Daughter of the Sky E-Book

Paul L. Briand, Jr.

• Herausgeber: Lebooks Editora
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 360

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

Daughter of the Sky:The Story of Amelia Earhart by Paul L. Briand Jr. is a biographical account that delves into the life and legacy of Amelia Earhart, one of the most iconic figures in aviation history. The book offers an intimate portrait of Earhart's adventurous spirit, tracing her journey from a young woman defying gender norms to a celebrated aviator whose mysterious disappearance captivated the world. Briand combines meticulous research with narrative detail to present not only Earhart's achievements but also the cultural and personal challenges she faced in pursuing her passion for flight. Since its publication, Daughter of the Sky has been recognized for its engaging and accessible portrayal of Earhart's life. It stands out for exploring the woman behind the legend, examining her motivations, relationships, and enduring impact on the fight for gender equality. The book contributes to the understanding of Earhart not just as a pilot, but as a symbol of courage and independence in a rapidly changing world. The lasting relevance of Daughter of the Sky lies in its ability to humanize a historic figure while celebrating her pioneering spirit. By capturing the drama, ambition, and mystery surrounding Amelia Earhart, the biography continues to inspire readers and underscore the significance of her contributions to aviation and women's history.

Leseprobe

Paul L. Briand Jr.

DAUGHTER OF THE SKY

THE STORY OF AMELIA EARHART

Contents

INTRODUCTION

DAUGHTER OF THE SKY

AUTHOR’S NOTE

PART ONE:THE FRIENDSHIP FLIGHT

PART TWO: THE WORLD OF FLIGHT

PART THREE: THE LAST FLIGHT

RECORD FLIGHTS

AWARDS AND DECORATIONS

INTRODUCTION

Paul L. Briand Jr.

1919–1981

Paul L. BriandJr.was an American author, historian, and professor known primarily for his works on the Kennedy family and American military history. With a background in both literature and the armed forces, Briand combined his skills as a writer and educator to craft biographies and historical accounts that were both accessible and engaging to a general audience. His work gained attention in the 1960s, particularly due to its proximity to contemporary political figures and events.

Early Life and Education

Paul L. Briand Jr. was born in 1919 in the United States. He pursued higher education with a focus on literature and history and later served in the U.S. military. This combination of academic training and military service shaped his future career as both an author and a professor at the U.S. Air Force Academy. His professional life was marked by a commitment to education and a keen interest in the intersection of personal biography and historical narrative.

Career and Contributions

Briand became best known for his 1961 biography Daughter of Destiny, one of the earliest published works about Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, wife of President John F. Kennedy. The book offered a favorable and idealized portrait of the First Lady, contributing to the early public image of Jackie Kennedy as both elegant and intelligent. Though it was not an official biography, Daughter of Destiny attracted national interest and reflected the public’s fascination with the Kennedy family at the dawn of the 1960s.

In addition to his biographical writing, Briand focused on military themes, publishing works that highlighted the experiences and values of American servicemen. His teaching career at the Air Force Academy further solidified his role in shaping narratives about patriotism, leadership, and national identity during the Cold War era.

Impact and Legacy

While Briand’s literary output was relatively modest in volume, his early engagement with the Kennedy legacy and his ability to frame political figures within broader historical currents gave his work a certain cultural significance during the early 1960s. His writing contributed to the mythologizing of the Kennedy era and helped form part of the narrative landscape that defined American public life in a time of transformation.

As an educator, Briand also influenced generations of students through his commitment to blending historical insight with narrative clarity. His work, while not as widely studied today, remains a snapshot of mid-20th-century American literary engagement with politics and national identity.

Paul L. Briand Jr. passed away in 1981. Though he did not achieve the lasting fame of some of his contemporaries, his work provides valuable insight into American cultural and political life during the postwar period. His biography of Jacqueline Kennedy remains a noteworthy example of early modern political portraiture, reflecting the evolving role of public figures in media and literature.

Today, Briand is remembered primarily for his proximity to historical moments and figures, and for his role as a storyteller who helped shape public perceptions during a pivotal era in American history.

About the work

Daughter of the Sky:The Story of Amelia Earhart by Paul L. Briand Jr. is a biographical account that delves into the life and legacy of Amelia Earhart, one of the most iconic figures in aviation history. The book offers an intimate portrait of Earhart’s adventurous spirit, tracing her journey from a young woman defying gender norms to a celebrated aviator whose mysterious disappearance captivated the world. Briand combines meticulous research with narrative detail to present not only Earhart’s achievements but also the cultural and personal challenges she faced in pursuing her passion for flight.

