H azel Ying Lee was the first Chinese-American woman to earn a pilot’s license, the first Chinese-American WASP pilot, and the last WASP to die in service of her country. She was born in 1912 in Portland, Oregon to first-generation Chinese-American immigrants. Following graduation from high school in 1929, Lee took a job as an elevator operator in a Portland, Oregon department store—one of the few jobs available to Asian-American women at the time. Three years later, she joined the Chinese Flying Club of Portland, took flying lessons, and earned her pilot’s license in 1932.

The following year, Lee travelled to China to enlist in the Chinese Air Force to aid in the fight against the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Though the Chinese Air Force declined her enlistment application because of her gender, Lee did other war work in China including flying supply transports for a commercial airline. In 1937, after the Chinese officially declared war against Japan, Lee tried to enlist again and was again rejected. This time, she returned to the United States and worked in supply procurement for the Chinese government.

Following the Japanese invasion of Pearl Harbor in 1941, the United States joined in the World War II conflict, and Hazel Ying Lee signed up to became a WASP—Women Airforce Service Pilot—in 1943, in service of the United States. Once she completed her six-month training, Lee was one of only 138 WASPs assigned to ferry fighter planes. She became a leader among the WASPs and enjoyed teaching the other women about Chinese culture and cooking. In addition to the challenges of war, prejudice against Asians in the United States ran high, and Lee experienced it first hand while on the job: when she had to make an emergency landing in a Kansas wheat field, the farmer held her at gunpoint until her identity as an American could be verified.

In November of 1944, just one month prior to the termination of the WASP program, Lee was assigned to land at an airfield in Montana. When she and the pilots she was flying with emerged from the clouds, they saw dozens of planes circling the airfield. As they prepared to land, Air Traffic Control ordered Lee and the plane above her to both pull up. Due to a broken radio in the other plane, Lee’s was the only plane to pull up, resulting in a crash. Hazel Ying Lee died of her injuries a couple of days later, making her the last WASP to die in service of her country.

Biography provided by Brenda Mandt, The Museum of Flight