Aviation was very much a man’s world at the time, and the female pilots had already needed to push past considerable barriers in their pursuit of flight. “I started flying while in high school. I paid for part of college [by] flight instructing and commercial flying. I continued working in aviation after college while being employed full time in engineering,” says Ratley, who also held a degree in mathematics with minors in physics and chemistry.

The 13 would-be astronauts also included Jerrie Cobb, Bernice Steadman, Janey Hart, Jerri Truhill, Rhea Woltman, Jan and Marion Dietrich, Myrtle Cagle, Gene Nora Jessen, Jean Hixson, Wally Funk, and Irene Leverton. Some of the group had come from the humblest beginnings to claim their status as elite pilots.

Leverton had more flying hours than any other of the candidates, and was a well-known aviator of the time. Now in her late 80s, Leverton is too fragile to talk, but according to her helper and long-term friend Kathi Schmier, she grew up so poor during the Great Depression, that as a child she would often come home to find all her possessions on the street. “The family had a dog, but they had to give it away as they could no longer feed themselves, let alone a dog. As a child she wanted aeroplanes instead of dolls and all she could think about was flying.”

Private funding

Leverton even turned down a scholarship at the Chicago Art Institute to pursue her love of flying, using every bit of money she had to save for flying lessons. According to Schmier “she persevered when others gave up”.

Nasa had not publicly expressed interest in sending women into space, so testing on the female astronauts began under private funding, spearheaded by Dr William Lovelace, who had been involved in evaluating the Mercury Seven. Some scientists believed that because the average woman was smaller and lighter than a man, their build could make them better potential candidates to travel into space and cope in the cramped conditions.