Since its publication, Daughter of the Sky has been recognized for its engaging and accessible portrayal of Earhart’s life. It stands out for exploring the woman behind the legend, examining her motivations, relationships, and enduring impact on the fight for gender equality. The book contributes to the understanding of Earhart not just as a pilot, but as a symbol of courage and independence in a rapidly changing world.

The lasting relevance of Daughter of the Sky lies in its ability to humanize a historic figure while celebrating her pioneering spirit. By capturing the drama, ambition, and mystery surrounding Amelia Earhart, the biography continues to inspire readers and underscore the significance of her contributions to aviation and women’s history.

DAUGHTER OF THE SKY

For Margaret, my wife,

who allowed another woman —

Amelia Earhart — into my life.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

There are many women who wish they were men; few men who wish they were women. Amelia Earhart did not want to be a man — she was the essence of femininity; but she did want to do many of the things men can do — and a few of the things men cannot do. For her, the greatest challenge in the world of men was the ability to fly, and this ability in AE (as she liked to be called) was the flowering of an attitude that took root early in her childhood. Having learned to fly, she was not content, however, simply to be able to fly; she wanted to be “the first to do,” to set new records, to prove that women could try things as men have tried.

Amelia Earhart was one of America’s great heroines; her life was in many ways unique. She was one of a kind, and the fabric of her life was woven of strands that are rarely produced: she had an insatiable curiosity about everything in life — ideas, books, people, places, mechanical things; she loved all kinds of sports and games, especially those “only for boys”; she fidgeted with an implacable unrest to experiment, to try new things; she teemed with a zest for living, paradoxically entwined with a gnawing and pervasive longing to be alone; and, finally, she brooded with a fatalism toward death, which she met with a tremendous will to live.

Of such strands was the fabric made that produced the public figure acclaimed throughout the world; the woman who succeeded in such incredible achievements as flying solo across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and then resented the publicity which they brought; the girl who simply wanted to do because she wanted to demonstrate the equality of her sex with that of the opposite in all fields of constructive endeavor. But what she wanted to do could not be done simply, and in that complexity lies the mystery of a human soul and the fascination of a woman who dared the dominion of that soul.

My research into the life of Amelia Earhart led me into a study of many lives and of the period in which they were lived; it has also led me thousands of miles across these United States and occasioned from me hundreds of letters of inquiry. I pored over books, magazines, and newspapers, and from them gained the basic story of the woman flier’s life; but it was the people I interviewed and wrote to, who answered my many and persistent questions and provided me with their private letters, pictures, and other memorabilia, who in the last analysis made the writing of this biography an enjoyable undertaking.

My purpose in choosing the narrative-dramatic-expository technique of the modern biographer in telling my story was a simple one: while I used many of the resources of the objective scholar in gathering and marshaling my materials and in establishing their accuracy, I tried to show the novelist’s interest in background influences, in hidden motives, in the complex nature of character. In short, I wanted to translate an intriguing woman out of aviation terms into human terms.

Paul L. Briand, Jr.

Captain, USAF

United States Air Force Academy

Colorado

PART ONE:THE FRIENDSHIP FLIGHT

1. Boston Social Worker

A low-slung yellow Kissel roadster with top down, a grinning tousle-haired girl at the wheel, rounded the corner, sped down Tyler Street in Boston, and screeched to a stop in front of Denison House. Before the girl could get a leg out of the car, a swarm of children from the settlement house gathered about their favorite teacher. Jumbled greetings accosted her on all sides.

“Miss Earhart,” said one of the older Italian boys, “you been flyin’?” His black eyes sparkled. “Gee, I wish I could fly.”

Amelia Earhart smiled at the boy and pulled his cap down over his eyes. “Your mother would send you back to Italy if you did.”

The others laughed and followed the tall and slender English teacher into the front door, a polyglot wake of Armenian, Syrian, Greek, Chinese, Jewish, and Italian childhood. She herded them down the hall and corralled them into one of the classrooms.

Finally settled down in the classroom, the children listened to simplified explanations of English grammar. They screwed their faces in disbelief and squinted their eyes in helpless confusion.

The Italian boy of the cap looked at his little brother to see if he understood; he didn’t. The older boy raised his hand. Miss Earhart recognized him. “Me and Gino,” he said, fingering his tight black curly hair, “we don’t....”

“Gino and I,” Amelia corrected him.

“Gino and you?”

Amelia pushed back her hair with a quick sweep of the hand. “No, no. You and your brother. You should say....”

In the middle of that afternoon in April, 1928, AE was called to the telephone.

“I’m too busy to answer just now,” she said. “Tell whoever it is to call back later.”

“But he says it’s important.”

