Women have been participants in the progress of aviation from the very beginning. Katherine Wright, sister of Orville and Wilbur, assisted her brothers in the construction of their history making aircraft. In 1911, Harriet Quimby was the first woman in America to become a licensed pilot. Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova was the first woman to orbit the Earth in 1963, and astronaut Sally K. Ride became America's first woman in space on June 18, 1983.
Women are now active in virtually every field of aviation and space flight.
With the understanding that our country had overlooked an extremely talented group in the past, American industry and the U.S. government are now bringing women, more than ever, into highly responsible command and executive positions in the aerospace field.