Knoch alumna and international opera star Marianne Cornetti shows off some of her makeup changes to choir students at Knoch on March 30. Shane Potter/Butler Eagle

Women’s History Month ended Friday with two Butler County natives well on their way to making history in their chosen professions.

Marianne Cornetti wrapped up her performances in the Pittsburgh Opera's production of the Giuseppe Verdi opera "Il Trovatore."

Cornetti plays the role of Azucena, the tormented woman, a role she’s played 173 times in a career that began more than 30 years ago.

During that time, the Knoch High School graduate has sung in Milan, Florence, the Vienna State Opera, Rome, Munich, Tel Aviv, Berlin, Tokyo, Shanghai and at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

Cornetti is recognized as one of the leading Verdi mezzo-sopranos of her generation.

Amanda Skidmore, of Butler, observes the Boeing E-3 Sentry aircraft being refuled while aboard Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker on March 10. Submitted Photo

Another Butler County native making history is Amanda Skidmore, the daughter of Chris and Kim Skidmore of Butler, who was part of the first all-female refueling flight.

Skidmore was the boom operator on a Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker that refueled a Boeing E-3 Sentry aircraft (known as an AWACS) in flight March 10 in the sky over McConnell Air Force Base in Wichita, Kan.

The 20-member crew of the AWACS was all female as well, Skidmore said. A third plane in the flight also was crewed by only women.

Skidmore said her Stratotanker pilot set up the flight to mark Women’s History Month.

Neither Skidmore nor Cornetti are resting on their laurels.

Cornetti plans to travel to Hong Kong in April to perform in another production of "Il Trovatore" and said she will perform a Czech-language opera, “Jenufa,” at the Chicago Lyric Opera in the fall.

She also is artistic director of Pittsburgh Festival Opera and is on the voice faculty at Carnegie Mellon University.

Skidmore, who was recently promoted to technical sergeant, has been in the Air Force for eight years and plans to make the military her career.

Wherever her posting takes her, her mother said Skidmore still manages to get back home to Butler four times a year.

Skidmore has that in common with Cornetti, who keeps a home and address in Natrona Heights.

“I've lived abroad, but my address was always here. I never left my address here,” Cornetti said.

— EKF