Lt Col Kathy LaSauce USAF Ret. Oral History - Interview 3, Part 1

title:

Lt Col Kathy LaSauce USAF Ret. Oral History - Interview 3, Part 1

creator:

LaSauce, Kathy "Hot Lips" (1949 November 14 -

subject:

Air Force

description:

Part 1 of 2 in interview 3 of 3. In this follow-up interview, Cydnee Totzke asks about several topics that Kathy LaSauce discussed in Part 2 of the interview. Her father, a Seabee during World War II, spent years updating the cabin they moved into when she was young, adding things like indoor plumbing over the years. They also grew their own vegetables, and both parents worked multiple jobs at once to support the family and help Kathy go to college. While she isn’t sure if she was dyslexic, she certainly struggled in school when she was younger because she was sick so often, including with diphtheria and scarlet fever. Luckily, a teacher noticed that her struggles likely came from missing so much school, so he led her and a few similar students in extra study time in the gym. In high school Kathy directed the pep band, so in officer training school she decided she wanted to direct the choir. It grew several times larger by the time she graduated, and gave married couples going through OTS together a place to see each other more often, since training was so gender-segregated. After graduating from Ithaca College in 1971 Kathy initially thought of becoming a teacher, but was disappointed in the quality of education for high schoolers. Instead, she applied to work for Pan Am since she was conversational in French and German. Although she felt she did well in the interview, she was still waiting for a response when she decided to look into the Air Force. By the time she got a job offer, she was already committed to the Air Force. She also reiterates that she’s glad she never learned to type in high school or college, because she would’ve been stationed at a desk doing paperwork in the Air Force if she did. No one could push her to do desk work as a maintenance officer, unlike other women who became maintenance officers alongside her. She also describes her time at Travis Air Force Base from 1973 to 1975, where she developed a refurbishment program for C-5s and C-141s that were returning from the evacuation of Vietnam. The program she developed became standard for Military Airlift Command. She also discusses incidents of sexual harassment and stalking that she faced. She also ends by discussing the early struggles women pilots had using the bathroom on planes like the C-130, where it was just a bucket at the end of the ramp, and how she got the call sign “Hot Lips” at undergraduate pilot training.

publisher:

Military Women's Memorial Foundation

contributor:

Totzke, Cydnee

date:

2022-02-27

type:

Audio

format:

Born Digital

identifier:

1543.03; 2022.1543

source:

Bobbi Knapp - SIU

language:

English

relation:

052629

coverage:

Vietnam War (1964-1975) | Operation Desert Shield/Storm—1990-1991 | 1972-1992

rights:

Unrestricted