The Aviatrix

CLXXVI

Amelia Mary Earhart was born on July 24, 1897 in Atchison, Kansas, the daughter of Samuel Stanton Earhart (known as “Edwin” all his life, after the Civil War-era Secretary of War) a struggling lawyer, and Amelia Otis, the daughter of a retired Federal judge.

“Meelie”

Amelia the younger (called “Meelie”) and her younger sister Grace (known as “Pidge”) grew up heavily influenced by their mother (who was called “Amy”). Amy Earhart was a supporter of women’s rights and outspokenly supported her two daughters’ ambitions to succeed in male-dominated fields. As might be expected in the home of a lawyer and a judge’s daughter, the Earhart home was overflowing with books. Meelie particularly liked adventure stories.

The girls were dressed by their mother in pants --- the radical “bloomers” of the day --- despite fierce opposition from their hidebound grandmothers. Amy encouraged Meelie and Pidge both, to climb trees, collect rocks, and keep unusual pets like lizards. The Earhart girls quickly developed reputations as tomboys.

Pidge, later in life

Most often, Edwin worked as a lawyer for the railroads. The Earharts moved rather frequently. Edwin was forever searching for a better professional situation for himself. In whatever location they settled Amy sought out “technical” schools with good science and laboratory programs. When they weren’t available, she educated the girls at home.  

A typical chemistry lab of the era

The first recorded “flight” taken by Amelia Earhart occurred in 1904. After having been taken to a carnival and riding the roller-coaster, she somehow convinced an uncle to build her a narrow-gauge railroad atop a shed. She bravely climbed into the soapbox railway car he’d constructed and rolled herself off the slanted roof, briefly becoming airborne. She wasn’t hurt in the crash, and breathlessly described the sensation to everyone as being “just like flying!” Although she wanted to do it again, the Earhart Railway to Nowhere was quickly disassembled and her uncle chastised by the family. In 1907, when she saw her first airplane at the Iowa State Fair she refused to go aloft despite the fact that rides were being sold --- it looked “rickety” she said, and, at age 10, opted for the merry-go-round instead.  

“It looked rickety,” she said

For the next ten years, the family’s fortunes resembled the roller-coaster she’d ridden on as a child. Never able to live up to his potential (despite periods of solvency and even affluence), Edwin increasingly turned to drink for solace. By the time Meelie graduated High School her parents were divorced and the family was destitute. The death of one of her grandmothers provided the family with a significant inheritance, and it was a fraction of this money that would eventually allow her to learn to fly.

After graduating High School she volunteered as a nurse to aid wounded men returning from the front lines of World War I. Meelie caught the Spanish Flu in 1918, and it permanently damaged her sinuses. Later in life, flying in unpressurized cabins often caused her severe craniofacial pain. Nevertheless, she persisted.

 

In 1919, Meelie’s interest in flying was reawakened when she attended another fair at which a veteran flyer of World War I was stunting. By this time, Amelia had grown into a tall, rather lanky girl, who stood out in a crowd. The pilot, spotting her from aloft, decided to “buzz” her, no doubt expecting her to scream, run, grab at her hat, or fall to the ground in fright, but Amelia stood her ground calmly as the plane roared just a few yards above her, her arms folded insouciantly across her chest.  “That little red plane spoke to me,” she was to write later, and, perhaps not coincidentally, when she achieved fame her favorite personal plane was red.

“That little red plane spoke to me”

On December 28, 1920, she went aloft for the first time in Long Beach, California. Though only a passenger on a $10 novelty flight, by the time the plane touched down she had decided to learn how to fly. Her mother Amy advanced her the not-insignificant sum of $1,000.00 for lessons with Aneta “Neta” Snook, one of the first female aviators. “I want to learn to fly,” Amelia told her. “Can you teach me?”

Neta Snook

Neta taught her. Amelia cropped off her long hair (an act considered a safety measure in those days of struts and wires), acquired a leather jacket that she wore to bed to break in, and set a new women’s world record in short order by passing the altitude of 14,000 feet in her bright yellow Kinner Airster biplane, nicknamed “The Canary.” In May of 1923, she was awarded the 16^th pilot’s license ever issued to a woman.

Amelia Earhart striking a typical pose in her trademark leather jacket

Sinus problems grounded her in 1924, and eventually, short of funds, she sold “The Canary” and another plane she’d bought, taking an earthbound job in Boston as a Social Worker. She remained intensely interested in flying, however, and was elected President of the American Aeronautical Association’s Boston chapter. During this period she wrote extensively on flying. She also flew occasionally, including the first flight out of Boston’s Dennison Airport in 1927.

“The Canary”

In 1928, she was asked to be the first woman to fly across the Atlantic. The flight, sponsored by George Putnam of the publishing house, was a stunt of sorts --- Amelia was to be the celebrity baggage, not a pilot, though she kept the flight log  --- but the stunt went off without a hitch on June 17, 1928, making the crossing from Newfoundland to Wales in 20 hours and 40 minutes exactly. The flight made her famous, although she admitted that she might as well have been a sack of potatoes. Nevertheless, she received a New York ticker-tape parade for her accomplishment.

