Mary Helen Foster

Mary Helen Crane Foster (born c. 1921 in Quero, Texas) was a World War II military pilot and later a librarian.

Mary Helen Crane grew up in San Antonio, Texas and was working at the General Depot there when the United States declared war in 1941. After observing flight training in Corpus Christi she became interested in learning to be a pilot. She began taking lessons and responded to a newspaper advertisement for what became the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) program, headed by aviator Jacqueline Cochrane.

Foster trained for seven months on the Vultee BT-13A and the Fairchild before earning her wings. She was deployed to Malden Army Air Field in Missouri where she was the only female pilot. With WASPs approved for stateside missions she flew maintenance test flights, ferry service and utility mission, primarily on BT-13s and C-47s. Just before the end of the war she was offered the use of the unit's craft to earn her civil instrument and commercial ratings.

With no piloting jobs available in military or civilian service after the war, Foster took a job as private secretary to the dean of women at Southwest Texas State University and later worked as a librarian in Dickinson and Houston, Texas. She and her husband raised five children.

Foster and her fellow WASP pilots were finally allowed veteran status and made eligible for benefits by order of President Carter in 1977. In 2000 she moved to Northport to be closer to a daughter employed at the University of Alabama. In March 2010 Foster and 1,113 of her fellow pilots were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

References

• Rickman, Sarah (2008) Nancy Love and the WASP Ferry Pilots of World War II. University of North Texas Press ISBN 1574412418
• "Alabama WWII Pilot to Attend WASP Congressional Event" (February 24, 2010) Alabama Aviatior