Amelia Earhart

Born July 24, 1897, in Atchison Kansas, Amelia Mary Earhart was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean making her one of the most celebrated pilots in the world. Amelia’s mother was a stay-at-home mom while her father was a railroad lawyer. At just 10 years old, Earhart spotted her first plane at the state fair and was simply not impressed. However, after watching a pilot dive at her and her friend, she knew that she needed to learn how to fly. After her grandparents passed away, her father struggled with alcoholism, pushing the family towards financial instability. In 1916, Amelia graduated from High School in Chicago. Once her mother received her inheritance, she was able to fund Amelia’s venture to attend Ogontz School in Rydal, Pennsylvania. After visiting her sister in Canada, Amelia discovered her interest in caring for wounded soldiers from World War l. As a direct result, Amelia left junior college to move to Toronto to become a nurse’s aide. After the war, Amelia’s parents insisted that she moved home to California.

In 1920, Amelia went on her first plane ride which led her to take flying lessons. Just one year later, Amelia purchased her first plane, a Kinner Airster and after several hours of training, she earned her pilot’s license in 1923. In the mid-1920s, Amelia moved to Boston to work as a social worker at the Denison House while continuing to pursue aviation. While in Massachusetts, sponsors were looking for a woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean and selected Amelia to do the job in April 1928. On June 17, 1928, Amelia departed from Trepassey, Newfoundland, Canada, and set off to fly down the Atlantic Ocean with pilots Wilmer Stultz and Louis Gordon. Shortly after landing at Burry Port in Wales on June 18th, Amelia started to gain a following. Reflecting on her journey, Amelia wrote the book, 20 Hrs. 40 Min and went on a lecture tour across the nation. In 1931, Amelia married her publisher, George Palmer Putnam but kept her maiden name. The same year she broke an altitude record when she reached 18,415 ft. (5613 m) in an autogiro. A year later, on May 20th,  Amelia made the journey across the Atlantic Ocean alone. In addition to her aviation accolades, Amelia quickly became well-known for encouraging women to reject constructive social norms and follow their dreams, especially in the field of aviation.

Earhart kept a scrapbook as a child filled with pages of clippings of successful women in male-dominated industries like film, law, advertising, management, and mechanical engineering. In 1937, Amelia tragically disappeared near Howland Island in the Pacific Ocean during what was supposed to be a trip around the world. Her disappearance remains a mystery because her plane or remains were never discovered.