Unwillingly Amelia went to the telephone and picked up the receiver.

“Hello,” the voice said at the other end. “My name is Railey, Captain Hilton Railey.”

“Yes, Captain Railey?” She could not place the name.

“I wonder if I could speak to you on a very important matter?” His voice was low and strong.

“What could that be?” Amelia answered matter-of-factly.

“You are interested in flying, are you not?”

“Yes, sir!” Her interest quickened.

“Would you like to do something for the cause of aviation?”

“That sounds like a big order.”

“Well, would you?” There was a challenge in Railey’s inflection.

Amelia twisted the long string of beads that hung from her neck. “Yes!” she said.

“It might be hazardous.”

Captain Railey refused to tell over the telephone the exact nature of the risk involved, and asked Miss Earhart to call at his office at 80 Federal Street in downtown Boston.

Amelia asked him for references; she wanted to make sure that this was not somebody’s hoax. Railey gave First Army Headquarters and the name of Commander Byrd. She was satisfied for the moment. As an added precaution, Amelia asked Marion Perkins, the head worker at Denison House, to accompany her to Railey’s office as chaperone and adviser.

Late that afternoon, nearly bursting with curiosity, AE drove her “yellow peril” faster than usual. She was annoyed at having to trail even one car through the narrow streets of the city. Miss Perkins, rigid stolidity beside her, cautioned against speeding with matronly authority.

The Kissel parked, Amelia tucked her hair under the rarely worn cloche hat and hurried to Railey’s office, but only at the pace which Marion Perkins’ decorum allowed.

Upon meeting Captain Railey, the two women discovered that he was a civilian who had been a captain in the Army during the war. He was now the president of a public-relations firm with offices in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. He numbered among his clients such aviation notables as Richard Byrd, Clarence Chamberlin, Sir Hubert Wilkins, Lincoln Ellsworth, and Ruth Nichols.

A dark-haired, handsome man, Hilton Railey seated the two women off to the side of his desk. He was pleased with the appearance of the humble social worker, who, he had learned, had a private pilot’s license, and had logged more than five hundred solo hours. What he liked above all was her striking resemblance to the greatest of American heroes — Charles Lindbergh. Here before him, if his eyes were not deceiving him, was a “Lady Lindy.” Like Lindbergh, she was shy and modest. She didn’t know it, but she had been discovered.

“Miss Earhart,” Railey asked, “have you ever heard of Mrs. Frederick Guest?”

“No, I’m afraid not,” Amelia answered. She sat on the edge of the chair, her back straight, her legs pressed firmly together.

“A short time ago, Mrs. Guest bought a trimotored Fokker from Commander Byrd. She wanted to be the first woman to fly the Atlantic.” Railey looked for initial stirring from the girl. “However, although she is courageous, she is also a mother, and her children have talked her out of it.”

Marion Perkins, suspicious as a protective aunt, unbending as a ramrod, eyed Railey coldly.

Guessing the direction of the interview, Amelia warmed to the thought crossing her mind. She eased back in the chair. “That’s too bad for her,” she said.

Hilton Railey gave the young woman a hard look; then he stole a glance at her long, straight legs. AE blushed. “Miss Earhart,” he continued, “Mrs. Guest still wants a woman to be a passenger on that flight. Would you like to be the first woman to fly across the Atlantic?”

Amelia flushed in excitement. Despite the hazard involved, she reasoned, this was a rare opportunity. There were no more than a dozen women in the country with flying licenses, and that seemed to be one of the requirements. Perhaps her chances were good. She made up her mind.

“Yes, sir,” she said finally, “I certainly would.”

Captain Railey rose to shake her hand. He was delighted that he had found such a charming candidate. “You will have to go to New York with me,” he told her, “to meet the backers of the flight. Other women fliers are being considered, too.” He paused, then added, “By the way, Miss Earhart, has anyone ever told you that you look like Lindbergh?”

In New York, plans for the flight were being completed. George Palmer Putnam had been commissioned by Mrs. Guest to find a woman flier to take her place. He had called everyone he knew who could possibly find a likely candidate.

It had been the intention of the Honorable Mrs. Frederick Guest of London, formerly Amy Phipps of Pittsburgh, to do for English-American relations what Charles Lindbergh had done for French-American relations.

Among the several women who had already been considered for the flight was Ruth Nichols of Rye, New York, who became a famous woman flier. In her career she paced AE all the way.

Waiting in New York to interview AE was an all-male jury. It was composed of George Palmer Putnam, the publisher; David T. Layman, Jr., Mrs. Guest’s attorney; and a brother of Mrs. Guest, John S. Phipps.

