While the flight and aviation industry still battles with diversifying, women like Casey Grant serve as pioneers. Grant first started working for Delta Airlines in 1971. The now retired former flight attendant looked back on her 35-year career in a recent interview with NBC Black.

Grant says that while Delta was protective of her, she often faced racism from colleagues and passengers.

“There were those who weren’t happy to see you,” Grant says. “They would not look at you, they would not even acknowledge you if you asked them something. They’d just turn their head.”

Grant also recalled a pilot who didn’t want her to be in his cockpit.

“We alerted all the others [Black flight attendants] should they have to fly with him,” she said. “The white flight attendants would have to [serve him], because he made it clear that we were forbidden to step foot in the cockpit.”

Despite adversity, Grant also recalls the many glamorous high points during her time as a flight attendant, which included meeting celebrities like Michael Jordan, Duke Ellington, Maya Angelou and even receiving perks like tickets to shows.

In her book, Stars in the Sky: Stories of the First African American Flight Attendants, Casey Grant chronicles her experience as one of the first few black flight attendants in the United States.