In the decades following World War II, Lillian Yonally never spoke of her year in uniform.

And neither did anyone else.

Her own children, like most Americans, knew nothing of the Women Airforce Service Pilots, or WASP, a program that had about 1,100 civilian female volunteers flying military aircraft stateside because of a desperate shortage of male pilots. Yonally had been one of the WASPs.

Now, 65 years later, she was honored Wednesday at the Capitol with a Congressional Gold Medal, Congress’ highest award for distinguished achievements and contributions.

Read the full story here

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010 at 6:50 am and is filed under Miscellaneous. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.