Flyer

By: Kate Aspengren

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Synopsis: Drama / 4 m., 5 f. (to play 21 roles). / Unit set. / While the Project Mercury astronauts carried America's hopes and dreams into space, NASA was busy training another elite corps of pilots, some with more flight experience than John Glenn and company. None of this group soared into space; they were women and here is their story. Flyer focuses on the hopes and dreams of one young pilot in particular. Fran Douglas rises above family scorn and her fiancee's condescension to join the women's corps. Action scenes involving NASA, Congress and Fran's family are intertwined with dream sequences about an intrepid black barnstormer, Bessie Coleman, who died in the 1920s performing an aerial feat. Bessie warns Fran about the many obstacles she will have to overcome to achieve her dream, a dream left unfulfilled when NASA pulled the plug on training women for space flight. / "This story needed to be told and Ms. Aspengren tells it brilliantly." The Westsider.