朱美嬌是二戰中女子空軍飛行隊1074名成員之一。
朱美嬌是二戰中女子空軍飛行隊1074名成員之一。 via Wings Across America
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Overlooked is a series of obituaries about remarkable people whose deaths, beginning in 1851, went unreported in The Times. This latest installment is from “Beyond the World War II We Know,” a series by The Times that documents lesser-known stories from the war.
「被遺漏的」是一系列傑出人物的訃告,自1851年以來,他們的死訊未被時報報導。最新一輯來自「我們所知的二戰之外」,這是時報的一個系列,記錄二戰中鮮為人知的故事。
They never met, but their early lives ran a strikingly similar course. They were both Chinese-American women who thwarted layers of prejudice and preconception to become World War II pilots. One died young, while transporting a fighter plane. The other lived to 89 and went on to become a scientist.
她們從未謀面,但她們的早年生活卻有著驚人的相似之處。她們都是華裔美國女性,克服了種種偏見和成見,成為二戰飛行員。其中一位在運送戰鬥機時英年早逝。另一位後來成為一名科學家,活到了89歲。
Their names were Hazel Ying Lee and Maggie Gee, and they were WASPs, or Women Airforce Service Pilots.
她們的名字是李月英(Hazel Ying Lee)和朱美嬌(Maggie Gee),她們是婦女空軍服務飛行隊(Women Airforce Service Pilots,簡稱WASP)的成員。
 
In 1942, as the Air Force faced a dearth of male pilots to sustain the war effort at home, the pilot Jacqueline Cochran persuaded the chief of the U.S. Army Air Force to recruit female pilots. More than 25,000 women applied. Only 1,830 were accepted into flight training. Of those, 1,074 completed the training.
1942年,美國空軍面臨男飛行員短缺的局面,無法滿足國內的戰爭需要,飛行員賈桂琳·科克倫(Jacqueline Cochran)說服美國陸軍航空軍司令招募女飛行員。超過2.5萬名女性申請。只有1830人被錄取接受飛行訓練。其中有1074人完成培訓。
For two years, these pilots flew nearly every type of aircraft. Their principal job was to ferry planes between bases. They also tested new planes, trained male pilots and flew damaged planes back to base for repair. They traveled in inclement weather and landed on unlighted runways at night. Thirty-eight of the women died in service.
兩年時間裡,這些飛行員幾乎駕駛了所有類型的飛機。她們的主要工作是在基地之間運送飛機,還負責測試新飛機,培訓男性飛行員,並將受損的飛機飛回基地進行維修。她們在惡劣的天氣下航行,夜間在沒有照明的跑道上降落。其中38名女性在服役期間身亡。
Gee, a third-generation Chinese American, was born Gee Mei Gue on Aug. 5, 1923, in Berkeley, Calif., one of six children. Her mother was Jung An Yoke, whose parents moved to California from a village in Guangzhou, China, in the 1870s. Her grandfather, Jung Sun Choy, settled on the Monterey Peninsula south of San Francisco and became a pioneer in the abalone business.
朱美嬌是第三代華裔美國人,1923年8月5日生於加州柏克萊,有五個兄弟姊妹。她的母親名叫榮安玉(Jung An Yoke,音),其父母於1870年代從中國廣州的一個村莊移民加州。她的外祖父榮生財(Jung Sun Choy,音)在舊金山以南的蒙特雷半島定居,並成為鮑魚經銷行業的一位先驅人物。
The family moved to San Francisco’s Chinatown in 1906, then to Berkeley.
1906年,這家人搬到了舊金山唐人街,然後又搬到了柏克萊。
The year after Gee was born, Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1924, which restricted immigration from Asia. Animosity toward the Chinese was growing, and the sentiments sometimes pervaded Gee’s childhood.
朱美嬌出生後第二年,國會通過了限制亞洲移民的1924年移民法。對華人的仇恨在增長,朱美嬌的童年不時感受到這種情緒。
She found a haven in the family’s Sunday outings to the Oakland airport to watch planes take off. “I loved how the vibrations echoed in my bones,” she told Marissa Moss, a children’s book author who wrote about Gee in “Sky High: The True Story of Maggie Gee” (2009). “Just being there, being part of it all, made me feel big and powerful.”
週日全家去往奧克蘭機場看飛機起飛的活動,給她帶去了慰藉。「我喜歡那種鑽進骨頭裡的震顫,」她對兒童讀物作家瑪麗莎·莫斯(Marissa Moss)說,後者的《高空——朱美嬌的真實故事》(Sky High: the True Story of Maggie Gee)一書於2009年出版。「光是待在那裡,成為這一切的一部分,就讓我覺得自己很強大。」
Gee would scan the skies for Amelia Earhart, who frequently flew into Oakland. And once, Gee spotted her. “When I waved, she saw me and waved back,” Gee said.
朱美嬌會仰望天空,尋找經常飛往奧克蘭的阿米莉亞·埃爾哈特(Amelia Earhart)。有一次,朱美嬌看到了她。「我向她揮手,她看見了我,也向我揮手,」朱美嬌說。
In 1941, when she was 18, Gee enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley, to study physics, but she dropped out a few months later when the United States entered World War II to work at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard, in Vallejo, Calif., near San Francisco. Her mother was a welder there, and Gee worked in the drafting department.
1941年,18歲的朱美嬌就讀於加利福尼亞大學柏克萊分校,攻讀物理學,但幾個月後美國加入第二次世界大戰,她旋即輟學,在舊金山附近的瓦列霍的馬雷島海軍造船廠工作。她的母親是那裡的焊工,朱美嬌在製圖部門工作。
Aviation soon beckoned. Gee and two co-workers pooled their funds, bought a car for $25 and drove to Texas for six months of training at Avenger Field in Sweetwater, 40 miles west of Abilene.
她很快開始了飛行的生涯。朱美嬌和兩名同事湊了25美元買了一輛汽車,開車前往得克薩斯州,在阿比林以西40英里的斯威特沃特的復仇者機場進行了6個月的培訓。
“I learned to parachute and make emergency landings, Gee said. “We did the same intense work the male pilots had to do.”
「我學會了使用降落傘以及緊急降落,」朱美嬌說。「男飛行員必須要做的艱巨工作,我們也一樣在做。」
Gee was occasionally mistaken for the Japanese enemy. She knew she stood out. “I felt like an exhibit at the country fair, a two-headed cow, the amazing Chinese-American WASP,” she said.
朱美嬌偶爾被誤認為是日本敵人。她知道自己和別人不一樣。她說:「我感覺就像是一頭在鄉下集會上展覽的雙頭牛,那個非凡的華裔美國人女子飛行員。」
The only other Chinese-American woman in the program was Lee.
該計劃只有兩名華裔美國人女子飛行員,另一名是李月英。
李月英(左)與奧特姆·日內瓦·斯拉克在得克薩斯州斯威特沃特的復仇者機場。李月英在那裡接受了6個月的訓練後,成為一名女子飛行隊員。
李月英(左)與奧特姆·日內瓦·斯拉克在得克薩斯州斯威特沃特的復仇者機場。李月英在那裡接受了6個月的訓練後,成為一名女子飛行隊員。 via Alan Rosenberg
Ah Ying Lee was born on Aug. 25, 1912, in Portland, Ore. Her father, Lee Yuet, was a businessman who owned an import-export business. Her mother, Wong Sau Lan, was a homemaker.
李月英於1912年8月25日出生於奧勒岡州波特蘭,父親李悅(Lee Yuet,音)是一位進出口商。她的母親黃秀蘭(Wong Sau Lan,音)是家庭主婦。
After graduating from high school in 1929, Lee got a job as an elevator operator at H. Liebes & Company, a department store in Portland, where she also did stockroom work.
1929年高中畢業後,李月英在波特蘭的H·列比斯百貨公司擔任電梯司機,並在那裡的庫房工作。

