Betty Greene – Missionary Pilot
Elizabeth ‘Betty’ Greene was born in Seattle in 1920 to a Christian family. When she was seven years old, Charles Lindbergh made his solo flight across the Atlantic. A year later, Amelia Earhart made her famous flight. Flying fascinated her, and when she was sixteen was given a sum of money from an uncle, she spent most of it on flying lessons.
Flying became a passion, as did service for Christ. When she voiced these two passions to an elderly lady in her church she advised to combine the passions. "Of course, dear," the woman said, "think of all the time — and sometimes lives — that could be saved if missionaries didn't have to spend weeks hacking their way through jungles."
This lady’s advice gave her direction for her life. Betty returned to school to study for missions work and continued working to get her pilot’s license. Interrupting this was World War II. She signed up as one of about 1,100 WASPs (Woman’s Air Force Service Pilots). Since women were not allowed on the front lines of combat, these WASPs took on the jobs of testing and ferrying planes from factories as needed – with the attitude of freeing men for combat roles. She learned to fly all kinds of planes, from fighters to bombers to cargo aircraft. She also served as a high-altitude test pilot and towed drone aircraft for live-fire anti-aircraft gunnery drills.
During wartime, she wrote a couple of articles for a Christian publication suggesting the benefits of the use of aircraft for missions work. A Navy pilot named Jim Truxton contacted her and suggested a collaboration to begin an organization to serve missionary families when the war ended. Betty and Jim, along with two colleagues, began the organization that was eventually called Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF). Betty became the mission organization’s first paid employee.
Acquiring their first plane, a little red Waco biplane, Betty began flying in Mexico at age 25 to help Wycliffe Bible Translators with their remote jungle training camp. Flying in to the dirt airstrip in that camp took her 1 hour and 45 minutes, while hacking through the jungle on foot took 10-14 days.
Bush flying was very hazardous. Betty flew without a copilot or navigator, obviously without GPS or autopilot, and found her destination by tracing roads or natural landmarks below her. Weather was unpredictable and weather forecasts unreliable. Coupled with the unusual occurrence of a woman pilot in her early days – she was often mistaken for a stewardess on some flights – and the prejudice sometimes shown her, made her a true humble hero in her work.
Betty never married, despite having some romantic possibilities. She felt her calling was incompatible with the burdens of marriage. All told, she flew over 4,800 hours with a perfect safety record – and attributed that to God’s providence and gracious hand. She knew many colleagues who were killed in the line of service. She brought medical supplies and food to mission camps, ferried missionaries and their families to and from the field, and took the sick and injured to hospitals in critical times. She served in 12 countries around the world, including Mexico, Peru, Africa, and Indonesia. She was first woman to fly over the Andes Mountains in South America and was the first woman to land a plane in Sudan – the latter requiring a literal act of the (then-) Sudanese Parliament.
In 1962, Betty retired from field work and worked administrative duties for MAF – with occasional flying ventures. She did this for many years, retiring to her hometown of Seattle in the latter years of her life. She died there of Alzheimer’s disease in 1997.
https://www.mnnonline.org/news/first-maf-pilot-honored-for-wartime-service/
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