While there is more information on the Pink Lady in all my sources than what I have listed below, I have only added information that seemed to be to be the most definitive. If anyone has any comments or corrections, please don't hesitate to post them!

lockheedvega.jpg Rolled out of the Lockheed-Vega production facility in Burbank, California in December, 1945, the Pink Lady was then only known as a B-17G-85-VE Fortress, serial number 44-8846, and construction number of 8246.

Too often overlooked, it would not be right to begin the history of any aircraft without discussing those who made its existence even possible. Already, images I have found in a national photographic database provide an interesting view of the production stage (though concerning the construction of B-17F in 1942), that are often overlooked by the general public. Though there are the expected production photos displaying an endless number of aircraft parts in various stages of production where the subject is not man, but machine:

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there is also the unexpected photos where the human element jumps out at you. Whether it be scenes of factory workers getting on a bus to go back home, a colorful shirt that you might imagine wearing on the weekend, such images really remind me of the importance of the people in such an endeavour.

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She was delivered to the United States Army and Air Force on January 17th 1945 at Cheyenne.

B-17 bombers like 8846 that were built late in the war were left unpainted, both to save weight and because there was less of a threat that the airfields in Europe would be bombed by the Luftwaffe. The only real paint that was applied to them was olive drab patches on the fuselage in front of the cockpit windows and on the inner sides of the engines. This was to prevent or reduce the amount of glare from sunlight that was reflected into the cockpit.

When 8846 was first made, the only marking she had was the number 48846 written on the vertical stabilizer, in 15-inch tall black numbers, in the 45° font of the USAAF.

On March 1st, 1945, 8846 was flown to Polebrook, England, where she would be assigned to the of the 351st Bomber Group of the 511th Bomber Squadron.

Below is a photo in which you can see the nose and crew of the Pink Lady when stationed in Polebrook...

Rear from left: 'S/Sgt. Phil Povlotsky,Lt. Eugene Leone, Lt. Howard F. Smith, S/Sgt. Kenneth A. Morris. Front, S/Sgt. John R. M. O'Neill, S/Sgt. Robert Smith, T/Sgt. John Snyder, T/Sgt. James Morphew'.

Source: Ken Harbour, The 351st Bomb Group in WWII, p. 140.
available at freespace.virgin.net/ken.harbour/index.htm

Crew and the Pink Lady 1945

This photo was taken in 1945 while the Pink Lady was stationed in Polebrook, England as part of the 351st Bomb Group. It is showing the original markings of the 511th squadron, where the aircraft was given the letter M as an identifier (the squadron's ID was DS). As you can see, the Pink Lady was in the usual unpainted aluminum typical of B17Gs, and is in mint condition.

Additionally, it is noteworthy to see that there is no nose artwork at the time of this photo. In fact, when B-17s had nose art, crews posed by it to help identify themselves with their aircraft. It is therefore evident that the only way to identify the Pink Lady in the same photo frame as a portrait of the crew was to have them pose by the "M" painted on the chin turret.

It is interesting to compare this with the photo of the post-"Memphis Belle" configuration which you may see in my first entry "Clear the Prop!" below...

When assigned to the 511th, she would be given the markings of the squadron, which were:

  • M on nose turret
  • Vertical stabilizer: Black Triangle (48" tall) with white J (40" tall), angled red stripe, black serial number 48846 (15" tall) painted 96" below top of vertical stabilizer, and in front of rudder. Black call letter M (24" tall) painted below the serial number.
  • Fuselage: M DS in 72"-tall black (insignia blue?) letters seperated by the USAAF logo (25"-long side bars, 50"-diameter circle) which was located 50" in front of the front edge of the waist gunner's window on the left side, and 50" from the back edge of the waist gunner's window.
  • Top left wing: USAAF star logo: 35" side bars, and a 70" diameter circle (total width of 140"). This was located 13 feet from the wingtip.
  • Lower right wing: USAAF star logo: 35" side bars, and a 70" diameter circle (total width of 140"). This was located 13 feet from the wingtip.

At that time, there were no de-icer boots on the leading edges of the wings or stabilizers on the pink lady. This can be seen by looking closely at the period photograph, where you can see to the left of engine number 3 where the de-icer boot would have been.

I wanted to be sure that this was the case, so I located a similar aircraft 44-85829 (AKA Yankee Lady) to compare photos. Below is a comparison of three images to help show that there was no de-icer boot in the photo of the Pink Lady.
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The first photo (a) is a color photo of 44-85829's engine #3 and its nearest de-icer boot, which is clearly visible. The second photo (b) is a black-and-white version of the same photo, that can eaisly be compared with the photo of the same wing section of the Pink lady (c). It is therefore evident that the de-icer boots were indeed missing.

These hard-to-maintain boots would appear later (in the 1980's) when she was outfitted as 'Lucky Lady' for airshows, and would remain on in her subsequent painting for the movie 'Memphis Belle' and thereafter in her ficticious olive drab 511 appearance.

