Category Archives: Air racing

Amelia Earhart (Air racing.  Born, Atchison, KS, July 24, 1898; died, near Howland Island in the Pacific Ocean, probably July 2, 1937.)  Originally coming to public attention as one of the women flyers in the Bendix Aviation air races (the so-called “powder puff derbies”), Amelia Earhart was a contemporary and competitor of, among others, Pancho Barnes, Marion Rice Hart and Jackie Cochran.  Earhart become a singular figure due to her feats after her marriage to New York publisher George Putnam (Feb. 2, 1932).  Putnam promoted her flight to Ireland that made her the first woman to fly the Atlantic Ocean solo.  She left Harbor Grace, Newfoundland, May 20, 1932, and landed in a farmer’s field at Culmore, Ireland, the next day, becoming instantly celebrated.  Her fame, to some degree, also rests on her ill-fated attempt to fly around the world in 1937.  Earhart took off from Oakland, Calif., May 21 amid a glare of publicity.  She left with navigator Fred Noonan from Lae, New Guinea, July 1 and subsequently disappeared without a trace.  President Franklin Roosevelt ordered the U.S. Navy to join in the search to no avail, creating a mystery that has endured ever since.