Elaine Harmon (B.S., '40, Microbiology) Awarded Congressional Gold Medal for WWII Service

Tue, Sep 1, 2009

On July 1, Elaine Danforth Harmon (B.S., '40, Microbiology) joined two other Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) in the Oval Office as President Obama signed into law a bill to award the Congressional Gold Medal to the WASP. "The Women Airforce Service Pilots courageously answered their country's call in a time of need while blazing a trail for the brave women who have given and continue to give so much in service to this nation since," President Obama said. "Every American should be grateful for their service, and I am honored to sign this bill to finally give them some of the hard-earned recognition they deserve." The Congressional Gold Medal is the highest and most distinguished award Congress can award to civilians.

The WASP was established during World War II with the primary mission of flying noncombat military missions in the United States, to free their male counterparts for combat missions overseas. They were the first women ever to fly American military aircraft, and they flew almost every type of aircraft operated by the Army Air Force during World War II.

Elaine Harmon, age 89, learned to fly at the College Park Airfield, while a student at Maryland. "To fly airplanes, that was a man's world, not for women," she said. In 1940, as the nation realized that it might need pilots for impending war, the civilian pilot training program ran an announcement in the University of Maryland's student newspaper, The Diamondback. Harmon completed the program and eventually accumulated enough flight hours to apply for WASP training. Of the 20,000 applicants, 1,830 were accepted; Harmon was one of 1,074 women who completed the flight program in Sweetwater, Texas, graduating in 1944.

Until the WASP disbanded, Harmon was stationed at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas, Nevada, where she helped male pilots with their instrument flying.
 "We didn't join the WASP looking for recognition, but were just doing what was needed during the war," she said. "Most everyone else in the country worked hard too and did their part to contribute to the war effort."

Harmon and her husband settled in Silver Spring, Md., where they raised four children. In the 1970s, she was involved in efforts to gain military status for the WASP.

Read the U.S. Air Force press release.