Girl Crush: Kay Bailey Hutchison
Posted at 1:00 PM Mar 19, 2009
By Kathleen Willcox
More than 1,000 women were trained to be pilots in the U.S. military during World War II. And though they were (shocker!) barred from combat, members of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) still winged it for a variety of missions, tested new planes and repaired old ones. 
The 1,102 women who served were trailblazers - dames had never been entrusted with such typically "masculine" jobs before, and 38 died serving America. (While male military personnel who were killed along with the WASPs received all honors, their bodies were reportedly sent home in cheap pine coffins, with no official acknowledgment of their service). WASP was shuttered in 1944 after only two years in the air, and the program's role in the military became a classified secret for more than three decades.
Finally, in 1977, their role in the Air Force was leaked by members of WASP who were fed up with the secrecy and lies - Congress caved, their records were unsealed and living members were finally recognized as veterans.
And now, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, a Texas Republican, has introduced a bill in Congress to see that every single female pilot who served in World War II receives a Congressional Gold Medal. About 300 WASPs are still alive.