  

“Friendship” the plane Amelia Earhart aboard which first crossed the Atlantic Ocean in 1928

Considering she hadn’t piloted at all (she was not yet checked out on instrument flying) and that she hadn’t been in the air much at all for four years, Amelia Earhart soon found herself a creation of the aviation-crazy Press. She was dubbed “The Queen of The Air” and “Lady Lindy.”

George Putnam turned her into a “brand.” She soon had a book out, then another, a column in McCall’s magazine, an associate editorship at Cosmopolitan, an extensive “active” women’s clothing line, and a luggage collection for travelers. She endorsed products. She toured the United States, Canada, and Western Europe, speaking to excited crowds, especially of women.  Transcontinental Air Transport, the future TWA, invited her to join its Board of Directors, which she did.

The flag of Howland Island, a U.S. possession in the Pacific. Howland is modestly famous as the intended "next" destination of Amelia Earhart in her 1937 circumnavigation by air.  After Earhart was presumed lost, the lighthouse / radio beacon on Howland was named for her. Howland's flag was designed to honor Earhart as well: The bold "99" in the upper hoist is the number of the all-female flying squadron Earhart helped found, and the lighthouse / radio beacon (the "ear") in the lower fly is emblazoned with a heart ( "Earhart"). The bar sinister rainbow represents the colors of nature found on Howland. It is a little ironic that the largest single memoriam to a great American woman lies in a remote stretch of ocean where no one can go.

Earhart knew she couldn’t be a flier who didn’t fly. She quickly learned instrument flying, and then set out on a two-way solo flight across North America in August 1928. She began to race competitively, and pushed for the establishment of “Women’s Divisions” in most contests and flying clubs. She established her own organization of aviatrices, “The Ninety-Nines” (so called for the number of its charter members) in 1929. It was not long before her skill as a pilot became her trademark, eclipsing her largely invented fame.

“Lucky Lindy” and “Lady Lindy” respected each other as fliers, but disagreed vehemently on many social issues. The two, both Midwesterners of North European descent, strongly resembled each other despite not being related

Earhart married George Putnam in 1931. Their marriage was unconventional. She refused to be called “Mrs. Putnam” (indeed, George became used to being called “Mr. Earhart”) and they spent much time apart, though he enthusiastically supported all her endeavors, aeronautical and otherwise.

  

George Putnam’s and Amelia Earhart’s wedding day

In 1932, Earhart successfully flew her Lockheed Vega solo nonstop from Newfoundland to Ireland in fifteen hours, despite mechanical problems en route. As the first woman to make the flight, Earhart received the Distinguished Flying Cross from the U.S. Congress, the Cross of Knight of the Legion of Honor from the French Government and the Gold Medal of the National Geographic Society.

Earhart and her Lockheed Vega preparing for liftoff to Europe

Not long afterward, Earhart achieved another “first,” becoming the first pilot (female or male) to fly solo from Honolulu to Alameda, a distance of just over 2,400 miles. During the flight in the unpressurized plane she grew cold, and so she reached for a thermos of piping hot hot chocolate. She later wrote, “That was the most interesting cup of chocolate I have ever had, sitting up eight thousand feet over the middle of the Pacific Ocean quite alone.”

Middle America looked upon Amelia Earhart as a favorite daughter. Note the “Mrs. Putnam” in the column headline

Already world famous, she began to turn her public attentions to social issues, particularly women’s issues such as family planning, women’s health, and equal pay for equal work. She pressed hard for the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, which had been first introduced in 1923.  

Amelia Earhart and Eleanor Roosevelt, 1935

 Her very public stances and her “unusual” marriage led more conservative elements in the U.S. to attack her, but offsetting the criticism,  she was a regular consultant to the President and Congress during the early New Deal. She developed a very close friendship with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, whom she took flying. Roosevelt was so excited by the experience that she obtained a student permit to learn to fly, but her other commitments did not allow her to further pursue becoming a pilot.] Earhart was also close friends with the woman whom the media cast as her bitterest rival, Jacqueline Cochran.

Jacqueline Cochran (1906-1980)

In 1936, Amelia and George moved from Rye, New York to Toluca Lake, California, where he became the head of Paramount Pictures. She became a professor at Purdue University. It was at this time that Earhart decided to put into action a long-considered plan --- to be the first woman to fly around the world. Both Purdue and Paramount decided to help fund the trip.

The planned route of Amelia Earhart’s 1937 Worldflight

While Earhart’s planned flight was not the first circumnavigation by air, it was the first one that a woman would be piloting, and she added to the challenge by planning an Equatorial route. Not only would this add to the air mileage, but it would also take her over some of the most inhospitable and isolated areas of the planet --- the Sahara Desert, the jungles of Southeast Asia, and the widest expanse of the Pacific. It would be nearly 30,000 miles of bruising flying, but there was little doubt among the public and the people who knew her that Amelia Earhart was going to do something unforgettable.