The image below is a recreation of the the 8846 as it appeared in April 1945, with the markings of the 511th Bomber Squadron (Source: Cédric FWV) B-17XLpink-lady-1945a.gif

Since the war would soon be over, 8846 would only fly six missions over Germany as part of her active duty for the 511th (April 6, 1945 to May 23, 1945):

Date: Sunday, April 8, 1945
Captain: Jay H. Maish
Mission #932: Marshalling yard at Halberstadt, Germany

Date: Monday, April 9, 1945
Captain: Frank H. Wilcox
Mission #935: Luftwaffe airfield at Fürstenfeldbruck, Germany

Date: Saturday, April 14, 1945
Captain: Norman A. Trapp
Mission #948: Strongpoints and flak batteries in Royan, France

Date: Monday, April 16, 1945
Captain: Julian C. Meadows
Mission #954: Rail bridge at Regensburg, Germany

Date: Wednesday, April 18, 1945
Captain: Julian C. Meadows
Mission #959: Electrical transformers (or marshalling yard) at Traunstein, Germany

Date: Friday, April 20, 1945
Captain: Lieutenant George A. Patterson
Mission #962: Marshalling yards at Brandenberg, Germany

Lt. Pattersom Photo of Lieutenant Patterson, the last captain of the Pink Lady during her active war duty (photo from when he was with 48468, TU-J):

The active wartime mission duty crew for mission #962 of the Pink Lady was as follows:

Lt Thomas Kucskar
Lt Georges A Patterson Lt L. L. Lesch
Lt D. J. Young
Lt L. R. Phelps
T/Sgt W. L. Mawhorter
S/Sgt A. L. Rhoden
S/Sgt D.J. Appleford
S/Sgt R. L. Dickman
T/Sgt D. B. Saltman

8846 remained in England when the rest of the 351st returned to the United States, as she was transferred to the 365th Bombing Squadron of the 305th Bombing Group, based in Chelveston, England.

In May 1945, the Pink Lady was transferred to (the 45th Reconnaissance Squadron, in Lechfeld Army Air Base, Germany with) the 305th Bombing Group. She would participate in the "Casey Jones Project", an ambitious project to map Germany by Air by B-17.

On 22 March 22nd, 1949 The pink lady was relocated converted to a RB-17G, and stationed at Weisbaden Air Force Base, Germany until February 1953, when she would return to the United States.

The Pink Lady was then assigned to the Ogden Air Material Command Centre, Hill Air Force Base, in Northern Utah.

On November 10th, 1954, the Pink Lady was retired from the Air Force at Olmstead Air Force Base, in Pennsylvania.

On december 5 (7th?), 1954, the Pink Lady flew to France, after being purchased by the IGN, where she would accumulate 9,483 hours of flight. She was then given the tail number F-BGSP. As you can see in the photo below ("Fana de l'Aviation", 85 - Dec. 1976. Merci Tex Hill!) the inner surfaces of the engines and just in front of the cockpit windows has been painted. This is to reduce the glair from the reflecting sun shining into the cockpit.
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She would then be stationed at Creil, in the north of Paris. The IGN modified her with special survey equipment.

The Pink Lady would perform survey operations around the world, including such locations as Polynesia and the Far North. In 1965 she was flown to South Africa for a survey proect, when she would be allocated the tail number (ZS-DXM).

The pink Lady would appear in several films, such as the 1966 French comedy, "Don't Look Now... We're Being Shot At" (Original title: "La Grande Vadrouille"), and in 1968, "The biggest bundle of them all" (in the final sequence).

The Pink Lady stopped flying on August 27th 1979 and put in storage, after having her tail number changed to F-BWFU.

44-8846 was restored to flight worthiness, funded in part by Air France, and performed a flyover during the July 14th parade in 1984.
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In May of the following year she was given to the "Forteresse Toujours Volante" association in partnership with the Amicale Jean-Baptiste Salis. The Pink Lady was then re-registered as F-AZDX. At that time, the Pink Lady was re-painted with ficticious 8th Air Force markings.
alu2.jpg Though its ball turret and nose turrets were not returned.
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It then flew at airshows as "Lucky Lady":

Altenrhein Airshow 1988
And eventually found a sponsor, who used her as a billboard for advertisement:
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In June 1989, the Pink Lady flew to England for the shooting of the movie, Memphis Belle. F-AZDX was then painted in olive drab, and adopted the serial number 25703, along with DF-S fuselage codes, as "Mother and Country". Fake turrets were fit on the aircraft.

In August 1989, the filming of Memphis Belle was complete, and the Pink Lady returned to France. Though oficially registered as F-AZDX, was painted for the movie, "Memphis Belle" as 28703 (25703?) on tail, DF-S on fuselage, "Mother and Country" on nose

Right side: 122960 on tail, G-DF on fuselage, "The Pink Lady" artwork on nose:

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Below is a 1997 photograph showing her with tail number 22955 and ZQ-X painted on the fuselage:

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In 1999, The pink Lady was painted back to the markings of her original assignment as part of the 351st Bomber Group, 511th BS, though she remained in the Olive Drab applied to her for the Memphis Belle movie.

At present, the Pink Lady has a dual identity and is currently flying without her nose turret. On ler right side, she has both "Mother and Country", and "The Pink Lady" artwork on nose, and is painted with her original wartime number: triangle-J 48846 M on tail (with red stripe), M-DS on fuselage:

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On her left side, she presently has "the Pink Lady" nose art:

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The Pink Lady is now based at the Paris-Orly Airport, though she is not open to the public for display. Her current captains are Michel Bezy and André Domine.
Current crew of the Pink Lady (André Domine is not pictured): equipage.jpg
(Photo by Franck Lenoir)

In October 2006, the Pink Lady was transferred to a new location: St Yan.