This Pilot’s Tune: Nancy in the Sky With Misgivings

First requirement for travel is a good companion.

Peter Garrison

Wednesday, July 23, 2025 at 07:00 AM ET

Verified

Edited By:

Travis Tingle

Nancy Salter and FLYING contributing editor Peter Garrison in 1976 [Courtesy: Peter Garrison]

Key Takeaways:

The article chronicles the author's long-term relationship with Nancy Salter, whose experiences with his passion for aviation were consistently marked by deep apprehension and fear.
Despite her significant aversion, Nancy accompanied the author on numerous adventurous and often perilous flights, including transatlantic and transpacific journeys, enduring stressful situations with remarkable composure.
After decades of shared flying and an airplane accident, Nancy's reluctance to fly grew, leading her to eventually cease joining the author, who reflects on their quarter-million miles together with gratitude for her presence.

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I first saw Nancy Salter in the kitchen of a dilapidated three-decker in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in summer 1967.

The only utensils in the kitchen were a few wrenches scattered around somebody’s partially dismantled motorcycle. We didn’t talk then, but I worked up the courage to call her the next day—quite a trick, for me—and ask her to a movie. In spite of her having to get up early the next morning to catch the first of three buses for work at the Winchester Star, she consented.