Amelia had never seen such a stern-looking group. After Captain Railey introduced her to each of them in turn, they began to question her. Was she willing to fly the Atlantic? Would she release them from responsibility in the event of disaster? What was her education? How strong was she? How willing? What flying experience did she have? What would she do after the flight? Was she prepared not to be paid, although the two men in the flight would be?

The demure Boston social worker survived the examination. Recalling the experience, Amelia said later: “I found myself in a curious situation. If they did not like me at all or found me wanting in too many respects, I would be deprived of the trip. If they liked me too well, they might be loath to drown me. It was, therefore, necessary for me to maintain an attitude of impenetrable mediocrity. Apparently I did, because I was chosen.”

Impenetrable mediocrity to the contrary, the committee discovered in the girl much of what they were looking for. She was tall and slender and boyish-looking. She was humble and soft-spoken. The men could not help but agree with Railey: she did indeed look and act like Charles Lindbergh.

Amelia was thrilled because she had been selected for the flight. With unbounded enthusiasm she followed the preparations. It had been decided to make the take-off from Boston Harbor, for if news of the project should leak out to the press, then everyone could say that Boston’s own Commander Byrd was preparing another Arctic expedition and that the plane was his.

By the time AE returned to Denison House much had already been done. Acting for Mrs. Guest, Commander Byrd had picked the pilot. He was Wilmer L. “Bill” Stultz, who in turn could make his choice of mechanics. Stultz decided on Lou “Slim” Gordon, who was working in Monroe, Louisiana.

In the event of an emergency, Byrd had also chosen an alternate pilot, Lou Gower. Stultz, however, an exceptional pilot, never had to be replaced, although there were times when he might have been.

The plane, named the Friendship by Mrs. Guest, was brought to a hangar in East Boston to undergo alterations. Because of the risks involved in a long over-water flight and the ever-present possibility of having to make a forced landing, it was decided to replace the wheels of the Fokker with pontoons. For added range, two large gas tanks, which could hold 900 extra gallons of gasoline, were fitted to the forward bulkheads in the cabin of the plane. As an extra precaution, new flight instruments and radio equipment were installed. The work done, Stultz and Gordon took the plane up for many test flights before they pronounced it ready.

The press never discovered what was afoot. According to the agreement, everyone connected with the flight kept quiet about it. Amelia did not tell even her family, who were living in nearby Medford. She did, however, tell Samuel Chapman, a good friend, who was in turn supposed to tell her family after the take-off.

Little is known about Samuel Chapman. He was a lawyer who worked in the Boston office of the Edison Company. According to some reports, Amelia met him in Los Angeles when she was first learning to fly. Some claimed that Amelia was engaged to him.

If there was an engagement, something happened before, during, or after the Friendship flight to break it. After the flight, whenever Amelia was asked about Chapman, she was vague and elusive. She would say that she didn’t know where he was, that she hadn’t seen him, that she didn’t plan to see him. She managed to be as secretive about Samuel Chapman as she had been about the Friendship preparations.

By the middle of May, 1928, the plane was declared ready by Stultz and Gordon. Weather information was gathered, coordinated, and plotted. Reports came in from ships at sea to the Weather Bureau; British reports were digested and cabled to New York. Dr. James H. Kimball, the great friend of fliers, collected, studied, and advised from his New York office of the United States Weather Bureau. Weather became the great obstacle.

Three weeks of waiting for the right weather drew nerves taut. Because she was so well known about the local airports, Amelia avoided East Boston and the hangar. She and George Palmer Putnam (known to everyone as GP) often visited with the Byrds on Brimmer Street, looking over the vast preparations for the commander’s forthcoming expedition to the Antarctic.

On good days Amelia and either Hilton Railey or GP would take long drives into the country in the yellow Kissel. Each night they would eat at a different restaurant specializing in foreign dishes, and after dinner they would attend one of Boston’s legitimate theaters.

Bill Stultz and Slim Gordon stayed at the Copley-Plaza where they shared a room. Stultz, the man of action, the rare combination of great pilot, navigator, instrument flier, and radio operator, grew more restless with the passing days. A somber melancholy began to creep into his waiting hours. He turned to brandy to relieve his boredom and anxiety. His daily intoxication became an acute concern to Amelia, Putnam, and Railey. Gordon, himself sick with ptomaine poisoning, nevertheless knew and insisted that everything would change for the better for both of them if they ever could get out of Boston and into the air.

Spirits dampened during the long, gray days. When the weather was favorable in Boston, the mid-Atlantic was forbidding; when the mid-Atlantic was favorable, Boston was shrouded in fog; when the Atlantic and Boston favorably agreed, the harbor offered only a peaceful calm that made it impossible for the heavy plane to take off.

