This piece originally ran in the March 2022 issue of EAA Sport Aviation magazine.
This jacket is part of a dress uniform that belonged to Adela Riek Scharr, a member of the Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron. The WAFS was established in September 1942 to ferry military aircraft under the Air Transport Command. In 1943, the WAFS merged with Jacqueline Cochran’s training program to form the WASP. Headquartered at New Castle Army Air Base in Wilmington, Delaware, the WAFS never had more than 28 members at one time, so uniforms are quite rare. Scharr was a teacher and flight instructor before the war and joined the WAFS in 1942, and continued flying as part of the WASP until 1944. She remained active in the Air Force Reserve until 1967. Scharr’s family donated both her WAFS and WASP uniforms to the EAA Aviation Museum in 2000.