Anna and The King, Cheesecloth, and Standard Oil

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On this map, circa 1937, the large area in Empire Pink is Burma (and part of India); the smaller area is the Malay States, at whose extreme southern end is Singapore. Thailand (here “Siam”) is in yellow, while French Indochina is in blue. Note that Burma, Thailand and the Malay States (today’s Malaysia) share the narrow Malay Peninsula and the Kra Isthmus. Singapore is today an independent city-state

June 20^th dawned overcast and grey, but it was reasonable flying weather, so the Electra lifted off for Bangkok, the capital of Thailand, or as Amelia persisted in calling it a bit romantically, Siam.

Anna Leonowens. Famed as the “Anna” in “Anna and The King” and the “I” in “The King and I” she led a peripatetic life that Amelia Earhart might have recognized. She was also the aunt of the famed actor Boris Karloff

It is not hard to imagine that her mind was focused on a legendary king and a legendary Anglo-Indian governess named A. Leonowens. Amelia’s writing took on a lyrical cast:

Moist clouds were our companions as we left Rangoon the next morning, bound for Bangkok, Siam. . . . A great range of mountains extends north and south along the western border of Siam, separating it from the long arm of Burma that reaches down into the Malay Peninsula. Through squally weather we climbed to 8,000 feet and more, topping this mountain barrier. On its eastern flanks the clouds broke and there stretched before us a dark green forest splashed with patches of bright color, cheerful even in the eyes of a pilot who recognized in all the limitless view no landing place. The country fell away gradually to the east, the hills flattening out into heavy jungle. Then we crossed the Mei Khlaung River [the Mekong River], with little villages scattered along its banks, the wide expanses of irrigated land burdened with rice crops.

The mountains of Thailand

Touching down in Bangkok, Earhart and Noonan stayed just long enough to refuel. She was glad to see that her stocks of aviation fuel (marked STANDARD OIL with her own name on the drums in bright yellow letters) had not been disturbed even so far from home. As was typical, the field mechanics poured the gas into the tanks through a cheesecloth filter in order to strain out any impurities. It was an extra precaution that kept sludge from fouling the Electra’s engines, but it was also a slight protection against tampering; from here on out, concern about Japanese sabotage was a remote but real consideration; Noonan had a stock of more-or-less true stories about “Japs” messing with Pan Am’s navigational equipment and rigging traps in the landing paths of Clippers (at least Japanese had been blamed and arrested as the likely suspects). The Orient seemed exotic to Earhart and Noonan, but, typical of their time they feared the “Yellow Peril,” and one “slanty-eyed gook” looked much the same as any other to their white-bred eyes. They quickly lifted off for Singapore, the major British possession in this corner of the world.*

A rice paddy in Thailand

*Earhart and Noonan were both born in the Victorian Age and were undoubtedly raised on the idea of the “White Man’s Burden.” Amelia was very liberal, especially by 1937 standards. Still, the fear of Japanese sabotage was no bugbear but a very real possibility as the once-friendly relations between the U.S. and the Empire of the Sun had deteriorated sharply after Japan’s seizure of Manchuria from China in 1931. 1937 was to be a watershed year that put the two nations on the collision course that led to Pearl Harbor, and Earhart and Noonan’s own fate may make up a significant part of that watershed.