Ladies Courageous (1944)

Interesting facts

Ladies Courageous is a 1944 war film based on the novel Looking For Trouble (1941) by Virginia Spencer Cowles. Directed by John Rawlins, the film stars Loretta Young and Geraldine Fitzgerald. It tells the story of the paramilitary Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron formed in the United States during World War II. Film historians and scholars consider Ladies Courageous an à-clef story of famed aviator Jacqueline Cochran and test pilot Nancy Harkness Love's work to mobilize women pilots to contribute to the war effort.

Production

Ladies Courageous featured the onscreen notice, "... sanctioned by the United States Army Air Forces as the official motion-picture story of the Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron, now known as the Wasps, Women's Air Force Service Pilots." The genesis of the film came in 1942 when Colonel Mason Wright, the head of the War Department Bureau of Public Relations motion picture branch, contacted producer Walter Wanger to make a film about the WAFS.

Wanger argued that considerable financial commitment had already been made, but faced with opposition from the military, relented and agreed to the 13 changes that were demanded. Principal photography for Ladies Courageous at both Universal Pictures Studios and location shooting at the Long Beach Army Air Field in California began on August 23 and continued to early November 1943.

The film was the first screenplay of prolific radio writer Doris Gilbert, daughter of Louis Wolfe Gilbert.

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