Author Archives: The National Air and Space Museum

Women in Space

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With March upon us, the calls start coming for information about women in space.  March is Women’s History Month and those of us trained as women’s historians know that our topics have particular currency in the third month of the year.  But for women in space, the month to celebrate really should be June.

Valentina Tereshkova

Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Vladmirovna Tereshkova in the spacecraft Vostok 6.

Fifty years ago, on June 16, 1963, the Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to fly in space. Tereshkova was chosen from a group of five women who had been selected and trained as possible cosmonauts in the Soviet Union.  Her expertise as a skydiver and her personal and family background (her father was a war hero) aided her selection to fly in space.  Launched as the sole occupant of Vostok 6, Tereshkova orbited at the same time as Vostok 5, marking the second time that two human spaceflight vehicles were in space at the same time. Her mission lasted just less than three days (two days, 23 hours, and 12 minutes).

Twenty years later (almost to the day), on June 18, 1983, which is exactly 30 years ago this year, Sally Ride became the first American woman in space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger (STS-7). She flew with four other crew members on a six-day mission that included launching two communications satellites. After earning her Ph.D. in physics at Stanford University, Ride applied to be an astronaut and was selected in 1978 as a part of the first NASA astronaut candidate class to include women and people of color.  (Five other women also became astronauts in that class: Anna Fisher, Shannon Lucid, Judith Resnik, Rhea Seddon, and Kathryn Sullivan.)  Ride’s distinguished career with NASA included two spaceflights, service on the Rogers Commission after the Challenger disaster in 1986, and founding NASA’s Office of Exploration.

Sally Ride

Sally Ride was the first American woman in space.

Finally, last year, in 2012, again in June (on June 16, exactly 49 years after Tereshkova), Liu Yang became the first female taikonaut to fly into space when she, along with two male crewmates, participated in a thirteen-day mission to dock, both manually and robotically, with China’s prototype space station. As the third nation in the world to launch human beings into orbit, China has flown four crewed missions: its first human mission in 2003, a two-person flight in 2005, its first spacewalk in 2008, and the first crewed orbital docking (in which Liu participated) in 2012. As it did for the Soviet space program in the early 1960s, including a female flyer in a mission drew attention to the program.

Although the inclusion of women in spaceflight is only one part of the broader history of women in aerospace, space travelers serve as the public face of their organizations and thus have symbolic importance in addition to their real contributions.

In the United States, the factors affecting the number of women in space tend to be related to the “pipeline” of experience, schooling, and training required to fulfill those positions.  In the early years of the space race, when astronauts were drawn primarily from the ranks of military-trained jet test pilots, women —who were excluded from military flying from the end of the Women Airforce Service Pilots in 1944 until military flight training was reopened to women in the early 1970s—did not have the military jet test piloting experience to be considered. (A group of talented women pilots did undergo some private astronaut testing in 1960, but the Lovelace Women in Space Program ended abruptly in 1961.) The introduction of the Space Transportation System or “Space Shuttle” also introduced a new type of astronaut: the mission specialists, who were researchers with advanced scientific or technical degrees. The first American women astronaut candidates announced by NASA in 1978 were drawn from an applicant pool that included a greater proportion of women with terminal research degrees (Ph.D.s or M.D.s) than had previously existed.

Although Women’s History Month will be over at the end of March, we will revisit this particular history in June at the Museum. Three curators in Space History are planning an informal series of lunchtime talks, done as a part of the Museum’s weekly “Ask an Expert” series, explaining the history of these women’s achievements. After all, pioneering women deserve attention, even if it is not March.

Margaret A. Weitekamp is a curator in the National Air and Space Museum’s Space History Department.

Preserving and Displaying the “Bat-Wing Ship” – March Update

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Horetn

Close up of the acrylic canopy being analyzed by our conservation staff and Smithsonian’s Museum Conservation Institute (MCI).

