Geraldine "Geri" Nyman

Nyman, Geraldine "Geri"
of Casa Grande and Phoenix, Arizona, died on December 30, 2011. She was 91. Geri was in the first class of 25 Women Airforce Service Pilots ("WASPs") - the women who flew military aircraft in World War II. One of the proudest moments in Geri's life was when she and Van, her husband of 69 years, attended the March, 2010 ceremony in Washington D.C. at which the WASPs received the Congressional Gold Medal for their service and sacrifices. But the WASPs didn't make Geri; she was plucky from the start. Geri was born in Emmett, Idaho in 1920, just when the Pacific Northwest was getting its ten year head start on the Great Depression. Geri spent some of her early years with her paternal grandmother, Mattie, a beaver trapper who lived on a remote Wyoming ranch. One of Geri's favorite pictures is astride her enormous horse, accompanied by her dog in front of the nearest one-room school house. But most of Geri's youth was spent accompanying her parents - an itinerant barber and a fruit packer - as they traveled from town to town and camp to camp in their Model A roadster in search of entrepreneurial opportunities. The life apparently suited her; by the time she graduated from high school, Geri had skipped two grades, led her high school debate team, and learned to sew, weave, crochet and knit every fiber she could find. After two years of college, and a few months of small jobs, Geri decided that she wanted to fly. So she agreed to do the bookkeeping at the local air field in exchange for flying lessons. She quickly became a flight instructor, moved on to taking hunters into the wilderness, and then graduated to piloting multi-engine planes for smoke jumpers. By the time the WASPs were formed in 1943, Geri was a 23 year old with over 2000 hours flying multi-engine aircraft. It was just the experience the WASPs were looking for. After the war Geri helped her new husband, Van (whom she had met on a troop train) earn his flying license, and they moved to Alaska, where they owned and operated a bush pilot service. After four years - which produced three sons (Paul, Ken and Bruce) and an airplane- shaped hole in the ice - they moved to the mining town of Wallace, Idaho, where Geri owned and managed a dime store while Van completed his engineering degree. The family lived in the basement of the dime store while Van and Geri saved for a three month trip to Europe, which they memorialized with Geri's pen and Van's Leica camera. 50 years later, the three sons can still recall almost every day of that trip. While in Idaho, Geri was the only woman on the Wallace City Council, attended the 1964 National Republican Convention, helped Barry Goldwater win one of the least conservative counties in Idaho, was PTA parent of the year, and was active in Eastern Star, PEO, the League of Women Voters, and the Episcopal Church. And in 1970, she was in charge of the Census for Eastern Washington and North Idaho. Meanwhile, she sewed her sons' shirts, knitted their sweaters, darned their socks and supervised as they washed and ironed their own clothes. Geri and Van moved to Casa Grande in 1971. In 1976, Geri helped manage Barry Goldwater's Senatorial campaign in Pinal County - which he had never won. He won the county by one vote. In the 1980's and 1990's, she won several first prizes for her pine needle baskets at the Arizona State Fair. Geri was a dynamo, and she will be remembered. She is survived by her husband and best friend, Van (93), by her three sons, three terrific daughters-in-law (Kathy, Kristine and Pam), eight grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. Donations can be made to the Beatitudes Campus of Care or to Hospice of the Valley.