Annie “Belle” Lawrence, 84, pilot delivered WWII aircraft

Annie “Belle” Lawrence was 17 when she earned her pilot’s license, before she even had a driver’s license.

As a youngster she saw airplanes buzz over her grandparents’ farm in Lakewood as they landed on a nearby dirt strip. They inspired a passion for aviation in Mrs. Lawrence at a time when women were just beginning to take to the skies.

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Annie ‘Belle’ Lawrence, an avid pilot, also learned to repair machinery from her grandfather.

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Lawrence didn’t just learn to fly airplanes. She became an aviation mechanic and made a business of rebuilding them.

Mrs. Lawrence, 84, died of complications from diabetes and dementia on Wednesday at a personal care home in Lawrenceville. The funeral was Sunday at Philadelphia Presbyterian Church in Forest Park, with interment at Jonesboro City Cemetery.

Mrs. Lawrence was an early member of Amelia Earhart’s the Ninety-Nines, an international organization of female pilots. She was among a select group of women who served as ferry pilots during World War II to deliver military aircraft throughout the country, said her son Eric Lawrence. Once she had to make an emergency landing in a cabbage field in Oklahoma.

“The farmer in the field she landed in was quite impressed because he had never seen a plane,” Eric Lawrence said.

The farmer took Mrs. Lawrence into town to buy parts to fix the airplane. She promptly repaired it and flew off, her son said.

Mrs. Lawrence learned to repair machinery from her grandfather. He was a self-employed machinist who designed and built manufacturing equipment for assembly lines in the big mills in Atlanta. She was a beautiful woman, but a tomboyish one who preferred working with tools and being outdoors.

“As I grew up and grew out of clothes, she would wear my clothes,” Eric Lawrence said. “She liked pants with pockets in the front and shirts that had pockets in the front. The white dress shirt she’s going to be buried in is one of mine that she wore for many years.”

Maggie Jean Benning, 91, worked as a maid for Mrs. Lawrence’s grandparents from the time Ms. Benning was 17 years old. She said Mrs. Lawrence always treated her like a sister. Ms. Benning was awed the first time she saw the young woman fly a plane over the house, waving a handkerchief.

“I didn’t know nothing about a young girl like that flying an airplane,” Ms. Benning said. “We were just so amazed.”

During the ’40s and ’50s, Mrs. Lawrence made a business of repairing airplanes in Deland, Fla., where she repaired fabric-covered wings and engines. She also taught aviation classes at Stetson University in Deland, and she volunteered for more than 25 years as a pilot for the Civil Air Patrol in Fernandina Beach, Fla.

After Mrs. Lawrence moved from Florida to the Atlanta area, she took a job as a ticket agent with Delta Air Lines and worked at the Fulton County Airport. She married a pilot — her late husband, B.L. Lawrence — and had two sons, Eric and Eliot. Many civic organizations in Clayton County benefited from her volunteer work, including Forest Park Ceramics, the Alliance Theatre and Spivey Hall.

She is survived by her two sons, grandsons Trent C. Lawrence and Jason C. Wetzstein, granddaughter Charlee S. Lawrence, and great-granddaughters Kyleigh and Brooklynn Wetzstein.