Waiting for an update on the conservation and restoration of our Horten H IX V3 “Bat-wing Ship?” Here’s the latest! Our conservation staff, in collaboration with curator Russ Lee, is working with the Smithsonian’s Museum Conservation Institute (MCI) to figure out the materials and technologies used to craft the Horten H IX V3.  For example, the transparent canopy was analyzed with a portable Raman spectrometer and determined to be a polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) plastic.  PMMA was developed by Rohm and Haas in the mid-1930s in Germany and the United States, and the material is reputed to have been incorporated quickly into aircraft canopies, gun turrets, and transparent noses. It is lightweight, impact resistant, relatively easy to form, and transmits light even better than glass.  In this instance, identifying the canopy as PMMA confirms what we already expected from our research of trade literature from that period.  It also shows how studying our collection, visually and with analytical tools like MCIs Raman spectrometer, provides direct physical evidence of an aircraft’s manufacture, which enriches our understanding of the history of early plastics in aviation.

Raman spectroscopy identifies materials by shining a laser beam at a surface and measuring the energy distribution of inelastically scattered light.  It is potentially non-destructive and does not require removing a sample from the aircraft.  MCIs spectrometer weighs only 6 lbs. and fits in a convenient “carry on” sized suitcase for trips out to the Udvar-Hazy Center and other Smithsonian museums.

Lauren Horelick is a objects conservator in the Collections Department of the National Air and Space Museum.

An Artistic Search for Pluto

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How do you illustrate a non-fiction book for kids based on the former ninth planet? Some people still have some pretty strong feelings about Pluto’s demotion: protest signs, student protest speeches, public demonstrations. Cries of unfairness could be heard when news of poor Pluto’s removal from the planetary ranks occurred. It is the intention of this new children’s book to set the story straight or at least attempt to share “Pluto’s side of the story.”

I‘ve worked in the children’s book market as a freelance illustrator for several years in addition to my full-time job with the Museum’s Early Childhood program. My latest book assignment from Abrams Books for Young Readers, Pluto’s Secret: an Icy World’s Tale of Discovery, connected my job as an artist and an educator.

Pluto's Secreet

Pluto’s Secret, An Icy World’s Tale of Discovery, by Margaret A. Weitekamp and David DeVorkin. Illustrated by Diane Kidd.

In publishing, typically the illustrator and the author never meet or exchange ideas. In some cases the author might live across the state or in another country. The approved manuscript is sent to the artist from the publisher. It is then up to the artist to find the visual voice of the text. Fortunately, for this project the authors Margaret Weitekamp and David DeVorkin were my Museum colleagues. In my first sketch, for example, I used my daughter’s old high school algebra homework, which was my interpretation of a possible equation mathematician Percival Lowell might have calculated. David knew right away it was not correct and gave me a copy of an actual Lowell equation which is now in the book. I also needed to re-work my idea of a telescope, which originally looked like one from Dr. Seuss, to one that looked more like Lowell’s telescope.

Telescope

Original draft of the telescope from Pluto’s Secret.

telescope

Revised draft of the telescope, based on David DeVorkin’s comments.

When I work, I use water jars, brushes, water color pads, and tissue paper. I need good lighting and scads of paper towel, and music really helps the flow. Next I usually consider color and composition. In this case, “What color should I make Pluto? Hmmm… Purple? Blue? Meatball brown? Red is taken by Mars.” There is also a lot of activity in space. Things crash into each other, explosions and collisions happen, surfaces have been impacted by objects bumping into them.  Maybe Pluto might have a somewhat bumpy surface with a few craters. What does dirty methane gas look like? An icy world might have a few patches of surface ice. What might life in a Kuiper belt be like? No one really knows exactly, so imagination holds the paint brush.

Pluto

Color sample for Pluto’s Secret, by Diane Kidd

First I sketched out my ideas then sent them to the editor for review and critique, and to Margaret and David for review. Later the publisher sent corrections back marked in red.  The corrected sketches were re-drawn and then re-submitted  to the publisher. Once all the corrected sketches were approved, I worked on re-drawing and painting each image by hand on watercolor paper.

In the past, the procedure of mailing sketches back and forth between the publisher and artist often took weeks to complete. Today sketches can be scanned and sent out and corrections returned within a few days. Once the designer receives the corrected art, he/she can lay out the text copy with finished art work and get a pretty good idea of what the final product will look like. No more mailing tubes or runs to the copy shop in the middle of the night, or trips to the local post office trying to make a deadline.

