Evelyn Greenblatt Howren Papers

Evelyn Sylvia Greenblatt was born in Atlanta, Georgia on July 28, 1917 to Samuel R. and Bessie Shear Greenblatt. She graduated from The Westminster Schools in 1934 and then attended Vanderbilt University. She took up flying in 1939 and began her formal flying career in June of 1940 when she started taking flight instruction at what was then called Candler Field, now Atlanta Hartsfield International Airport. She received her private pilot rating and joined the first all-women's squadron of newly formed Civil Air Patrol in 1941. In June of 1942, she became one of the first class of eight women Air Traffic Controller trainees and was one of only three who were pilots. In November of 1942, she became one of only thirty members of the first class of Women's Air Service Pilots (WASPs).

After the war, she returned to civilian life and became a flight instructor. She was one of the organizers of the Women's Aero Club of Atlanta in 1947. She finally retired permanently in 1983, but still continued to fly and have all the current flight qualifications and ratings.

In 1969, at age 52, Ms. Greenblatt married her longtime friend and business partner, Hillman V. (Butch) Howren (1924-1997), who was also a World War II aviator. Butch died in 1997 and Evelyn passed away less than a year later on February 9, 1998. She was 80 years old.