OUR RICH HISTORY

The Air Force Officers’ Wives’ Club was constituted on May 25, 1923, making it the first Air Force club of its kind. Mrs. Mason Patrick, wife of the Chief of the Air Service invited fifty “flapper” wives of young pilots into her home and they organized “The Air Service Club.” Their Board of Governors consisted of three elected officers and three committee chairmen: membership, hospitality and entertainment.

They continued to act as a social club until 1940, when under the leadership of Mrs. “Hap” Arnold, they decided to invest more time volunteering to meet the needs of the “Air Corps Aid Society.” The club’s name was eventually changed to the Air Force Officers’ Wives’ Club of Washington, D.C.

The AFOWC’s commitment to enrich the lives of the entire Air Force Family is seen in draft proposals which helped establish Air Force Village, Family Services and the Arlington Committee.

The United States Air Force Wife Emblem

The shape is the traditional Air Force organizational emblem - a shield with attached scroll. The Wings are symbolic of the Air Force and their flying role in the defense of our country. The wedding rings are entwined side by side to show the equal and integral parts the wife and husband have in the marriage and home. The rose woven in the beauty through the rings represents the wife as an individual strong in her central role as homemaker and mother, in support of her husband in his career and in pursuing her own personal goals.

A portion of the world is shown to represent the many homes established and filled with love, comfort, and security for her family, wherever assignments take her. The branch with leaves signifies the active life, growth, and service of the Air Force wife that she shares at each station and in each community. It also represents her children who thrive under her care and guidance. Many travels are shown by the lines and the stars as destinations; the lines are also representative of contrails, and the stars add a spiritual quality.

The AFOWC Coat of Arms 

SHIELD: The wings and color blue denote the Air Force.  The distaff with the wedding ring symbolizes the wife's domestic and family life. The zigzag line suggest house roofs, symbolizing the home and the reciprocation of hospitality. The scallop shells (symbols of pilgrimage) represent the movement of homes necessitated by that of the officers and their careers.

CREST: Above the shield is the closed helmet proper to impersonal arms with its crest-wreath and decorative mantling of cloak in the basic colors of the arms, blue and white. The crest is a blazing hearth, symbolic of home and hospitality.

MOTTO: An abbreviation of the old saying, "Suaviter in Modo Fortiter in Re," it may be translated as "Gently, but Bravely," referring to the wife's double role as mistress of a hospitable home and supporter of her husband in times of difficulty.

Information on the AFOWC Coat of Arms was taken from the December 1965 issue of Protocall.  The AFOWC Coat of Arms is copyrighted and may not be duplicated or used without the express written permission of the AFOWC.

Sunday
Jun202010

Into the Wild Blue Yonder

Click here to play The Air Force Song, as performed by the USAF Band, located at Bolling AFB!

Off we go into the wild blue yonder
Climbing high into the sun...

Here they come zooming to meet our thunder,
At 'em boys, Give 'er the gun! (Give 'er the gun!)

Down we dive, spouting our flame from under,
Off with one helluva roar!

We live in fame
Or go down in flame.  Hey!

Nothing'll stop the U.S. Air Force!

Brigadier General H."Hap" Arnold proposed a song-writing contest to help give the Air Corps its own musical identity. Established as the Aeronautical Division of the Army Signal Corps in 1907, just four years after the Wright Brothers' first flight, and renamed the Air Corps in 1926, it remained throughout WWII a combat arm of the U.S. Army, although the Navy and the Marine Corps also had pilots on active duty.

The contest was sponsored by Liberty magazine in 1938 and over six hundred entries were submitted. Among the applicant composers were such names as Meredith Willson, who went on to Broadway fame as the author of The Music Manand Irving Berlin, whom the Air Corps flew in a B-18 bomber to spark his creativity. Neither of their proposals won, but the fruits of Berlin's labor were later planted in Moss Hart's Broadway show Winged Victory.

The winning entry was a last-minute submission from Yukon-born Robert Crawford, an amateur pilot. The selection committee, made up of airmen's wives, unanimously selected the song. Crawford (1899-1961) was a successful musical professional who had studied voice in France and at the Juilliard School of Music. He purchased a plane in order to fly himself from one concert engagement to the next and so had a good feel for his subject matter. Crawford was the one to officially introduce "Off We Go" to the public when he sang it at the Cleveland Air Races on September 2, 1939.

Source: The Performing Arts Encyclopedia section of the Library of Congress.

Saturday
May222010

A Piece of Our Rich History

1950 New AFOWC Officers

Pictured:

Mrs. Milford Itz, Assistant Treasurer

Mrs. E.W. Wigman, 2nd Vice President

Mrs. C.W. Schott, President

Mrs. H.S. Vandenberg, Honorary President

Mrs. T.S. Ryan, Treasurer

Mrs. Wm. J. Lookadoo, Recording Secretary

Not present:

Mrs. Wm. G. Booth, 1st Vice President

Mrs. M.J. Asensio, Corresponding Secretary

 

Along with this photo, we found some documentation from the 1949-1950 and 1950-1951 AFOWC Boards of Governors, including this November 1951 "AFOWC Report," (their newsletter).  Click here to read the newsletter.  You may find it helpful to zoom in--it is printed in very small print.