Last Thursday Book Group – July 2014

Book Summary

Nancy Bird’s training began in 1933, at the age of seventeen, in Sydney, where she was one of Charles Kingsford Smith’s first pupils. Despite many obstacles, including being too small to reach an aeroplane’s controls without the aid of cushions. Nancy was determined to fly, and in 1935, she became the youngest Australian woman to get a commercial pilot’s licence.

My God Its a Woman spans Nancy’s flying experiences in the Outback, her travels in Europe and the USA, her association with famous aviators such as Jean Batten and Amy Johnson, and her flying comeback in the 1950s. In 1966, Nancy was awarded the Order of the British Empire in recognition of her support of charities, and in 1990 her significant contribution to aviation and her courageous work in the Outback was recognised with an Order of Australia. Qantas named its first A380 jet in her honour, in 2008.

Comments

• Read a few chapters and found the book too crowded – too many different characters and couldn’t get into the book.
• Hard to get into.
• Liked the book – Nancy Bird was one of the first women pilots in Australia and did flights similar to the Flying Doctors. Found the book interesting.
• Nancy Bird had limited schooling and then helped her father in his shop. After a couple of years Kingsford Smith started a flying school and Nancy started flying lessons and passed at a very young age. Nancy became the first female pilot to fly passengers.
• This book is a great testament to an extraordinary person, who happens to be a woman.