Nevertheless, I still waited with baited breath for comments from the art editor/publisher/authors as they reviewed the final art work. Did they like it? Did I get the right look? Did they notice that smudge? For me, this is one of the hardest parts of the process, the waiting. Finally, a thumbs up. Everything was approved. It’s a go.

My hope is that young readers and adults alike will have as much fun as I did learning why Pluto is no longer considered a planet and how “he” really feels about it. And I hope you like the book as much as I liked creating the art!

Diane Kidd is manager of the National Air and Space Museum’s Early Childhood Program.

Join us this Friday, March 15, at the Museum in Washington, DC to learn more about Pluto with the authors of Pluto’s Secret. Children can participate in educational activities, and purchase a signed copy of the book.

Pluto’s Secret: Writing the Museum’s First Children’s Book

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How did three staff members at the National Air and Space Museum get to collaborate on the Museum’s first children’s book, Pluto’s Secret: An Icy World’s Tale of Discovery?  The short answer is that this is an extraordinary place to work.  And when people are as generous with their time and talents as my collaborators have been, neat stuff happens.

Pluto’s Secret: An Icy World’s Tale of Discovery

The idea that became Pluto’s Secret began in the Writers’ Group that I hold for Museum curators and fellows.  We meet twice a month to share mutual problems we encounter in our research and writing of aviation and space history.  David DeVorkin, the Museum’s senior curator of space astronomy (who was present at the 2006 International Astronomical Union meeting in Prague during which astronomers voted on Pluto’s new designation), told the group about an article that he was writing about Pluto’s discovery and reclassification. David’s article examined how disagreements among astronomers over how Pluto should be categorized reflected pre-existing divisions in the field of astronomy. (You can find David’s final essay in Exploring the Planets (Palgrave, 2013)). David’s draft was called, “Pluto: The Problem Planet.” As a mother who spent many hours reading to my then-preschool son, our oldest, I thought, “That would be a great title for a children’s book!”

So, during my commutes in and out of Washington, DC, I added the story of Pluto’s discovery to the repertoire of tales that I would tell my son in the car to pass the time. Standard fairy tales had gotten repetitive and boring—I had even started retelling the same stories from different points of view to vary them, a skill that became useful for Pluto’s Secret —so I wanted something new.

When I eventually suggested Pluto’s tale to Trish Graboske, the Museum’s publications officer, she suggested the addition that made the Museum’s first children’s book a reality: Diane Kidd, the Museum’s early childhood manager, is also a professional children’s books illustrator! If she would illuminate our book, we might really have something. David and Diane agreed to take on the project with me and the rest is history (of science).

Margaret, David, and Diane

Margaret Weitekamp, David DeVorkin, and Diane Kidd

The collaboration between the three of us became my favorite part of this project. Usually, we learned, a children’s book illustrator might never meet the author at all. (Diane is working on a blog entry about her process to appear soon.)  This time, we met as a group to discuss the concept and we worked together, in person, throughout the whole process. I wrote and rewrote the text. Diane patiently subjected her beautiful artistic illustrations to David’s exacting reviews to check all of the details: the right telescopes, the correct astronomical domes, and even appropriate equations floating above Percival Lowell’s head. And David helped to refine the story with me. My son enjoyed (endured?) MANY bedtime readings (“When is it going to be real book?”), which were often interrupted as I scribbled on the pages to edit an awkward phrase or clarify a point.

At one point, David suggested a perspective that put everything in focus: Pluto does not change! Scientists’ ideas about Pluto changed as they learned more, but the icy world Pluto is just Pluto—out there on the edge of the solar system, being itself. The story needed a different point of view. It wasn’t the story of the scientists, interesting as they were. “Pluto, the Problem Planet” became Pluto’s Secret, the story of an icy world on the edge of the solar system that did not fit the label that scientists wanted to give it. (In fact, in 2006, because of Pluto, astronomers defined “planet” for the very first time.) Diane thought that kids would connect with the character of the icy world who was not bad, just different, and did not always follow the grown-ups’ arbitrary rules.

