The Orchid Lady's Fighter Plane Story
In 1950 when I was working at Convair on the airplanes there, we were all graded by "A," "B," and "C." An "A" was the most money. But they weren't willing to pay me what I was worth, because I was a woman.
I was the union rep on the nose cone of the F-102, and I did all the wiring. And when I had taught eleven men to do my job, I decided that was the last one I was going to do. I told them unless I got an "A" they weren't going to get an "A." An di had a book where I had written every system in the nose of the plane, and yet they just wouldn't give me an "A."
It was a small one-man fighter plane. It has one pilot, not even a co-pilot. It was a "in and hit and gone." The engineer on the plane knew me - and I would tell them the problems and they would come and fix it, and then also give me the correct blueprints so that I could prove my reason for changing something. As I did this, I had made my own book of how things operated, and, like I had said, I had trained everybody. They went on and got their "A's," but I didn't because they were all men I wasn't. And so I said, "This is the last plane." And they said, "Well you can't leave here with that book of the system for the airplane in it." I said, "I didn't say I'd leave with it, but I can sit right here and eat it." They were not going to get that book!
Years later after an article in the San Diego Tribune came out about me a man from Arizona drove over here to see me. He said, "I wanted to thank you. You saved my life, because there was one switch on the dashboard that if it had not had a notation on it, I'd be dead today." And he said, "The notation had your name on it."
You see I wrote a note and put it on two planes because they hadn't listened to me. It said if you're having trouble getting this to function when you press this button, then press this one first, this one second, and that one third.
Anyway, that's just how it happened. He even brought his wife, and said, "I've thought often of you, I didn't think you were still living so I could thank you, and when I saw the article I had to come to day 'Hi.'"
It was very gratifying.
