WOMEN AIRFORCE SERVICE PILOTS PHOTOS
Ann E. Cawley O’Connor
July 20, 1922 – September 20, 2009
Class: 44-W-7
Training Location: Avenger Field (Sweetwater, Tex.)
Assigned Bases: Stockton Army Air Base (Calif.)
Planes flown: PT-17, BT-13, AT-6, AT-11, UC-78
Ann was born in Orange, New Jersey on July 20, 1922 to Herbert and Dorothy (Tomkins) Cawley of Short Hills, New Jersey. The family moved to New York City after her father’s death when she was just 15 years old.
Ann attended two years at the University of Arizona and one semester at Harvard College, graduating from Finch College. She took secretarial courses in New York and worked until she was qualified for WASP training, learning to fly in the New York area.
After earning her private pilot license and the required 35 hours, Ann applied and was accepted into the WASP training program as a member of the class of 44-7, traveling to Sweetwater, Texas in March of 1944. After graduation, she was assigned to Stockton, California as part of the training command, where she ferried retired UC-78’s.
After the WASP were deactivated, Ann met married H. Hayden O’Connor on June 18, 1948. The couple lived in Cazenovia in the 1940s and 1950s and again in the 1980s. They resided in Rye, NY, from 1952 to 1980. They spent 45 years together. Hayden passed away in 1993.
Her vocations ranged from working on a cattle ranch to testing ship models to administration of hospital-based home care. She was also an active volunteer. She enjoyed tennis, was a prize-winning floral arranger, an avid bridge player and traveled extensively. She was a member of Gamma Phi Beta Sorority, The Little Garden Club of Rye, the Malletts Bay Club in Vermont and the Cazenovia Club. She was an elder of Cazenovia Presbyterian Church. She was also vice president of the board of the Friends of Lorenzo.
For the last several years of her life, Ann suffered from Meinere’s disease–a condition she called ‘bothersome’ and ‘a great indignity for a pilot.’ Her good humor and her volunteer spirit no doubt inspired many whose lives she touched.
Ann is survived by her son, Hayden T. (Liz) O’Connor of Washington, CT, and their daughters, Sydney and Gillian; daughter, Sheila F. O’Connor, and son, John P. O’Connor, both of Syracuse.
Sources:
Texas Women’s University in Denton, Texas, WASP Collection
WASP Final Blog Spot
Syracuse Obituary
