A member of the Longines Honor Roll, Amelia Earhart, aviator extraordinaire and ‘Queen of the Air’[1] was born on July 24th 1897 in Atchison, Kansas.
She went on to lead an extraordinary life; a pioneer in her field, who broke records and inspired a generation to fly, to aspire, and reach for the seemingly impossible. Affectionately named ‘Lady Lindy’[2] she was adored by the public who would later mourn her disappearance as a great loss to aviation.
Her legacy, through the Ninety Nines, through the pilots she inspired and the records she broke, lives on to this day.
In the December of 1920 Earhart took her first flight. A fateful day that would shape the rest of her life.
Flown by Frank Hawkins, who would later find fame as an air racer, Earhart knew that she had found her calling.
Remembering this day she states: “By the time I had got two or three hundred feet (60-90m) off the ground… I knew I had to fly.”[3]
And fly she did. After working various jobs to save the necessary $1,000 for flying lessons she began her learning with Neta Snook. Just six months later Earhart purchased The Canary, her affectionately named bright yellow Kinner Airster Biplane.
The First of Many Records
In the October of 1922 she and her Canary secured their place in aviation history. Flying the plane to an altitude of 14,000 feet; she set a new world record for female pilots. This would be the first of many records she was to break.
Just over a year later, on May 15th 1923, Amelia Earhart became the 16th woman to receive a pilot’s license from the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. She went on to become the 1st woman to fly the Atlantic.
As a passenger, she was required to keep the flight log, while Wilmer Stultz and Louis Gordon piloted the Fokker F.VII B/3M. Leaving Trepassey Harbour in Newfoundland on the 17th of June 1928 and arriving in South Wales 20 hours and 40 minutes later.
As a fiercely ambitious individual, Earhart was discontented with her role as passenger, describing herself as “a sack of potatoes”[4] and declaring that “maybe someday I’ll try it alone.”[5]
Only moments after breaking a world record Earhart is determined to further push both aviation and social barriers; to challenge and reshape the role of women within the field.
As an advocate for female pilots Earhart, rather controversially, refused to fly screen actress Mary Pickford to open the 1934 Bendix Trophy Race. The race had banned female pilots from competing and Earhart would not condone this.
She campaigned for the establishment of separate gendered records and was crucial in the shaping of these standards within the National Aeronautic Association and the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale.
She utilized her position as Associate Director of Cosmopolitan magazine to campaign for public acceptance of aviation, often highlighting the role of women within the field.
A Founding Member of the Ninety Nines
She went on to become a founding member and the 1st President of the Ninety Nines; a group aimed at supporting and advancing the careers of female aviators. An organization that continues to this day.
It was a time of immense change and opportunity where mankind took to the skies, an act once thought impossible. It is no wonder that Earhart’s plucky character and immense bravery in the face of adversity inspired a nation to aim high, to break the mold and defy anyone who might say “it can’t be done.”
Flying itself is a feat of human imagination brought into tangible existence through a fantastic mixture of dreaming and technology. Arthur C. Clark writes that ‘any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’[6]
This is what flight represented; a sort of feat that would appear as magic to primitive humanity. People laughed at the Wright brothers as madmen and fantasists when human flight was taking shape. Flight itself proves that the impossible is possible and Earhart embraced this in every aspect of her life.
In August 1928 Earhart went on to become the 1st woman to fly solo across the North American Continent. Just one year later she placed third during the 1st Santa Monica-to-Cleveland- Women’s Air Derby.
In 1931 she goes on to set yet another altitude record; flying a Pitcairn PCA-2 autogyro to 18,415 feet. On May 20th 1932, aged 34, Earhart attempted Charles Lindbergh’s solo flight.
In her single engine Lockheed Vega 5B she hoped to fly from America to Paris but encountered strong northern winds, ice and mechanical issues. 14 hours and 56 minutes later she arrived at a pasture in Northern Ireland to be met by a farm hand who asked “have you flown far?” to which Earhart replied, “from America.”[7]
This site is now the home of the ‘Amelia Earhart Center.’ For this flight she was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross from Congress, Cross of Knight of the Legion of Honor from the French Government and, from Herbert Hoover, the Gold Medal of the National Geographic Society.
A Record Holder
From 1930 – 1935 Earhart, in a variety of aircraft, had set 7 women’s distance and speed aviation records.
On January 11th 1935 she was the first person to fly solo from Honolulu, Hawaii to Oakland, California. Flying “old Bessie, the fire horse”[8], she and the Vega aircraft flew from Los Angeles to Mexico City in the April of 1935.
She went on to set yet another new record with a nonstop flight from Mexico City to New York. As the 1st woman to enter the Bendix Trophy Race, Earhart placed 5th in 1935.
Setting the bar higher than ever before Earhart looked toward her next challenge with “one flight which I most wanted to attempt – a circumnavigation of the globe as near its waistline as could be.”[9]
Following the equator, in a Lockheed model 10 Electra, this daring feat was the first of its kind. Two attempts of this journey were made by Earhart, with the last proving fatal.
Ever the daring adventurer, Earhart disappeared on July 2nd 1937 near Howland Island with 7,000 miles of the journey remaining.
Her Disappearance
The disappearance itself is shrouded in mystery, with many theories still debated to this day and Earhart yet to be found. Even now, some 79 years on, Earhart stands firm as one of the best loved and most exceptional aviators of our time.
Regarding Amelia Earhart, Charles Kuralt, of CBS’ ‘Sunday Morning’, said “She was a pioneer in aviation… she led the way so that others could follow and go on to even greater achievements…. Trailblazers prepare the rest of us for the future.”[10]
Earhart paved the way for future aviators like Astronaut Shanon Walker who, on June 17th 2010, accompanied Amelia Earhart’s Longines one-button, two-register chronograph on a flight to the International Space Station.