 

She joined the Chinese Flying Club of Portland and in 1932 graduated from aviation school with her pilot’s license.
她加入了波特蘭華人飛行俱樂部,並於1932年從航空學校畢業,取得飛行員執照。
“I think that for Hazel, flying a plane symbolized not just flight but a freedom she didn’t have on the ground,” said Alan Rosenberg, a filmmaker who made “A Brief Flight” (2002), a documentary about Lee.
電影製片人艾倫·羅森伯格(Alan Rosenberg)製作了一部關於李月英的紀錄片《短暫的飛行》(A Brief Flight, 2002),他說:「我認為,對於李月英來說,駕駛飛機不僅象徵著飛行,還象徵著她在地面上所沒有的自由。」
In Portland, while learning to fly, she met Louie Yen-chung, a student from China who was training as a cadet. Their romance endured for more than a decade, even with long stretches of time spent miles — sometimes continents — apart.
在波特蘭學習飛行的同時,她遇到了正在接受軍事訓練的中國學生雷炎均。儘管長期相隔兩地——甚至有時相距兩個大洲,他們的愛情堅守了十多年。
In 1933, in the buildup to the Second Sino-Japanese war, Lee hoped to fly for the Chinese Air Force. But the Chinese government turned her down, saying women were too “unstable” to fly, her sister Frances Tong told The Portland Oregonian in 2003. Instead, Lee flew commercial and private flights.
1933年,在第二次中日戰爭前夕,李月英希望效力於中國空軍。但是她的姐姐弗朗西斯·唐(Frances Tong,音)在2003年告訴波特蘭的《奧勒岡人報》(The Oregonian),中國政府拒絕了她,說女人太過「不穩定」,不適合飛行。李月英轉而去駕駛商業和私人航班。
Lee returned to the United States in December 1938, living in New York. She graduated from the WASP training program in 1943 and was sent to Romulus, Mich.
李月英於1938年12月回到美國,住在紐約。她於1943年從女子飛行隊員培訓計劃畢業,並被派往密西根州羅穆盧斯。
Because WASPs were Civil Service employees and not military personnel, they had to pay for their food and lodging. There were no flight suits for women, and Lee’s frame, at 5’3” and 115 pounds, was overwhelmed by even the smallest of the men’s uniforms.
由於女子飛行隊員屬於公務員,不是軍事人員,因此他們的伙食住宿必須自費。沒有女性可穿的飛行服,李月英身高5英寸3英寸、重115磅,即使是最小號的男性飛行服也還是太大。

 

On Oct. 9, 1943, she married Louie, whom she called “Cliff,” by then a major in the Chinese Air Force. “KNOT TIED TODAY,” she wrote in a telegram to another pilot. “CAVU FOR CLIFF AND ME.” CAVU, an acronym used by pilots, stands for “ceiling and visibility unlimited.”
1943年10月9日,她與雷炎均結婚了,她管他叫「凱瑞夫」,那時他是一名中國空軍少校。「今日喜結連理,」她在電報中寫給另一位飛行員。「凱瑞夫和我CAVU。」CAVU是飛行員使用的首字母縮寫,代表「天空視野無垠」(ceiling and visibility unlimited)。
After their wedding, Louie returned to China, and Lee did not hear from her husband for six months. “She said she was sure that he was either dead or captured,” said Virginia Luttrell Krahn, another WASP, in a 1997 oral history interview.
結婚後,雷炎均回到中國,李月英有六個月沒有聽到丈夫的消息。另一名女子飛行隊員維吉尼亞·盧特雷爾·克拉恩(Virginia Luttrell Krahn)在1997年的一次口述歷史採訪中說:「她說她確信他已經死了,或被俘虜了。」
Glimpses of the racial prism through which Lee was viewed are sprinkled through archives maintained at Texas Woman’s University in Denton, Texas. Another pilot, for instance, referred to Lee as “the little Chinese girl” in a letter she wrote to family.
德克薩斯州丹頓市德州女子大學(Texas Woman’s University)保存的檔案中,可以瞥見種族稜鏡下的李月英。例如,另一位飛行員在給家人的一封信中稱李為「那個中國小姑娘」。
Like Gee, Lee was mistaken for Japanese. In her 1997 interview, Krahn said Lee had been flying one day in Texas when her engine failed and she landed in a field. When Lee got out of the plane, “here is this farmer coming at her with a pitchfork,” Krahn recounted.
像朱美嬌一樣,李月英曾被誤認為日本人。克拉恩在1997年的一次採訪中說,李月英有一天在德克薩斯州飛行,當時她的發動機發生了故障,她降落在一片農田裡。當李月英從飛機上下來時,「一個農夫抄起乾草叉向她衝過來,」克拉恩回憶道。
“He said, ‘The Japs have landed, the Japs have landed.’ And Hazel said, ‘No, I am an American, I am an American,’” Krahn said. “This was too much for these farmers. There was no way that they were going to believe that Hazel was a Chinese, not only a Chinese, but a woman Chinese pilot.”
「他說,『日本人降落了,日本人降落了。’而李月英說,『不,我是美國人,我是美國人,’」克拉恩說。「對於這些農民來說,這太難理解了。他們無法相信李月英是中國人,不僅是華人,還是華裔女飛行員。」
In recounting the incident that night over dinner in the mess hall, Lee “had the whole line in hysterics,” Krahn added.
克萊恩還說,當晚在食堂吃晚飯時她說起這件事,李月英「讓所有人都捧腹大笑」。

 

