The Greenville News from Greenville, South Carolina • Page 50

10D Thursday. October 22, 1998 Greenville News Looking for a lower Interest rate en your mortgage? Too many Bills Have Yon Bogged Down? Free ol0ct3o Veteran pilot Cagle had the right stuff RSST 0PI71L EAS THE SOIITIO)' I0S YOH Wake Mi I cncur Swfl Lit I) it liiWlf 3 Vt't HUM naM tern ftrtt jAf8 fapnefrt Sg.OOO "lijT 1375 jT.32 ttitM $75,000 lOy SlOO.SOO SOjr U1 $632.07 1 1 Balat 2nd an laglwr. Rales tome sublet to tfonga. 1st and 2nd mortgages Purchases Refinance Home Improvements Bill Consolidation Slow Credit Programs Loans up to 125 of the value of your home Free loan consultation FIRST CAPITAL MOMCAGEC0RPOKA1KJN ToUFic88M154380 BIMHtiiMi Knight-Ridder MACON, Ga. She doesn't look like an astronaut.

Myrtle Cagle's small stature and large glasses make her look meek and bookish. But in her 70-plus years, she's done things most of us Window 232-141(1 onf five at Corrtar of Main St m. i 0m i -I' -y': v''i 0 J- I 11 1 (- .1 I 1 'C -1 i I il-: I I 1 1 4, -rii I i' 7 i Fashion Dresses A ii '4 A fashionable selection of the latest styles for day or evening. can only dream of accomplishing. In fact, there was a time whefi Cagle was way ahead of late Middle Georgia astronaut Sonny Carter, She was just never able to get hef space-flight dreams off the ground.

She was a member of the Mercif ry 13, a legendary group of women who stood on the cutting edge of space flight before the plug wa? pulled on the program. In the early 1960s they were part of the United States' space race with the Soviet Union. Friday she and her dozen team member' are the subject of a television pro; gram on The History Channel titled The Mercury 13: Secret Astro, nauts." Today Cagle is retired from ins Air Force and spends her time studying aircraft structure at Macon-Bibb Technical School. You'd think at this point, she'd just want to sit and relax. But that's not the way she's made.

And working with airplanes is just natural. Among her earliest memories is her desire to fly. "I can remember seeing a little sparrow hopping, along the ground and then go flying off," she said. "I decided to try if myself." She figures she was about 3 when she sailed off the front porch of her family's home in Sel-ma, N.C., using her mother's urn, brella as wings. She carried a scar-on her forehead from that failed ad venture for a long time.

$Vhen she. finally got into the air, it seems as if she never came back down. i At 14, she was the youngest licensed pilot in her native North Carolina. From there she became commercial pilot, an instructor, stunt pilot and airfield owner. She's flown everything from helicopters tct a T-33 jet trainer.

When sjie" flew the jet in 1953, she was one of only about five women who'd ever piloted a jet. A 1952 story in a N.C., newspaper hailed her as "the; only practicing female stunt flier in the United States." A 1948 story in a North Carolina newspaper described her as "a wispy blonde tip-' ping the scales at 98 pounds and looking more like an underage college bobby-soxer than the veteran pilot she is." But she had the right stuff. She's; featured in several segments of Frip day night's History Channel documentary. program not only looks at the then-controversial at-; tempt to bring women into the space program, but also provides an interesting look at American wonn en's role in aviation in general. The experiment that produced the Mercury 13 began with Dr.

Randy Lovelace. His lab in New-Mexico had been the testing site of. America's first male astronauts, Lovelace was curious about the et fects of the tests on women. He enlisted the help of female pilot Jackie Cochran. Cochran was the country's top fe male pilot.

With Cochran's Lovelace contacted America's topi women pilots. Cagle was among; that group. She had married Walti Cagle in 1960 and moved to Mal con. It was also the year the expert-; ment in New Mexico began. The; women paid their own way to and were subjected to a vari! ety of tests.

Cagle said they had; one stipulation for her before she began the tests. "They told me not to get preg; nant," she said. One of Cagle's most memorable tests was one she alsol related on the documentary. "They I got the bad part out of the way to start with," she said. "They froze; my eardrum.

They pumped ice wa- ter into my ears. That makes you! lose your balance. I lost my cook- ies. I told Dr. Lovelace I don't get air sick.

He said, 'If you hadn't gotr' If sick you wouldn't have passed, the test." Any woman who wanted to be-; come an astronaut also had to have' Navy jet-pilot training. But before the women could en ter that phase of the program, if was canceled, apparently falling vie; tim to the prejudices of the time about women not being capable of doing a man's job. The leading pilot among the! group, Jerrie Cobb, fought to keep the program going. She enlisted the help of another of the Mercury 13; Jane Hart, who was married to U.S; Sen. Phillip Hart of Michigan.

A1-; though a Congressional subcommittee was formed to study the issue; with people such as American as; tronauts John Glenn and Alan Shepherd speaking out against the idea) it was doomed to failure and died after the 1962 hearings. In fact, women were not eligible for jet pilot training until Ironically, when the Soviet Union sent Valentina Tereshkova into or-i bit even though she was the first woman in space she wasn't a pilot of any kind, compare at $60 I i Receive extra savings every time you shop. Earn a 5 bonus on all Marshalls purchases made with the TJX card issued by People's Bank, CT. Pick up an application at your nearest store to start earning rewards! A i irtj iiarsiniai I Merchandise will vary by store. 1998 Marshalls Drond names for less.

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