It’s so exciting to see Pluto’s Secret out in print. I’ve finally gotten to read a real, bound version to my three children at bedtime. And we look forward to telling this tale of discovery to audiences at the Museum and around the D.C. area. Come out and see us!

Margaret A. Weitekamp is a curator in the Space History Department of the National Air and Space Museum.

Meet the Curtiss-Wright Aeronautical Engineering Cadettes

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Just when I think I might know something about women in aviation, or just when we think we’ve heard all the stories about “the greatest generation,” I find out about another group who contributed to the World War II effort.  They were not Rosie the Riveters assembling aircraft on production lines nor were they the pilots known as the WASP.  By now, most people have heard of the Women Airforce Service Pilots, 1,074 civilian women who, from 1943 to 1944, flew more than 60 million miles ferrying military aircraft, towing targets, and performing other administrative flying duties for the US Army Air Forces.  Thirty-eight women lost their lives in the course of their duties to their country, but deceased or living, they received no military benefits. After being deactivated in December 1944, so that returning male pilots could resume stateside military flight duties, their remarkable story was lost for many years, in fact until 1977 when Congress finally conferred retroactive military status to the WASP. In the 1990s, various WWII 50th anniversary events reintroduced them and finally, in March 2010, the WASP received their ultimate honor with the awarding of Congressional Gold Medal for their service and “revolutionary reform in the Armed Forces” during World War II. Each living WASP or family of a WASP received a bronze medal and National Air and Space Museum became the repository for the single Gold Medal, now displayed at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. Many books and documentaries now tell the powerful WASP story.

WASP

Members of the WASP (Women Airforce Service Pilots) are pictured at Lockbourne Army Air Field in World War II. From left to right are Frances Green, Margaret (Peg) Kirchner, Ann Waldner and Blanche Osborn. The WASP were civilian women pilots who flew in non-combat situations for the U.S. Army Air Forces during the war. The program came to an abrupt end in 1944 because of gender politics.

Recently I learned about another group of unheralded women from the World War II era. Last fall Jean-Vi Lenthe e-mailed me about a women’s aeronautical engineering training and employment program sponsored by the Curtiss-Wright Corporation, and although I must have read about it in Deborah Douglas’ American Women in Flight Since 1940, I could not recall the details. Lenthe promptly sent me a copy of her book that tells the story of the intrepid women, including her own mother, known as the Curtiss-Wright Cadettes. Having never spoken in depth about it with her mother before her death, Lenthe became curious and began contacting the remnants of the Curtiss-Wright Corporation, visiting the old Curtiss-Wright plants and repositories of Curtiss-Wright archives (including the National Air and Space Museum unbeknownst to me), and interviewing living Curtiss-Wright Cadettes. How did her mother become involved and what work did she and the rest of co-eds train for and perform? The motivated and tenacious Lenthe was just the person to unravel this puzzle and the result is Flying Into Yesterday My Search for the Curtiss-Wright Aeronautical Engineering Cadettes.

Flying Into Yesterday

Flying Into Yesterday, by Jean-Vi Lenthe

Curtiss-Wright Corporation was a major aircraft manufacturer in World War II producing, among other aircraft, the P-40 Warhawk for the U.S. Army Air Forces and the SB2C Helldiver for the U.S. Navy. The Helldiver saga was a tortuous one with many complex design and production issues and in 1942, Curtiss-Wright was in danger of defaulting on its contract to provide the Navy with a new dive bomber. At the same time, male engineers were being drafted and the company was having trouble keeping up the necessary engineering work to fix the Helldiver and get it into sustained production. So Curtiss-Wright took the highly unusual step of authorizing women to fill in. Between February 1943 and March 1945, 918 female college students, identified as mathematically advanced, took courses in aerodynamics, engineering, and design at seven universities; 766 Cadettes graduated from the government-sponsored program and began work in five Curtiss-Wright plants.

