The Flying Bowmans

The Flying Bowmans of Texas were a family team.  Father Les, mother Marguerite “Martie”, and daughter Lorraine “Larnie” all flew. Les worked for the Kinner Engine and Aircraft Company in production and testing. Martie was a member of the National Air Race Association, and the Ninety-Nines, an International Organization of Women Pilots. She was also a highly successful air race pilot. Larnie, known as “The Flying Texanita,” learned to fly by the time she was 12 years old. The whole family gave wing-walking a try – Larnie starting at the age of eight. The Flying Bowmans flew with their pets, but the Bowman Family archives don’t reveal if they also tried wing-walking. Pets that accompanied them in their Waco UIC cabin biplane were Waco the cat and Cub, the Chow dog. This would have been in the early 1930s. Later, Les and Martie can be seen with Duchess, a Great Dan, in front of their Ryan Navion. NAV-4 (c. 1948).