Ninety-Nines Receive $1M Donation

The Ninety-Nines received a trove of documents for the Museum of Women Pilots, including Josephine Wood Wallingford’s 1931 Ninety-Nines membership card and 1929 logbook. [Courtesy: The Ninety-Nines]

The Ninety-Nines, the international order of women pilots, is celebrating a $1 million bequest from the late Bill Wallingford, whose mother Josephine Wood Wallingford was the youngest woman to hold a pilot certificate when the organization was created in 1929.

According to Ninety-Nines historians, Josephine Wood and her sister Francis took flying lessons in Santa Monica, California. After Josephine earned her private pilot certificate, she received a letter from famous aviatrix Amelia Earhart asking her to join an organization that was forming to promote and encourage women pilots.

At the time, 117 women in the U.S. held private pilot certificates—and Earhart reached out to all of them. After 99 women responded favorably by the cutoff date, the group had its name: The Ninety-Nines.

In 1930 when Wood was interviewed by a newspaper reporter, she declared that flying was not her hobby—it was going to be her profession. She continued to fly, then just after she earned her commercial certificate, the Great Depression hit. Wood hung up her wings to take care of her mother and sister. She eventually married Frederic Wallingford and settled in Texas.

According to Bill Wallingford's recollections, his mother rarely talked about flying but considered the letter from Earhart to be one of her most prized possessions. She was a member of the Houston Ninety-Nines chapter until her death in 2004.

Wallingford died in 2023, and as he had no heirs, he decided to leave his money to organizations he considered the most meaningful. The Ninety-Nines topped the list.

The Ninety-Nines are happy to honor both mother and son with the bequest, said Kristin Smith, a researcher with the organization.

"While this is not the first bequest that we have had, it certainly is the largest and most unexpected….to the Ninety-Nines," Smith said.

According to Smith, the funds will be used to increase education outreach and leadership programs that support The Ninety-Nines chapters and sections around the world. In addition, some of the windfall will be used to address some building maintenance at the organization headquarters and the Museum of Women Pilots in Oklahoma City.

Amelia Earhart Aviation History Museum of Women Pilots Ninety-Nines Women in Aviation

Meg GodlewskiAuthor

Meg Godlewski has been an aviation journalist for more than 24 years and a CFI for more than 20 years. If she is not flying or teaching aviation, she is writing about it. Meg is a founding member of the Pilot Proficiency Center at EAA AirVenture and excels at the application of simulation technology to flatten the learning curve. Follow Meg on Twitter @2Lewski.