224939 Dorothy Jane Newnham US Army Air Force First Interceptor Command from:Mount Airy, PA Dorothy Newnham was a member of a civilian force that scanned the American skies for enemy aircraft during World War II, she served very quietly in the Army Air Forces' First Interceptor Command. The civilian volunteers, mostly women, were trained to spot planes entering American airspace. They were looking for bombers thought to be capable of ranging far from enemy bases.
On the East Coast, they worked from thousands of observation posts from Maine to Florida. When any planes were spotted, the volunteers would note the type and heading, and phone in the details to a secret regional Army Filter Center.
Volunteers plotted the data on large regional maps in windowless rooms, using plastic figures in the shape of planes. From balconies above the maps, officers of the Army, Army Air Forces, and Navy watched the markers move across the country.
Miss Newnham's job was to take the messages through headphones and plot the airplanes on the map. She worked in a building in Philadelphia but never revealed - even to family - where the building was or exactly what she learned.
Once, when she bumped into her mother coming out of the building, she made up a story to cover her presence there. A secret was a secret, she told her great-niece.
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