An air balloon festival, annual birthday celebration, a model airplane flying contest, walking trails honoring her personal path – all are just a few of the ideas being tossed about to honor Nashville’s own Cornelia Fort. Fort was the first female pilot in America to die on active duty, and if the community has its way, plans grander than a simple placard are afoot.

The city acquired the privately owned, flood-damaged Cornelia Fort Airpark when it went into foreclosure in order to expand Shelby Park and Shelby Bottoms Greenway. It was the first purchase in Mayor Karl Dean’s Open Space Plan, a public/private partnership with the Land Trust of Tennessee. The Land Trust came onboard to help offset the $1.2 million dollar acquisition and to help honor the aviator.

“One of the things we specialize in is historic properties,” says Audra Ladd, Middle Tennessee Project Manager for the Land Trust of Tennessee. “We wanted to make sure that the park retained the Cornelia Fort name, and we wanted to get the community involved with fundraising and then join with the Parks Department in helping to take the initiative to the next step.”

Ladd says there is no target amount for monies donated before planning begins. The Land Trust has been meeting with the Fort family, Friends of Shelby Park and Bottoms, and the Rosebank community, adjacent to the property, to hatch ideas for the new green space.

Metro’s Department of Parks and Recreation approved the purchase on May 17. Once combined, the East Nashville park, just across the Cumberland River from the Opryland area, will be larger that Central Park in New York City, 936 acres in total. The airpark, which sits directly on a flood plain, sustained millions of dollars in damages to airplanes, buildings and aircraft parts during the May 2010 flood.

Bonna Johnson, spokesperson for Mayor Dean, says the acquisition was natural given the nature of the airpark’s history and to provide added buffer to neighborhoods threatened by future flooding

“There’s a number of reasons for the acquisition: recreation, to honor or celebrate the city’s history, to expand existing parks and greenways, but it’s also for flood mitigation,” Johnson says.

The Land Trust of Tennessee’s website for the effort is corneliafort.org. The Friends of Shelby Park and Bottoms is taking a leadership role, Ladd says.

Cornelia Fort’s story is legend among local historians and some Nashvillians but is still unknown to many. She was born to a prominent Nashville family, many of whom still live in the area.

After graduating college, Fort joined the newly established Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron (WAFS). She was killed at the 6th Ferrying Group Base in Long Beach, Calif., when her BT-13 plane was struck mid-air by another plane. Fort was 24 years old at the time.

She also was one of the first witnesses to the attack on Pearl Harbor, giving flight instruction in the same airspace as the Japanese when they attacked Pearl Harbor.

Planning for the green space will start in September, Ladd says.

“We are still in the fundraising mode, and will probably close the campaign in late September,” Ladd adds. “Then planning will start to take off.

The airpark went into foreclosure in February after Ernest W. and Elaine Colbert’s Colemill Enterprises Inc., defaulted on a $1 million loan from 2005 and a $1.4 million loan from early 2010.