Jerrie cobb biography of williams
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She was a bush pilot in missionary endeavors in the Amazon for the next forty years and established the Jerrie Cobb Foundation, Inc. She was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1981 for her work with the native people of the Amazon and was later the recipient of the Amelia Earhart Award and Medal. She was also part of the "Mercury 13," a group of women who underwent some of the same physiological screening tests as the original Mercury Seven astronauts as part of a private, non-NASA program.
Early life
Cobb is the daughter of Lt.
Col. William H. Cobb and Helena Butler Stone Cobb. By the age of 21, Jerry was delivering four-engine military bombers and fighters to foreign Air Forces around the world. (See Mercury 13.)
A year later, Russia sent the first woman to fly in space, Valentina Tereshkova, a factory worker. During high school, she was barnstorming around the Great Plains in a Piper J-3 Cub, dropping leaflets over small towns announcing the arrival of an on-elephant circus.
I would have then, and I will now."
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Was the star of NASA’s first female astronaut program linked to the assassination of President John F.
Kennedy?
Franklin & Marshall alum Mary Haverstick ’82 set out to create a film spotlighting female aviator Jerrie Cobb. Sleeping under the Cub's wing at night helped scrape together money for fuel to practice her flying by giving rides. When she became the first woman to fly in the world's largest air exposition, the Salon Aeronautique Internacional in Paris, her fellow airmen named her Pilot of the Year and awarded her the Amelia Earhart Gold Medal of Achievement.
Finally, her hopes were deflated. She was staggered when John Glenn testified that "men go off and fight the wars and fly the airplanes," and women are not astronauts because of our social order. But when Haverstick stumbled upon Cobb’s ties to the JFK assassination, she flipped the script.
The biopic morphed into a book, and Haverstick celebrated the release of “A Woman I Know” on Nov.
14.
The freedom was just marvelous.”
Jerrie Cobb, reflecting on a flight with her father in 1943
Biography
Oklahoma native Jerrie Cobb received her pilot’s license at age 17, her commercial pilot’s license at 18, and flight and ground instructor’s rating at 21. "Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream".
The effort was unsuccessful.[1]
She has received numerous aviation honors, including the Harmon Trophy and the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale's Gold Wings Award.[3]
Awards
- Amelia Earhart Gold Medal of Achievement
- Named Woman of the Year in Aviation
- Amelia Earhart Memorial Award {cn}
- Named Pilot of the Year by the National Pilots Association
- Fourth American to be awarded Gold Wings of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, Paris, France
- Named Captain of Achievement by International Academy of Achievement
- Served five years as a consultant to the Federal Aviation Administration
- Honored by the government of Ecuador for pioneering new air routes over the Andes Mountains and Andes jungle
- 1973 Awarded Harmon International Trophy[9][10] for "The Worlds Best Woman Pilot" by President Richard Nixon at a White House ceremony.
- Inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame as "the Most Outstanding Aviatrix in the US
- Received Pioneer Woman Award for her "courageous frontier spirit" flying all over the Amazon jungle serving primitive Indian tribes
- 1979 Bishop Wright Air Industry Award for her "humanitarian contributions to modern aviation".[11]
- 2000 Inducted into "Women in Aviation International Pioneer Hall of Fame".[12]
- 2007 Honorary Doctor of Science degree from University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh.[13]
Notes
- ^ abcdefHargrave, The PioneersMonash University, Australia Accessed March 12, 2010
- ^ ab Jerrie Cobb “Jerrie Cobb, Solo Pilot” (Autobiography) jerrie-cobb.org-Solo Pilot, Accessed March 12, 2010
- ^ abcdefInternet Encyclopedia of Science, Aviation Pioneers Accessed 2010-03-12
- ^ ab John Shepler "Astronaut Jerrie Cobb, The Mercury 13 Were NASA's First Women Astronauts"johnshepler.com Accessed March 12, 2010
- ^ ab Kelli Gant Women in AviationThe [Ninety-Nines]Inc., Accessed March 12, 2010
- ^ Tanya Lee Stone.
The cost is $35 and includes a copy of “A Woman I Know.” Register here.
Read an excerpt from “A Woman I Know” (Penguin Random House)
Video: Mary Haverstick ’82: From Geology To Filmmaking (2019)
Jerrie Cobb
Geraldyn ("Jerrie") M.
Cobb (born March 5, 1931)[1] in Norman, Oklahoma is an American aviator. However, at the time NASA requirements for entry into the astronaut program were that a pilot be a military test pilot, experienced at high speed military test flying, and have an engineering background enabling the pilot to take over controls in the event it became necessary.
She was a semi-professional softball player for the Oklahoma City Queens, where she saved enough money to buy a World War II surplus Fairchild PT23. The American space program did not open the ranks of its astronaut corps to women until 1978.
Setting her disappointment aside, Cobb resigned from her position with the space agency and became a private pilot using her flying talent to serve the primitive people of the Amazon jungle.
However, she’s bracing for critique.
“I am expecting pushback,” Haverstick said.
“Haverstick distills a prodigious amount of research into a fast-moving story… As a fresh history of U.S. espionage, ‘A Woman I Know’ is an absorbing read.”
- The New York TimesPocket Books Shop (903 Wheatland Ave.) will host a reading and book signing with filmmaker and author Mary Haverstick ’82 on Dec.
14, 6-7 p.m.