Lenthe focused on her mother, Ricki Cruse Lenthe, who studied at Purdue University and completed the 10-month program condensed down from a two and one half year engineering curriculum that also included technical drawing, airframe structures, and subjects tailored to the work at the plant to which she would be assigned. Her mother reported to the Handbooks Group of the Service Engineering department at the Columbus, Ohio plant where she helped to prepare the Pilot Handbook for the Helldiver. Many Cadettes worked in drafting departments where they incorporated engineering orders into the original working drawings of the Helldiver, accurately modifying the drawings with major or minor changes (which eventually numbered nearly 900) for production use. It was another Cadette from that plant who years later gave Lenthe the push to research the Cadettes and document their work: Betty Masket, now living in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Masket performed inspections on the production line and once shut it down when she found a clearance issue with the hydraulic line to the dive brakes on the wings. She was concerned the line could be cut and cause an uncontrollable descent of the aircraft.

Lenthe called me because she was coming to Washington, DC to see Masket and wanted to bring her to the Udvar-Hazy Center to see our Helldiver undergoing restoration in the Mary Baker Engen Restoration Center. I am sure she was not really surprised when I told her I knew little of the Curtiss-Wright Cadettes, but no doubt she was yet again disappointed. SuperStorm Sandy delayed her trip east from New Mexico but we finally met on January 21.

Cochrane, Kinney, and Masket

Curators Dorothy Cochrane and Jeremy Kinney with Betty Masket by the Helldiver in the Udvar-Hazy Center.

Visits like this are rewarding aspects of working at the Museum because they have so many layers. Lenthe affirmed her research efforts and the Cadettes identity by linking them to their daily work and accomplishments, in this case Masket with the Helldiver, and Lenthe also made the personal connection to her mother’s work. Masket inspected yet another Helldiver and talked shop with curator Jeremy Kinney and our museum specialists who work on the restoration. Our museum specialists are always delighted to speak with someone with personal knowledge of an aircraft, whether a pilot, mechanic, or female engineer, and they peppered both women with questions. We could not confirm that Masket’s suggested change for the hydraulic line was made, but she thoroughly enjoyed seeing a Helldiver in pieces again and will be back to follow the work. The restorers, Jeremy, and I found out about the Curtiss-Wright Cadettes and we now have another resource for hands-on Helldiver details. I signed up the women for the Museum’s Women in Aviation and Space Family Day on Saturday, March 23. Later in the week, Lenthe and I discussed her growing Cadettes archival and artifact collections and her plans for an exhibit. Our aircraft provided the point of focus for the visit but the true value is in the people, in this case Lenthe, Masket, and the rest of intriguing Curtiss-Wright Aeronautical Engineering Cadettes.

Like the WASP and assembly line workers, the Cadettes were abruptly sent home at the end of World War II. Although they contributed to the production of more than 5,000 Helldivers at the Columbus plant, and more aircraft at other plants, and to propeller and engine programs as well, they did not receive promised help from Curtiss-Wright to finish their engineering degrees after the war. Worse yet, the company lost or threw out records of the program. A few Cadettes went on to become career engineers, some, like Lenthe’s mother, became teachers, and many became homemakers. But whatever they did, they all appreciated their Cadettes experience and the difference it made in their lives.

The Chance-Vought Corporation also established a scholarship program with the Daniel Guggenheim School for Aeronautics at New York University that led to the placement of a small number of female engineers in the Chance-Vought Engineering Department. On the whole though, only a handful of women became career engineers for aviation companies; similarly very few women became pilots or stayed in the industry in other capacities. Most everyone regarded women working for the war effort as just that and, when the war ceased, so did their employment. It would be several decades before women permanently entered the workplace in force.

Women in Aviation and Space Family Day at the Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, VA.

Women in Aviation and Space Family Day at the Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, VA.

Jean-Vi Lenthe, Betty Masket, and other Curtiss-Wright Cadettes will host a table at the Women in Aviation and Space Family Day at the Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, VA on March 23, 2013, 10:00am-3:00pm

Jean-Vi Lenthe will have a book signing from 12:00 – 2:00 pm.

Dorothy Cochrane is a curator in the Aeronautics Department of the National Air and Space Museum.