Previously published in Examiner
November is aviation history month and what better to celebrate women’s issues than to read about the most famous woman aviator in history.
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Amelia Earhart
The disappearance of Amelia Earhart in 1937 remains one of the biggest mysteries of all time.
Life and times of Amelia Earhart
Amelia Mary Earhart was born on July 24, 1897 in Atchinson, Kansas. Amelia and her sister spend the first years of their lives with their grandparents because they father was the railroad company’s lawyer and had to travel quite a bit. The girls went back to their parents when Amelia was 12 and they too traveled around with their parents. The father had a drinking problem and lost his job as a consequence of his drinking.
Through her high school years Amelia was always interested in women who worked in male oriented jobs. A true feminist at heart, Amelia was interested in women in law, engineering, medicine, film production advertising, and management.
When Amelia was 20 she did voluntary work as a nurses aid during World War I in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She also tried social working and studied medicine for a bit, but once she discovered flying she was hooked on it. Nothing would take her away from he newly found passion.
It was during this time when the Spanish flu outbreak reached Toronto that Ameila got sick herself and became a patient. She had several small operations on her sinuses which did not help. It took Amelia nearly a year to ge back to herself. She recouperated at her sister’s home in Northampton, Massachusetts. She spent the time reading poetry, studing mechanics and playing the banjo. Amelia would suffer from headaches the rest of her life after this sickness had passed.
Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amelia_Earhart