Nancy Corrigan
Born: 1 October 1912, Owenduff, Achill, Ireland
Died: 26 June 1983 (aged 70) Sarasota, Florida, United States
Cause of death: Heart attack
Nationality: Irish
Aviation career
Known for: Second female commercial pilot in the US
First flight: 1932
Flight license: Cleveland, Ohio
Racing career
Best position: 1948 Kendall Trophy, Cleveland, third place
Aircraft: AT-6 military trainer
Annie R. “Nancy” Corrigan (21 June 1912 – 1983) was an early aviator in the US who trained as a pilot in Cleveland, Ohio while working as a nursemaid and fashion model in 1932. She went on to be a successful instructor and commercial pilot when it was very unusual for women to be involved in such matters.
Early life
Corrigan was born in Owenduff In Achill in the west of Ireland. Annie (Nancy) was the 4th of 5 daughters born and her father was a railway worker on the Westport to Achill line. He was killed in a tragic accident and left his wife, Maggie Corrigan, near destitute forcing each of his daughters to emigrate to the United States. Nancy emigrated in 1929 at the age of 17 and sailed from Cork to New Jersey and went from there to Cleveland, Ohio. She found work as a nanny with a wealthy family in Shaker Heights.
Career
During her time in Cleveland she decided to take up flying. It was 1932 and flying was very uncommon for women and in addition it was very expensive. She was earning about $10 a week and the cost of a pilot’s licence was about $700 so she had to take up modelling to subsidize her hobby. She left her job as a nursemaid after three years an obtained employment with the John Robert Powers modelling agency in New York. The Powers modelling agency was one of the largest in the US, and the women on its books were known as ‘Powers Girls’. She worked for the Powers modelling agency for about 10 years, principally as a hand modeller.
Corrigan qualified as a pilot after only 4.45 hours of flying which was almost unthinkably rapid but such was her budget that she had to, since she couldn’t afford many more hours of training. Her story created such an impact that it was reported on in the Cleveland Newspapers.
Pilot trainer
When the US joined World War II her skills were sought after and she took on the role of trainer to fighter pilots and air cadets in Spartan College, Tulsa, Oklahoma. She also taught at Stephen’s College in Columbia, Missouri.
After the conclusion of the war she became only the second woman to earn a commercial pilot’s licence in the US. Over the decades that followed she logged 600,000 miles on commercial jets.
During her six years as head of St Stephen’s College in Columbia, Missouri, she supervised 600 women on their flight programme and graduate without a single failed test.
She became one of only two women with a multi-engine, commercial-rating pilot’s licence in the 1950s. She retired to Florida and died of a heart attack in 1983 aged 70 or 71.
Corrigan’s life was celebrated with a TV documentary (Nancy Corrigan: Spéirbhean Acla, “Sky-Woman of Achill”) first televised on the Irish language channel TG4 on January 6, 2015.
Corrigan is the subject of a special exhibition entitled “The Model Pilot,” at the International Women’s Air and Space Museum at Burke Lakefront Airport.
Nancy Corrigan – aviation pioneer and model
From Achill to a life on the runways of the US.
“With fewer than five hours of training, ‘the brunette colleen’ made her first solo flight”
There were two sorts of runways in Nancy Corrigan’s life; one relating to aviation, the other to fashion. This remarkable Mayo woman, who was born in Owenduff in Achill in 1912 and who became one of the most successful aviation pioneers in the US, funded her career by modelling in New York.
She was one of the four daughters of John Corrigan, a railway worker on the Westport to Achill line (now the Greenway) who died in a train accident, leaving his wife Maggie Ward and their children destitute.
Following in her sisters’ footsteps and in the timeworn Irish emigrant route, Nancy left Ireland at 17, sailing from Cork to New Jersey and from there to Cleveland, where she found work as a nanny with a wealthy family in Shaker Heights.
World records
In 1932 – the same year as Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic – Nancy began to take flying lessons in her off-duty hours completely unbeknownst to her family or her employers. With fewer than five hours of training, “the brunette colleen” made her first solo flight, breaking world records for flying solo in 4.45 hours and making the front page of Cleveland’s Plain Dealer newspaper. “I wasn’t a bit afraid. It felt like a million dollars,” she told reporters.
Where her drive and persistence came from, no one knows, and it is family speculation that the landing of Alcock & Brown in Connemara might have triggered her ambition or she may have been inspired by Earhart’s success and by Cleveland’s National Air Race event.
Flying may have been a glamorous pursuit then but it was hard and expensive work. Private flying lessons cost around $700, a huge sum in those days for a young nursemaid earning around $10 a week.
So Nancy moved to New York and joined the Robert Power modelling school, the first of its kind, representing many models who later went on to develop successful movie careers in Hollywood. To be a “Power’s Girl” was a much sought after position and the beautiful Nancy Corrigan also specialised in hand modelling, which earned enough for her to continue her aviation career and acquire the necessary piloting certificates.
When war broke out Nancy obtained a position with Spartan College in Tulsa as an instructor training US and civilian pilots and joined the Women Flyers of America, quite an achievement at a time when aviation was considered a men’s club and women had a hard time getting recognition. “They faced discrimination, sabotage when racing and there was a distaste generally for them”, one commentator recalled.
For the Kendal Air Show in 1948, and with a record of 5,000 hours in 16 years, Nancy ploughed all her savings into purchasing an AT6 trainer twin engineering aircraft for the event. So many successful Corrigans in Cleveland – lawyers, doctors and officials clubbed together to help with the purchase, that she painted “Corrigans” on the fuselage of the plane.
“It was a test of skill, aircraft management and bravery – and very dangerous”, according to a man who had been instructed by Nancy and who at the age of 85 is still flying. “She was a natural instructor and patient and one of only two women at the time who managed to break into the commercial corporate field”, he says.
Corrigan went on to fly 600,000 miles in a commercial flight career that ended with her retirement and retreat to Florida in the 1960s. “She used all her gifts, her charm, savvy and contacts to get what she wanted,” says Masterson.
