Haywood S. Hansell - Personality and Family

Personality and Family

Short in stature and slightly built, Hansell worked at being an athlete, becoming proficient in tennis, polo, and squash. Socially, he was a noted dancer, and acquired a reputation as "the unofficial poet laureate of the Air Corps." He was fond of Gilbert and Sullivan, Shakespeare, and Miguel Cervantes’ Don Quixote. General Ira C. Eaker described him as "nervous and high strung," and one biographer noted several incidents of imperious temper in social situations. However his correspondence secretary during World War II, T/Sgt. James Cooper, described him as "pleasant and diplomatic," and an aviation historian described him as "a forward-looking optimist with a sense of humor."

While stationed at Langley Field, Virginia, Hansell met his wife, Dorothy "Dotta" Rogers, a teacher from Waco, Texas, where they were married in 1932. He fathered three children, son "Tony" (Haywood S. Hansell III, born in 1933), daughter Lucia (1940), and son Dennett (1941). While frequent absences, long working hours, and Hansell’s autocratic nature severely stressed their marriage during World War II, they remained married for 56 years until his death in 1988. Hansell's eldest son continued the family military tradition, graduating from the United States Military Academy in 1955, becoming a colonel in the United States Air Force, and marrying Olivia Twining, the daughter of General Nathan F. Twining.