On the 82nd anniversary of Earhart’s 1st trans-Atlantic flight, Walker honored the life and legacy of this astonishing woman. Given as a gift by Earhart to H. Gordon Selfridge Junior, the watch is inscribed with these words: “This watch was worn by Amelia Earhart on her two transatlantic flights and presented by her to H.G.S Jr just before her death.”[11]
After journeying into space the watch was placed on display in the Ninety Nines Museum of Women Pilots in Oklahoma City.
Walker, as a member of the Ninety Nines herself owes some part of her own legacy to that of Amelia Earhart’s. With the barriers she broke and the dreams she realized “(Earhart) created a legacy that resonates today for anyone, girls and boys, who dream of the stars”.[12]
Footnotes
- Doris L. Rich, Amelia Earhart: A Biography. (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989) pp. 177.
- C.V. Glines, ‘’Lady Lindy’: The Remarkable Life of Amelia Earhart.’ Aviation History, (Cowels History Group, July 1997) pp. 44.
- Amelia Earhart, Last Flight. (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, first edition: Putnam, 1937) pp.4.
- Donald M. Goldstein and Katherine V. Dillon. Amelia: The Centennial Biography of an Aviation Pioneer. (Washington, D.C.: Brassey’s, 1997) pp. 54.
- Donald M. Goldstein and Katherine V. Dillon. Amelia: The Centennial Biography of an Aviation Pioneer. (Washington, D.C.: Brassey’s, 1997) pp. 54.
- Steve Sneyd, ‘Wormholeing into Elsewhere,’ Where Rockets Burn Through, (London: Penned in the Margins, 2012), pp. 20-21.
- Seth Goddard, ‘Life Hero of the Week Profile: Amelia Earhart—First Lady of the Sky,’ Wayback Machine, https://web.archive.org/web/20021005082222/http://www.life.com/Life/heroes/newsletters/nlearhart.html (life.com: May 19, 1997, Archived: October 5, 2002, Date Accessed: July 18th 2016).
- Richard Sanders, Allen. Revolution in the Sky: Those Fabulous Lockheeds, The Pilots Who Flew Them. (Brattleboro, Vermont: The Stephen Greene Press, 1964) pp. 199, 200, 202.
- Amelia Earhart, Last Flight. (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, first edition: Putnam, 1937) pp. 37.
- Eileen Morey, The Importance of Amelia Earhart. (San Diego: Lucent Books, 1995) pp. 11.
- Stuart D, ‘Historical Watches: The Amelia Earhart Watch,’ Renaissance Watch Repair, http://www.pocketwatchrepair.com/histories/earhart-watch.html (Accessed: 18th July 2016).
- Hillary Rodham Clinton, ‘Secretary of State’, (Benjamin Franklin Room, Washington, DC: March 20th 2012). Speech accessed via: http://www.state.gov/secretary/20092013clinton/rm/2012/03/186072.htm (Date accessed: 18th July 2016).
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Allen, Richard Sanders. Revolution in the Sky: Those Fabulous Lockheeds, The Pilots Who Flew Them. (Brattleboro, Vermont: The Stephen Greene Press, 1964).
Clinton, Hillary Rodham. ‘Secretary of State’, (Benjamin Franklin Room, Washington, DC: March 20th 2012). Speech accessed via: http://www.state.gov/secretary/20092013clinton/rm/2012/03/186072.htm (Date accessed: 17th July 2016).
D. Stuart, ‘Historical Watches: The Amelia Earhart Watch.’ Renaissance Watch Repair http://www.pocketwatchrepair.com/histories/earhart-watch.html (Accessed: 18th July 2016)
Earhart, Amelia. Last Flight. (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, first edition: Putnam, 1937)
Glines, C.V. ‘’Lady Lindy’: The Remarkable Life of Amelia Earhart.’ Aviation History, (Cowels History Group, July 1997).
Goddard, Seth. ‘Life Hero of the Week Profile: Amelia Earhart—First Lady of the Sky,’ Wayback Machine, https://web.archive.org/web/20021005082222/http://www.life.com/Life/heroes/newsletters/nlearhart.html (life.com: May 19, 1997, Archived: October 5, 2002, Date Accessed: July 18th 2016).
Goldstein, Donald M. and Katherine V. Dillon. Amelia: The Centennial Biography of an Aviation Pioneer. (Washington, D.C.: Brassey’s, 1997).
Morey, Eileen. The Importance of Amelia Earhart. (San Diego: Lucent Books, 1995).
Rich, Doris L. Amelia Earhart: A Biography. (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989).
Sneyd, Steve. ‘Wormholeing into Elsewhere,’ Where Rockets Burn Through, (London: Penned in the Margins, 2012).
Secondary Sources
Amelia Earhart: The Official Website, http://www.ameliaearhart.com/ (Date Accessed: 16th July 2016).
HISTORYNET, ‘Aviation History’, http://www.historynet.com/aviation-history (Date Accessed: 15th July 2016).
Ninety Nines, ‘Women in Air Racing’, http://www.ninety-nines.org/women-in-air-racing.htm (Date Accessed: 16th July 2016).
Pearlman, Robert Z. Space.com, ‘Amelia Earhart’s Watch Reaches Space Station 82 Years After Historic Flight’ http://www.space.com/8631-amelia-earhart-watch-reaches-space-station-82-years-historic-flight.html (Date Accessed: 18th July 2016).