Mary Bell (3 December 1903 – 6 February 1979), nicknamed "Paddy", was an Australian aviator and founding leader of the Women's Air Training Corps, a volunteer organisation that provided support to the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) during World War II. She later helped establish the Women's Auxiliary Australian Air Force (WAAAF), the first and largest women's wartime service in the country, which grew to more than 18,000 members by 1944. Born Mary Fernandes in Launceston, Tasmania, she married John Bell, an RAAF officer, in 1923 and obtained a pilot's licence in 1927. Given temporary command of the WAAAF on its formation in 1941, she was passed over as its inaugural director in favour of corporate executive Clare Stevenson. Bell refused the post of deputy director and resigned, but later rejoined and served until the final months of the war. She and her husband became farmers after leaving the military.

Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Bell_%28aviator%29

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1945:

Indonesian National Revolution: Following the killing of British officer Brigadier A. W. S. Mallaby a few weeks earlier, British forces retaliated by attacking Surabaya. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Surabaya

1969:

The children's television series Sesame Street (puppeteer Caroll Spinney pictured) premiered in the United States. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sesame_Street

1975:

SS Edmund Fitzgerald, the largest ship on North America's Great Lakes, sank in Lake Superior with the loss of 29 lives. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Edmund_Fitzgerald

2009:

Ships of the South Korean and North Korean navies skirmished off Daecheong Island in the Yellow Sea. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Daecheong

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

sumac: 1. Any of various shrubs or small trees of the genus Rhus and other genera in Anacardiaceae, particularly the elm-leaved sumac, Sicilian sumac, or tanner's sumac (Rhus coriaria). 2. Dried and chopped-up leaves and stems of a plant of the genus Rhus, particularly the tanner's sumac (see sense 1), used for dyeing and tanning leather or for medicinal purposes. 3. A sour spice popular in the Eastern Mediterranean, made from the berries of tanner's sumac. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sumac

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

All writers … have an obligation to our readers: it's the obligation to write true things, especially important when we are creating tales of people who do not exist in places that never were — to understand that truth is not in what happens but what it tells us about who we are. Fiction is the lie that tells the truth, after all.   --Neil Gaiman https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman