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The first female pilot to break the sound barrier grew up in Bagdad, just south of Milton. Jacqueline “Jackie” Cochran was a record setter who also shattered the glass ceiling in aviation, earning induction into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in Dayton, Ohio in 1971.
U.S. Air Force Major Charles “Chuck” Yeager, left, and Jacqueline Cochran, winners of the 1954 Harmon International Aviation Awards as the world’s outstanding aviator and aviatrix, shown, July 4, 1954. Maj. Yeager was honored for his piloting the X-1A rocket-powered experimental aircraft to a speed of more than 1,600 miles per hour; Cochran for becoming the first woman ever to break through the sound barrier and for many speed records.
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