Mary Feik overhauled her first automobile engine when she was 13, then turned to aircraft engines and military aircraft at the age of 18, eventually teaching aircraft maintenance to crew chiefs and mechanics for the U.S. Army Air Force in 1942. During WWII, Feik became an expert on many military aircraft and is credited with becoming the first woman engineer in research and development in the Air Technical Service Command’s Engineering Division at Wright Field, Ohio.
At a time when men dominated the cockpits of military aircraft, Mary Feik logged more than 5,000 hours as a B-29 flight engineer, engineering observer, and pilot in fighter, attack, bomber, cargo, and training aircraft. When the Lockheed P-80 entered service, she was issued a brand-new model nicknamed “Mary’s Little Lamb” in her honor.
While flying a P-59 jet fighter during gunnery training, she witnessed tracer rounds coming within feet of the airplane’s nose. “I was the only person to fly open cockpit in a jet airplane… the airflow over this little windscreen was so great that I think I was off the seat no matter how tightly I was strapped down,” she explains. The job of a test engineer was a dangerous one.
She also used her expertise to design high-performance and jet fighter pilot transition trainers and aircraft maintenance trainers. The pilot training manuals and technical engineering reports she authored were distributed throughout the armed forces.
Mary Feik retired from the National Air and Space Museum’s (NASM) Paul E. Garber Restoration Facility as a Restoration Specialist. She restores antique and classic aircraft and has participated in the construction of reproduction WWI aircraft, helping restore NASM’s 1910 Wiseman-Cook aircraft, a WWI Spad XIII fighter, and a 1930 Northrop “Alpha” mail plane.
A recipient of many aerospace honors, in 1994 Feik was inducted into the Women in Aviation Pioneer Hall of Fame. Additionally, she earned the FAA’s Charles Taylor Master Mechanic Award in recognition of her many outstanding contributions to aviation safety. Fei] was the first woman to ever receive the award, named for the Wright brothers’ mechanic and engineer.
Mary Feik’s proudest professional honor was bestowed in 2003. “My ultimate honor [is] the Civil Air Patrol cadet achievement created in my name.”
From Feik family sources and Maryland Aloft: A Celebration of Aviators, Airfields, and Airspace by Edmund Preston, Barry A. Lanman and John R. Breihan.