Amelia wrote what she called “Popping off Letters.” One for her father in Los Angeles, and one for her mother in Medford; the one was gay and stoically resigned, the other was serious and somewhat grim. The letter to her father read:

May 20, 1928

Dearest Dad:

Hooray for the last grand adventure! I wish I had won, but it was worth while anyway. You know that. I have no faith we’ll meet anywhere again, but I wish we might.

Anyway, good-by and good luck to you.

Affectionately, your doter,

Mill.

To her mother she wrote: “Even though I have lost, the adventure was worth while. Our family tends to be too secure. My life has really been very happy, and I didn’t mind contemplating its end in the midst of it.”

Toward the end of May everything seemed ready. But two attempted take-offs were unsuccessful. Too little wind and too much fog mutinied against human will and seabound craft.

At three thirty in the morning of still another day the group left the Copley-Plaza and entered the gray of still another dawn. Once more sandwiches had been made, thermos bottles filled with coffee and cocoa, gear readied and packed. Again they climbed into waiting cars and drove through the wet deserted streets to T Wharf and clambered aboard the tugboat Sadie Ross. They chugged once more out to the Jeffrey Yacht Club in East Boston, and out to the anchored plane. The Friendship seemed a desultory bird, its golden wings and red body bubbled over with morning dew. It was Sunday, the third of June.

The fog was not too thick. The wind was reasonably right, blowing in from the southeast and churning up waves that pounded the pontoons and splashed over the outboard motors.

There were no good-bys; there had been too many before. Slim Gordon took the tarpaulin covers off the three motors. Bill checked the radio and the cockpit instruments. Slim, jumping from pontoon to pontoon, cranked the motors, and then climbed into the copilot’s seat.

The plane started to taxi out of the harbor. Amelia stood between the two large tanks in the cabin and glued her eyes on the air-speed indicator. Lou Gower crouched in the aft end of the plane, hoping the added weight of his body would help bring up the nose of the plane for take-off. The attempt failed.

A five-gallon can of gasoline was cast overboard, but that did not help. The plane was still too heavy. Lou Gower had hoped to go as far as Newfoundland, but realizing the inevitable, he gathered his gear and signaled for a boat from the tug. He wished the crew good luck and left the plane.

The Friendship taxied again down the harbor, propellers whirring in the spray, pontoons cutting the whitecaps. The tug trailed the plane in the churning wake of foam.

Inside the Fokker Amelia watched the air-speed needle while they tried for the take-off. The hand on the instrument moved slowly — to thirty, to forty, then beyond the necessary fifty to fifty-five, and finally to sixty. The three motors roared and snarled and strained. The pontoons rose on the steps, then quickly lifted from the sea. At last they were off.

Amelia glanced at her watch; it was 6:30 A.M. She looked out the window in the side door. Boston and the tugs and fishing boats began to disappear in the fog as the plane climbed to cruising altitude. The sun broke over the rim of the harbor. They were on their way straight up the New England coast, bound for Nova Scotia and Newfoundland.

As official recorder for the flight, AE pulled out her stenographer’s pad that served as a logbook. She sat on a water can and wrote:

96 miles out (1 hour). 7:30. 2,500 ft. Bill shows me on the map that we are near Cash’s Ledge. We cannot see anything (if there is anything to see), as the haze makes visibility poor. The sun is blinding in the cockpit and will be, for a couple of hours. Bill is crouching in the hatchway taking sights.

One hour and fifteen minutes later they sighted Nova Scotia and Fear Island. The plane dropped to 2,000 feet for a closer look. The haze had lessened. White gulls flew over the clustered houses on the green land and headed out over the waves rocking a lone dory on the shore. A rocky ledge ruffled the edge of the island. Pubnico Harbor was directly below. The Friendship, motors humming sweetly, had averaged 114 mph since it left Boston.

Amelia changed her seat to a gas can and looked down through the hatchway. A green dappled shore came into view. The plane raced fast-scudding clouds and churned through the reappearing haze. Bored with nothing more to see, AE now lay on the floor of the fuselage and pulled up the fur collar of her oversized leather flying suit. She felt snug and warm. Beside her along the bulkhead the gas cans squeaked against the heavy tie ropes. “Having a squeaking good time,” Amelia said to herself, and remembered those other squeaking good times she once had in Atchison, Kansas.

2. Girlhood in Kansas

Grandfather Otis stood in front of the fireplace in the long living room of his home. He clasped his hands behind his back and rocked back and forth, his black, square-toed, handmade shoes squeaking on the hard wood floor. He was a big, thick-chested man, and even in retirement he was still every inch the judge he had been before his two granddaughters were born.

His wife Amelia sat in the rocking chair, darning a black knee stocking. The chair creaked as it rocked, keeping involuntary time with the heel-and-toe swaying of the thick black shoes.

Two little girls, their daughter Amy’s only children, sat on the stiff horsehair sofa and exchanged knowing looks. The older girl, Amelia, who was named after her grandmother, bent over and whispered into her sister Muriel’s ear. “A squeaking good time!” They giggled. They wished they had shoes that squeaked, too.

The girls loved their grandfather because he often entertained them with stories about his early days in Kansas. Judge Otis had been one of the first settlers of Atchison. Shortly after the Civil War, when he graduated from the University of Michigan, he came by overland stage from Kalamazoo to Chicago, took a flatboat to St. Louis, then went up the Missouri River and debarked at Atchison to make his home. He built a large two-story brick-and-frame house on a site overlooking the river, and added a big barn and woodshed. The work completed, he sent for his bride, who had been staying with her Quaker family in Philadelphia.

Amelia Otis found the country nearly savage. The railroad tracks going into Atchison were lined with buffalo bones, and the so-called “friendly” Indians scared her half to death. They were too friendly. Whenever she went shopping in town, the curious Indians fingered her dress and poked into her shopping basket. Grandfather Otis chuckled when he told this story about his wife, for she would always remind him that she had preferred the civilization of Philadelphia and the society of Friends.

The Earhart girls enjoyed their grandfather but he never replaced their father, who, it seemed, was always away on a business trip. One of Amelia’s earliest memories of her childhood was waiting for her father to come home for the weekend, to see what presents he would bring and, best of all, to play with him during the day and to listen to his stories at night. He had bought them a baseball and bat and also a basketball, and had shown them how to play with them, despite the protests of some of the neighborhood mothers.

At bedtime for the girls, instead of sending them upstairs to their room, he would sit in the straight-backed chair by the fireplace, cross the long legs of his slender frame, and tell them stories of his family and boyhood.

Edwin S. Earhart had been born a few miles from Atchison, the youngest of twelve children. His father David and his mother Mary had labored many long hours on the tough Kansas sod, only to encounter crop failure, drought, dust storms, and grasshopper plagues. David Earhart had been a missionary minister for the Lutheran Church, and though he had traveled sometimes sixty miles to preach a sermon, his congregation had never numbered more than twenty. During the great drought of 1860 his family would have starved if David had not received two gifts of money, totaling $250. Thereafter, to insure some income, however small, David became a schoolteacher. Eventually he was named as one of the regents of the state college at Lawrence. Certainly the greatest figure in the Earhart family was David’s uncle, John Earhart, who had been a private in General Washington’s army and was killed in the battle of Germantown. All twelve children were proud of Uncle John, a hero.

Edwin Earhart received his law degree from the University of Kansas in 1895 and the same year married Amy Otis. He worked for the railroad as a claims agent and his job kept him from home and family for days, often weeks, at a time. Grandfather Otis, then a judge of the district court, had often advised his son-in-law to open up a law office in Atchison, but Edwin was stubborn. He liked the claims work and he liked to travel.

Amelia M. Earhart was born July 24, 1898, at the Otis home in Atchison, where her parents were living at the time. Since her father’s job with the railroad kept him moving from place to place as he settled claims or went to Topeka to plead a case before the Supreme Court, and her mother often accompanied him on the longer trips to Iowa and Illinois, Amelia and her sister Muriel spent most of their childhood living with the Otises.

As a child, Amelia was an irrepressible tomboy. “I was a horrid little girl,” she said about staying with her grandparents, “and I do not see how they put up with me, even part time.” A harsh judgment upon herself, but she did cause her mother and grandmother many moments of fret and anxiety about her unorthodox behavior.

3. Halifax and Trepassey

AE grinned as she lay on the cabin floor of the Friendship, thinking that this flight across the Atlantic was perhaps the most unorthodox happening in any girl’s life; then, as Bill Stultz throttled back and nosed the plane into a steep glide, she awoke quickly from her reverie, grabbing at the tie ropes with both hands so that she wouldn’t slide forward. They were going down through the thick fog that had developed, for a closer look at check points on the coast. The plane leveled off at 500 feet. Land was to the left through a clearing in the fog.

It was Halifax Harbor, halfway to Trepassey, the Atlantic take-off point, and halfway up the Nova Scotia coast line. Bill circled the harbor twice and slipped expertly down to a landing. The natives swarmed to the shore, and some of them climbed into dories to form a welcoming party. The fog had proved too thick for the fliers, much too thick for visual navigation.

Bill and Slim went ashore to get weather reports. Amelia, meanwhile, remained in the cabin and ate an orange, one of several carefully provided by GP. Mournful sounds of a foghorn punctuated the stillness on the water. A light wind sprang up, and AE hoped that it would help the take-off from the harbor.

Stultz and Gordon returned with discouraging news of rain and clouds for the rest of the flight to Trepassey. Nevertheless, because they had lost an hour by the change in time, they decided to try to make it. Slim cranked up, then discovered a broken primer. They still wanted to go. They took off at 2:30 P.M., but in vain.

It was a hopeless task to try to navigate along the coast. The rain and the fog were too thick and heavy. Disappointed, they turned around and went back to Halifax. They did not want to run the risk of blind flying.

At the Dartmouth Hotel in Halifax difficulties with the press began. Publicity about the flight was now inescapable, for it had been announced in the Boston newspapers that the aviators were on their way to cross the Atlantic. The three fliers found no chance to take much-needed rest.

At midnight two reporters and a cameraman were still trying to talk Bill and Slim into posing for a picture, and at five thirty the next morning the newsmen were waiting when the three travelers came down for breakfast. Before, during, and after the meal interviews and pictures were requested and begged. More reporters and cameramen awaited them at the dock. The fliers had to wait until 100 gallons of gas, which had been ordered two hours earlier, were brought by tug out to the plane and poured into the tanks.

At 9:45 A.M. they took off from a calm sea. Visibility was good and they cruised at 2,000 feet. The sharp rocks and ledges shone dark and bright along the coast beneath the left wing. The 200 miles of fog predicted the night before never materialized, but a thin haze did. At eleven forty-five they were off Cape Canso, the Atlantic tip of Nova Scotia.

Amelia and Slim, happy at the smooth progress of the flight, dived into the sandwiches prepared by the Copley-Plaza. AE munched hungrily and moved over to the side window. She wrinkled her brow as she looked over the scalloped sea. Between bites Slim smiled at the strange sight of Amelia in the oversized flying suit which she had borrowed from Army Major Woolley in Boston.

At 12:15 P.M. they cruised at 3,200 feet at 100 mph. A thick bank of fog rolled in from the Atlantic on the right. At twelve fifty they sighted Newfoundland; at two fifty, Saint Mary’s Bay. Curling masses of fog began to form over the warm earth below. Trepassey, their destination, came into view far below; it looked like an open beak of land. Bill glided and circled down, and landed the Fokker smoothly.

While the plane taxied, Amelia crawled into the cockpit to take pictures of the reception committee. A dozen small boats had come out and were circling the plane, each trying to claim the distinction of being the first to rope the plane and secure it to a mooring.

Slim Gordon had gone out to one of the pontoons. He waved an arm and screamed warnings in vain above the noise of the motors: one of the welcomers threw a rope and nearly knocked him into the water. Stultz at the controls cursed, worried lest the boats get too close to the propellers and entangle a rope in them.

It was impossible to get the idea across that the plane could get to its mooring under its own power, until a Paramount cameraman caught the idea and cleared the way through the boats. Amelia joyfully snapped pictures of the marine rodeo. She had an entertaining half-hour.

The stop at Trepassey became a nightmare of delay and frustration. Day after day angry winds churned the bay, making it impossible to load gasoline into the tanks. For fifteen days, from the fifth of June, sea and wind, together and separately, conspired to test the patience of the fliers. On June 7 they tried three times to take off and failed. A pontoon sprung a leak and an oil tank cracked. Slim patiently repaired both. The fret of anticipation grew worse by the hour.

At Devereux House, where they stayed, the travelers sought diversion by playing rummy and chopping wood, reading telegrams and scanning maps and weather reports, hiking and fishing. The local food became a topic of conversation. Slim, fearful that he would come down with another case of ptomaine poisoning, dieted mainly on candy bars, and soon exhausted the entire stock of the little neighborhood store. Amelia and Bill braved canned rabbit and boiled lamb, and the inevitable vegetables of potatoes, turnips, and cabbage. The austerity of the land forced a simple fare, but the warmth and friendliness of the Devereux family and the many visitors contrasted with the cruelty of the land and climate.

Apparently untroubled and indefatigable, Bill Stultz would get up before the others in the morning and go eeling, trouting, or exploring; at night he would pick out tunes on the guitar to entertain the others. Job-like, they all tried to ignore the smothering fog, the howling winds, and the hurtling sea, but the strain was telling in wrinkles of concern on all their faces. To dull the sharpened edge of his anxiety, Bill took to drinking heavily. His melancholy had returned. AE was worried about it; Slim, evidently, was unconcerned, knowing that Bill would stop drinking once he was back in the air, as he had in Boston.

