Viewing page 25 of 124

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

arms just as men did. (2) In Air Forces they developed a great desire to use women in flying assignments, resulting eventually in an appeal from a WAAC officer in an air command headquarters to know if there was any ruling under which she could prohibit the use of a woman radio operator on a training flight during which members of the crew practiced bombing and repulsed imaginary aerial attacks. (1) The principal objector to discontinuing this particular practice turned out to be the WAAC who was taking part in the flights! This school of thought also required women to train the same number of hours a day that men did, forgetting that their clerical assignments made it difficult to withdraw women from offices during the day and that Waacs were doing their own housekeeping, including maintenance of messes (while men ate in consolidated messes run by permanent food services personnel), and were in addition generally doing much of their own laundry, as women so often do. What resulted was often a 16-hour work day.

2. This eagerness on the part of certain commanding officers to qualify their WAAC units in arms, backed by the interest which many women who had loved sports and marksmanship in civilian life felt in the firing of pistols and rifles, resulted in a serious public relations problem for many months. The more conservative parts of the country which were slowest to accept the idea of the necessity of using women in the military services were quick to pounce on any picture of a woman in uniform aiming a pistol, and to say, "You see? What did I

1. As a result AAF issued a directive (AAF Regulation 35-45, 12 November 1943) providing that Wacs would not be placed on flying duties with combat units or in aircraft "normally embraced in the category of combat training." Many Wacs have, however, served as radio operators, etc., on cargo and similar aircraft.

-22-