Suzy Morgan (British Airways)
But equally thrilling was meeting and being able to talk to David Brown and Shanel Brown Jones, Willa Brown’s nephew and great-niece, and the Clarence Harpers – III and IV – Janet Bragg’s nephew and great-nephew.
WAI Pioneer Hall of Fame family members Clarence Harper III and Clarence Harper IV (nephew and great-nephew of Janet Harmon Waterford Bragg), and Shanel Brown Jones and David Brown, great-niece and nephew of Willa Brown Chappell
It was amazing to speak to people who had personal memories of our Pioneer Hall of Fame nominees, and the highlight of the entire conference was hearing their acceptance speeches – and then hearing Theresa Claiborne’s, as she acknowledged the legacy that these groundbreaking women from the Golden Age of Flight had passed down to her.
“These women didn’t just dream of aviation,” Theresa said; “they built runways to help us take off.”
Theresa Claiborne accepts her WAI Pioneer Hall of Fame nomination
She also exhorted us to continue to support and insist on diversity in aviation. Her message was forceful: “Representation isn’t just about being seen, it’s about ensuring that no dream is forced to wait.”
It was an honor and yet so humbling for Sherri and I to feel that now, by our own involvement, we’d become part of the story we told in American Wings – that we’d helped to raise awareness of the amazing people who inspired us, particularly at a time when it feels urgently important to keep their memory and legacy alive.
But it takes a village! So many people came together to make this event happen, and to share this legacy. We’d never have thought to put forward that nomination if Liz Booker hadn’t suggested it, and organized the education session. Having Theresa Claiborne as our panel moderator no doubt was a huge draw and major contributor to our session’s success. And of course – we wouldn’t be here without the pioneering efforts of Willa Brown and Janet Bragg themselves.
Sherri L. Smith and E. Wein in our Pioneer Hall of Fame banquet duds!
With Janet Bragg's relatives...
... and with Willa Brown's!
Not to mention Bessie Coleman, the woman who first tore down the barriers of race and gender to open the sky to all.
E. Wein and Sherri L. Smith posing with Courtney Wilson, student pilot and Bessie Coleman lookalike
In our recent non-fiction book American Wings: Chicago’s Pioneering Black Aviators and the Race for Equality in the Sky, my co-author Sherri L. Smith and I told the story of Willa Brown Chappell and Janet Harmon Waterford Bragg, who learned to fly in the 1930s. These two amazing Black women ran integrated flight schools, pushed for the integration of civil and military aviation in the United States, and helped train the pilots who eventually became the Tuskegee Airmen, the only Black Americans who flew in combat in World War II.
Urged by Liz Booker, retired U.S. Coast Guard helicopter pilot and a writer herself – Liz runs the “Literary Aviatrix” book club and writers’ group (https://literaryaviatrix.com/) – Sherri and I nominated Willa Brown and Janet Bragg to the WAI Pioneer Hall of Fame, hoping that the honors would be awarded at this year’s annual conference.
Liz Booker, "The Literary Aviatrix," at the Authors Connect bookstore at the WAI conference
Our nominations were accepted, and Liz organized an education session at the conference designed to highlight the nominations, in a panel event entitled “The Race for Equality in the Sky.” The session showcased Janet Bragg and Willa Brown, as well as Bessie Coleman, who in 1921 became the first Black American woman to earn an international pilot’s license.
Liz with a carload of authors and pilots!
It was hands-down the most electrifying and well-received panel event I’ve ever had the good fortune to participate in. Sherri and I spoke to an absolutely packed audience of 250 attendees - standing room only, the most diverse and enthusiastic group I’ve ever addressed. Joining us on the panel were Bessie Coleman’s great-niece Gigi Coleman and Beth Powell, a 737 captain who grew up in Jamaica and who is Gigi’s co-author on Queen of the Skies, a fictional biography of Bessie Coleman.
The panel was moderated by WAI’s third Pioneer Hall of Fame inductee for 2025, Theresa Claiborne, the first Black woman to fly in the US Air Force. Theresa is founder of Sisters of the Skies (https://sistersoftheskies.org/), a program dedicated to diversifying aviation, and she’s a powerhouse of aviation advocacy. She’s also an eloquent and captivating speaker in her own right, and it was humbling and invigorating to participate in this hugely popular panel discussion.
