Collection is open for research.
Leah Hing was born in Portland, Oregon, in 1907. She played saxophone in a band whose members were all Chinese American women, and the band toured with Honorable Wu on the Radio-Keith-Orpheum Circuit in 1929. In the 1930s, Hing worked in her family's restaurant to pay for lessons at the Tex Rankin School of Flying in Portland. In 1934, she earned her pilot's license, becoming the second Chinese American woman to do so, and during World War II, she was an instrument checker at the Portland Air Base. She later worked at the Aero Club in Portland, retiring in 1970. Hing also sold insurance, ran a watch repair business, and was a photographer; in her free time, she assisted Chinese immigrants with the process to become U.S. citizens. Hing died in 2001.
Sources: Vital records on Ancestry.com; information provided by Hing in her interview; "Chinese Girl Takes to Air; First in U.S.," by Dick Rummel, Oregon Daily Journal, March 6, 1932, Page 7; "Chinese Girl Flying Pupil Quick to Acquire Knack," Sunday Oregonian, March 6, 1932, Section Six, Page 4; "If the Hereafter has Rules, Leah Hing's Breaking Them," by Margie Boulé, Oregonian, July 29, 2001, Page A1; "Leah Hing: A Life of Service," by Lt. Col. Elizabeth A. Sydow, Civil Air Patrol News, May 26,2020 (accessed January 24, 2025),
An incomplete transcript (15 pages) is available for in-person use at the Oregon Historical Society Research Library.
Oral history interview with Leah Hing, by Patricia Keith, SR 9130, Oregon Historical Society Research Library.
Two additional interviews with Leah Hing, designated SR 3567 and SR 3568, are also held at the Oregon Historical Society Research Library.
This oral history interview with Leah Hing was conducted by Patricia Keith on June 2, 1980, at the Oregon Historical Society in Portland, Oregon, as part of the oral history program at the society's research library.
In this interview, Hing discusses learning to fly airplanes with Tex Rankin at the Tex Rankin School of Flying in Portland during the 1930s. She briefly talks about her first solo flight, about the plane she owned, and about her involvement with the Ninety-Nines, an organization of women pilots. She closes the interview by discussing her involvement with the Aero Club in Portland.
Copyright for this interview is held by the Oregon Historical Society. Use is allowed according to the following statement: Creative Commons - BY-NC-SA,