Dawn Mourning of Double Oak will retire from the cockpit after more than 40 years, just like her father did before her. Now, one of her kids will be taking over the yoke.
Mourning started her flying career with the Air Force because her dad, also a pilot, said if she got a scholarship she could keep the money and he would pay for her school. Well, the best scholarship came from ROTC.
She ended up sticking out a career in the military and spent time in Oklahoma, Louisiana and Mississippi training new, 22-year-old pilots. She was only 24 when she started.
“That was always exciting,” she said. “You’re going 500 miles per hour and three feet away from another plane next to you.”
Often, she was the only woman in her flight, which is a smaller group within a squadron, but she never noticed.
“I didn’t think of it as unique,” said Mourning. “I had brothers growing up, I was a geologist in college and I was always around men. It never occurred to me that it was unusual.”
After she wrapped up her military career, Mourning moved to Lewisville in 1991 when she got a job flying commercially for American Airlines.
She would fly trips that lasted two or three days at the most, then she was back home.
In 1992, she moved to Double Oak, where she has lived ever since. There, she has raised three kids, two daughters and a son, with her husband who worked in home building.
After the terrorist attacks on 9/11, Mourning felt she needed a schedule that worked better with her family, especially after growing up with her dad being gone five or six days at a time when he flew for the military.
“Since 9/11, I’ve just done day trips, which is out to California and back or something local,” she said. “Because most American Airlines trips now are four or five days long and that’s hard on a family.”
From the three kids in her family, only one chose to carry on the legacy of flying.
Somebody had asked her son when he was nine years old if he wanted to fly like his mom.
“He said no,” said Mourning, laughing. “He said that was a girl’s job.”
Instead, her daughter, Brooke Lancaster, became the third-generation pilot.
She went to school for a bit, but it didn’t work out. Her mom said she had to do something instead, so she started to fly. Recently, she finished training for the second-in-command position.
Now, she is working with a company that gets contracts to fly private planes.
“I always grew up knowing that’s what I wanted to do,” said Lancaster.
It was also a source of pride for Lancaster, being able to say that her mom was a pilot when there weren’t many women in the industry.
“I was so proud that my mom was a pilot, in general, but also that she was part of the early stages of women in the Air Force,” she said. “Growing up, I never knew she was part of such a small percentage until people starting tell me ‘oh, it’s your mom that flies,’ it was a really cool thing to experience.”
With a family of her own now, Lancaster said it was impressive that her mom was able to be so present in their lives while being a pilot. She said her mom made sacrifices in her career to be there for them, but it was still hard her to see her go when she did leave.
“Anytime she would leave, we would sit and watch her drive off, crying, as little kids,” she said. “Then we were counting down the hours until she got back. Looking back on it now, she wasn’t gone that much because she made it a point to stay home.”
Lancaster said she doesn’t remember any Christmas, big holiday or performance that her mother missed during her childhood.
“Having kids now, I understand why she made the sacrifice and I’m so thankful that she got into the business at the right time,” she said.
The right time meant she was able to become a first-seat officer quickly, so she had more control over her schedule–when she flew and where she flew. That’s what Lancaster is hoping for working with a contracted crew.
With her mother retiring, Lancaster will be the only one in the cockpit for a while. But, she might be raising a fourth-generation pilot.
“It’s fun to think that maybe my kids could be the fourth generation,” she said. “So, I’m trying to instill that love of flying, but also the freedom of the job and how fun it is.”
It’s exactly how Mourning described it.
“Flying and seeing things from a God’s-eye view, is wonderful,” she said. “And the excitement and adrenaline–it’s a kick in the pants.”
Mourning said she doesn’t know what she’ll do after retirement, but it will involve her grandchildren and staying busy.
“I’ll have to find something in volunteering or maybe equine therapy,” she said. “I have a pony here in the backyard so I’m going to start with her.”
Lancaster said her mom will find something to do that will help the community.
“I think she’s going to have a hard time not flying,” she said. “But she’s very much a busybody, so she’ll find something to do.”
The sun is setting on Dawn’s pilot career, but her hard work and dedication helped pave the way for women in the flying industry.
“You look at it now, and there are lots and lots of women–and rightly so,” said Mourning. “It has always been a man’s job, but it didn’t have to be. It was all about knowledge and women do it just as well.”