In the Q&A that followed the event, an audience member asked anxiously for advice on how to remain hopeful and inspired when battling rampant and insidious institutional injustice.
Beth Powell’s answer was worth remembering: “If you feel like quitting some days, don’t quit. Rest.”
Apart from this panel discussion, the International Reception on the first full day of the conference, and the Pioneer Hall of Fame Banquet on the last evening, I didn’t manage to get to a single organized event. I was so busy talking to people and signing books with Sherri!
Authors Connect authors, pilots and volunteers
Liz Booker’s “Authors Connect” bookstore acted as a hub and meeting point, and I was astonished at how many people I ran into with whom I’d crossed paths before, many of them pilots-turned-writers: Janna Greenhalgh, a long-time fan of my books who’s currently cloud-seeding and firefighting in the air; Cady Coleman, my astronaut friend who lived for six months on the International Space Station (!); Erin Miller, who fought for years for the right to inter her grandmother, one of the Women’s Airforce Service Pilot’s, in Arlington Cemetery; Sue Tuddenham, whom I’d last encountered at the Sywell Air Show in England when she was towing gliders out of West Wycombe to build hours, and who is now flying business jets; Melinda Viteri, who worked with me fifteen years ago on a joint Ninety-Nines and WAI “Concorde” chapter newsletter (encompassing Britain and France); Lola Reid Allin, the Canadian pilot author of Highway to the Sky; Maaike Lustenhouwer, a Dutch aviation lawyer who’s an avid reader in the Literary Aviatrix book group; Janet Patton, a 777 captain for American Airlines, whose Piper Warrior G-EVIE my husband and I have become involved with in Scotland; and Suzy Morgan, a 777 captain for British Airways who’s also a Literary Aviatrix book club fan.
It felt like one of the coolest achievements of my life to be able to introduce two women who are Boeing 777 captains to each other – it hadn’t ever occurred to me that I KNOW two women who are 777 captains!
Pilots and authors: Melinda Viteri, Sue Tuddenham, Janet Patton, E Wein, and Tracey Curtis-Taylor
Erin Miller and E Wein
Boeing 777 captains Janet Patton (American Airlines) and Suzy Morgan (British Airways)
But equally thrilling was meeting and being able to talk to David Brown and Shanel Brown Jones, Willa Brown’s nephew and great-niece, and the Clarence Harpers – III and IV – Janet Bragg’s nephew and great-nephew.
WAI Pioneer Hall of Fame family members Clarence Harper III and Clarence Harper IV (nephew and great-nephew of Janet Harmon Waterford Bragg), and Shanel Brown Jones and David Brown, great-niece and nephew of Willa Brown Chappell
It was amazing to speak to people who had personal memories of our Pioneer Hall of Fame nominees, and the highlight of the entire conference was hearing their acceptance speeches – and then hearing Theresa Claiborne’s, as she acknowledged the legacy that these groundbreaking women from the Golden Age of Flight had passed down to her.
“These women didn’t just dream of aviation,” Theresa said; “they built runways to help us take off.”
Theresa Claiborne accepts her WAI Pioneer Hall of Fame nomination
She also exhorted us to continue to support and insist on diversity in aviation. Her message was forceful: “Representation isn’t just about being seen, it’s about ensuring that no dream is forced to wait.”
It was an honor and yet so humbling for Sherri and I to feel that now, by our own involvement, we’d become part of the story we told in American Wings – that we’d helped to raise awareness of the amazing people who inspired us, particularly at a time when it feels urgently important to keep their memory and legacy alive.
But it takes a village! So many people came together to make this event happen, and to share this legacy. We’d never have thought to put forward that nomination if Liz Booker hadn’t suggested it, and organized the education session. Having Theresa Claiborne as our panel moderator no doubt was a huge draw and major contributor to our session’s success. And of course – we wouldn’t be here without the pioneering efforts of Willa Brown and Janet Bragg themselves.
Sherri L. Smith and E. Wein in our Pioneer Hall of Fame banquet duds!
With Janet Bragg's relatives...
... and with Willa Brown's!
Not to mention Bessie Coleman, the woman who first tore down the barriers of race and gender to open the sky to all.
E. Wein and Sherri L. Smith posing with Courtney Wilson, student pilot and Bessie Coleman lookalike
Ringing down at St. Mark's Cathedral, Shreveport
