Furloughed Pilot Helps Young Girls File Flight Plans For Aviation Careers

By Deborah Grigsby

Lynda Meeks is the kind of girl that doesn't take "no" for an answer. Growing up traveling, camping and studying overseas, she not only got the travel bug, but the confidence to pretty much take on whatever is placed in front of her. "Life is short, and you gotta see and do everything you can with the time you have here on earth," asserts Meeks.

Linda And Norman Meeks

In college she knew she wanted to do something different and exciting, but really didn't know what it was. A postcard from a friend in Tunisia sent her to the local Army ROTC office. "This post card had a picture of people rappelling, so I showed up in the Army ROTC office and said, "I'd like to go rappelling!"

Meeks admits the look on the recruiting officer's face was priceless.

But she enrolled and went to summer camp and did so well she was offered a scholarship when she came back. Having studied history, Meeks then thought military intelligence would be a cool branch to join, but someone told her the toughest branch in the Army to break into is the aviation branch. Meeks took that as a personal challenge to herself as an individual, not as a challenge for being a woman.

"Even though I was in the Army and around helicopters and pilots, and they were saying we really need more female pilots, it didn't make an impression on me because I thought, "Yeah, why wouldn't I be a pilot?'" And she went on to become a Bell UH-1 'Huey' pilot. "I was so privileged to fly the Huey," she said with emotion. "I remember being at several static displays and grown men would come up to me with tears in their eyes saying "That helicopter saved my life." Meeks treasures that experience.

Her career in the Army went on to find her moving from rotary wing airframes to flying counterdrug operations in Central and South America in the Beechcraft C-12 Huron. When her military obligation was up, she decided to get out of the Army, but was not exactly sure what she'd do. "I still really wanted to do something different, but still wanted to travel," she said.

Something different was about to become something very familiar. "I remember one day I was on this commercial airliner and the captain made an announcement," Meeks recalled. "And this little girl in the seat behind me said, 'Mommy How come you never hear any girl pilots?'" Meeks said her heart sank and she realized at that moment she had to stay in aviation.

She did.

And while she admits there are a series of events that have steered her into her current project, Girls With Wings, this was the one that kept her flying. "That little girl needs to see other girl pilots," Meeks insisted. But as funny as it sounds, it would be the lack of a baby shower gift for a fellow female pilot that would propel Meeks to create Girls With Wings, a non-profit organization that focuses its efforts on introducing young girls to female role models in aviation-related careers.

Meek's colleague was having a baby, and everyone knew it was going to be a girl. "I wanted to send a gift for her newborn daughter with an airplane logo or something on it," she said. "So I got on the Internet and found nothing. Absolutely nothing." Not settling for that option, Meeks went out and purchased an embroidery machine, taught herself to use it and started embroidering airplanes and helicopters on everything she could find. Then, she started selling the items, and she noticed a trend.

Noah Martensen Sports A GWW Temporary Tattoo

"Whenever someone (usually female) bought an item, there was almost always a story involved," she said. "And the story usually involved something like, "I wanted to be a pilot when I was young, but was told girls couldn't fly." Or something like "I became a pilot anyway and it sure would have been nice to feel like I could when I was little, and I want my daughter to know she can do this as well."
 
As the stories continued to roll in, Meeks began to speak at career day events.  Her new position as a corporate pilot became quite an asset. Meeks knew she was on to something, but needed to package it appropriately. With the help of friends and her father, she launched a Web site and the Girls With Wings concept was born.

While there are plenty of professional organizations out there and resources for females who are already pilots, there wasn't really anything that appealed to the very young. Girls With Wings seemed to fill that void. Meeks said she intentionally selected the organization's pink and purple colors to appeal to very young girls. "You see little girls all time looking up and pointing to airplanes," she said. "But for some reason the strong colors of black and blue and red seem to send them the message that flying is really for boys."

Meeks says you can certainly see her point in the fact most toys designed and marketed to young girls come in soft pastel colors, and she wanted to follow that feminine trend. "I wanted to start early," Meeks said. "I wanted to catch them when they are young because by the time they get to an age where they are old enough for us to explain that they really can be a pilot too, it's almost too late."

Meeks said she hopes she is filling a unique empty spot in the aviation career field. "I want everyone to know that we fully support organizations like the Young Eagles, we are not trying to compete, but what I have found over the years is that in organizations that attract both boys and girls, you tend to lose more girls than you do boys."

Penelope The Pilot Cover

Meeks hopes her pink and frilly concept is enough to get girls introduced to the concept of aviation careers while building their confidence to go on to other programs. Now in its fifth year, Girls With Wings offers a full package of frilly flying-related frocks, as well as educational materials, an annual scholarship and a series of children's chapter books featuring "Penelope the Pilot."

Meeks says if you're a female pilot in any capacity, you're a role model, and Girls With Wings can use your help. 'When I give presentations to second graders, I always ask, 'If I line up a hundred airline pilots, how many of that hundred do you think would be women?'" Most of the time the answer is 50, according to Meeks, based on the fact even second-graders get the picture the population is pretty evenly split. "The fact is only about three of those hundred pilots are going to be women," said Meeks.

But Girls With Wings is not entirely focused on creating pilots.  Meeks hopes to expand that idea to other aviation related fields such as meteorology, navigation, aircraft maintenance, and air traffic control. Most girls, as well as most people, are not aware of how many different facets there are to aviation, said Meeks.

Now furloughed from her corporate pilot job, Meeks had dedicated nearly every waking hour to pushing the concept forward. Meeks says her greatest need is to find volunteers to help set up local Girls With Wings Chapters across the country. She has also launched the "Penelope the Pilot" project, which is an online calendar of events, and activities tied to the Penelope the Pilot series of books. "The whole idea is for girls to have a 'flight plan' for their future," concluded Meeks. "Instead of having our girls dream about a knight in shining armor, how about having them dream about exploring the night in a shining airplane?"

FMI: www.girlswithwings.com, www.penelopepilotproject.org