Lee was one of 132 pilots chosen to fly so-called “pursuit” planes, now known as fighter aircraft. Among her duties was to fly new Bell P-63 Kingcobra fighters from the manufacturing plant in Buffalo to Great Falls, Mont., for eventual delivery to the Soviet Union.
李月英是132名被選中駕駛所謂的「追擊」機——現在叫做戰鬥機——的飛行員之一。她的職責之一是將新的貝爾P-63眼鏡王蛇戰鬥機從布法羅的製造廠飛到蒙大拿州的大瀑布城,最終交付給蘇聯。
In November 1944, Lee was on one such mission with a group of pilots on Thanksgiving Day, the first clear day in a while.
1944年11月,李月英在感恩節那天——很久以來的第一個晴天——與一群飛行員一起執行了這樣的任務。
Krahn, who also flew that day, recounted the chain of events.
當天也執行了飛行任務的克拉恩回憶了那天發生的一系列事件。
“Shortly after we took off, Jeff moved over close to me and pointed to his earphone and raised his hand,” she said, referring to Jeff Russell, another pilot. “His radio was out.”
「起飛後不久,傑夫飛得離我很近,指著他的耳機,舉起了手。」她指的是另一位飛行員傑夫·拉塞爾(Jeff Russell)。她說:「他的無線電壞了。」
The crew stopped in Bismarck, N.D., hoping to have Russell’s radio fixed, but since it was a holiday, they were out of luck; the group continued on to Montana.
機組去了北達科他州俾斯麥,希望在那裡修理拉塞爾的無線電,結果運氣不好,那天正好是節假日。機組繼續前往蒙大拿州。
“By this time there were so many planes circling at Great Falls and ready to land,” Krahn said. “The air was just filled with P-63’s.”
「這一次,大瀑布上空盤旋了很多準備降落的飛機,」克拉恩說「天上全是P-63。」
After landing safely, Krahn saw, to her horror, that at the end of the runway two planes were too close together, one above the other.
安全著陸後,克拉恩驚恐地看到,在跑道盡頭有兩架飛機靠得太近了,一架在另一架上方。
“When the tower saw what was happening they said ‘pull up, pull up.’ And the only plane that could hear it was Hazel,” Krahn recalled. “And she pulled up right into Jeff, who heard nothing.”
「塔台看到後直喊『拉升,拉升’。只有李月英聽到了警告,」克拉恩回憶道。「她便拉升,直接撞上了傑夫。傑夫什麼都沒聽到。」
Both aircraft burst into flames over the runway.
兩架飛機都在跑道上起火。
Russell survived with minor injuries. Lee was trapped in her plane and was badly burned. She died two days later, on Nov. 25, 1944. She was 32.
拉塞爾撿回一條命,只受了輕傷。李月英困在了飛機上,被嚴重燒傷。兩天後,即1944年11月25日,她去世了,享年32歲。
“She was conscious the entire time,” Krahn said. “She never complained. The doctor said they had never seen anyone so brave.”
「她一直都是清醒的,」克拉恩說。「她從不抱怨。醫生說,他們從未見過如此勇敢的人。」
Lee’s husband, it turned out, was still alive. He died in 1999 in Taipei, Taiwan.
後來人們得知,李月英的丈夫還活著。他於1999年在台灣台北去世。
Lee was the 38th — and the last — WASP to die in the line of duty.
李月英是第38位,也是最後一位殉職的女子飛行隊員。
The program was disbanded on Dec. 20, 1944, in anticipation of the end of the war, and the pilots faded into the housewifery and child rearing that defined the role of women in the 1950s.
由於預期的戰爭將結束,該計劃於1944年12月20日被取消,女飛行員們的形象在相夫教子的生活中逐漸淡漠——那是1950年代女性的角色定義。
Gee was an exception. She returned to Berkeley, earned a bachelor’s degree in physics, then worked on weapons systems at the Lawrence Livermore Berkeley National Laboratory.
朱美嬌是一個例外。她回到柏克萊,獲得物理學學士學位,然後在勞倫斯·利弗莫爾·柏克萊國家實驗室(Lawrence Livermore Berkeley National Laboratory)研究武器系統。
“She was that generation of Chinese-American women who broke out of the confines of isolation in the community,” said Harvey Dong, a lecturer in Asian-American and Asian diaspora studies at Berkeley.
柏克萊分校的亞裔美國人和亞裔僑民研究講師哈維·董(Harvey Dong,音)說:「她就是那一代擺脫了社群孤立界限的華裔美國女性。」
Gee died on Feb. 1, 2013. She was 89. Warren Heckrotte, her partner of nearly 50 years, died in 2019.
朱美嬌於2013年2月1日去世,享年89歲。和她廝守近50年的伴侶沃倫·赫克羅特(Warren Heckrotte)於2019年去世。
In 1977, after years of fighting for recognition, WASPs were granted veteran status with full benefits. In 2010 around 200 of the surviving pilots were presented with the Congressional Gold Medal by President Barack Obama. Gee was one of them.
經過多年的爭取,女子飛行隊員在1977年被授予退伍軍人身份,享受全額津貼。2010年,貝拉克·歐巴馬(Barack Obama)總統向大約200名尚在世的飛行員頒發國會金質獎章。朱美嬌就是其中之一。

Katie Hafner是《紐約時報》前記者,也是《巫師熬夜之處:互聯網的起源》(Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of The Internet)一書的合著者。

翻譯:晉其角、鄧妍

 

 

https://cn.nytimes.com/obits/20200526/hazel-ying-lee-and-maggie-gee-overlooked/zh-hant/dual/

 

 

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