On June 12 they tried desperately for four hours to take off, but the heaviness of the receding tide sprayed and silenced the outboard motors. The plane seemed heavy and unwieldy. Every item of unnecessary equipment was unloaded — camera, coats, bags, cushions — but still the salt spray continued to kill the motors. They were too discouraged to speak.

The next day they arose at six o’clock. They unloaded 300 pounds of fuel and tried for take-off, but the left motor cut out. More days of waiting plagued them until the motor was repaired, but one reassuring message had reached them. The Southern Cross, a trimotored Fokker, like the Friendship except for pontoons, had crossed the Pacific from San Francisco.

Back at the Devereux home, they decided to do something about their clothes. Amelia, who had only the clothes she was wearing, bought a green-checked Mother Hubbard for ninety cents and a pair of tan hose, then borrowed a pair of shoes, a skirt, and a slip, so that she could wash everything from the skin out. Bill and Slim felt the same crawling need for cleanliness. They borrowed clothes, and had their suits cleaned and pressed and their shirts laundered. Bill splurged and bought a new tie and new Trepassey socks.

Finally, a slight break in the weather came on Sunday morning, June 17. At eleven o’clock, after three tries in a heavy sea, the take-off was successful. Bill Stultz, unfortunately, had to be all but carried on the plane by Amelia and Gordon, but again he called upon hidden reserves of airmanship, as in Boston, and piloted the Friendship as if nothing had ever happened.

Amelia worried lest there would be a recurrence of drinking during the long over-water flight. Her fears were intensified when she found a bottle hidden in the rear of the plane. She debated the discovery for a few moments, but soon acted: she dropped the bottle into the ocean. As it happened, her concern was unfounded. Stultz never came back to look for his stimulant; flying, it appeared, was for him stimulant enough.

The Friendship wobbled through the fog, one engine still spluttering from the sea spray on take-off, climbed to 3,000 feet, and leveled off to cruise for a while. More wisps of fog flitted by. Bill nosed the plane higher, out of the fog, but into a sudden snowstorm. Lighter by 2,000 pounds, because of the excess baggage and fuel that had been removed at Trepassey, three tons of aircraft now flew through the air, shaking violently in the buffeting of the storm.

Bill pointed the nose down; the motors roared wide open. At 3,000 feet they bucked a head wind and a lashing rain; the plane bumped and lurched in the downdrafts and updrafts. The air speed was steady at 106 mph. Suddenly a clear sky, sun shining, and blue sea broke as far as Amelia could see; then, ominously, mountainous peaks of clouds towered dead ahead. The plane upended and hurtled headlong in a steep dive. Amelia braced herself against the forward bulkhead and waited for the plane to right itself.

4. Atchison Tomboy

How often before had she known the same sensation, long before she had ever seen or learned how to fly an airplane. Like the day she decided to build a roller coaster out behind her grandfather’s woodshed. With her sister Muriel and her cousins Katherine and Lucy Challiss to help her, Amelia had nailed some cross boards to two long planks for the runway, then tacked some old roller-skate wheels to a wide board for the coaster. The girls lifted the crude runway and leaned it against the top of the shed, while Amelia climbed up a ladder to the roof. The coaster was handed up to her, and as she knelt with the board between her hands, she felt a shiver along the middle of her back. She wondered for a moment if she could make it down the steep incline. The first time she tried, she flipped over when the coaster reached the ground, and her sister and cousins screamed. Amelia cautioned them against making too much noise, then insisted that she would try it again after the boards were made longer. On the second attempt she shot from the end of the incline onto the ground, right side up and unharmed.

The next day when Grandmother Otis discovered the roughly built roller coaster she disapproved strongly. Young girls just didn’t do those things. They stayed at home and sewed and learned how to cook. “Why,” Grandmother Otis used to say to Amelia and Muriel, “the most strenuous thing I ever did as a girl was to roll a hoop in the public square.”

Despite Grandmother’s remark, the girls would scamper hand in hand through the paths from the bluff down to the river where they would search the caves for arrowheads and play Pioneers and Indians. One day when they had returned from such an adventure, Mrs. Earhart looked at her daughters’ dirty pinafores and decided they needed costumes more in keeping with their play. Amy Otis bought for her girls some new gym suits. The neighborhood was shocked. Amelia and Muriel were delighted: now they could climb on the back of the cow in the barn, or play baseball and basketball, and never worry about tearing their dresses.