The Girl in Brown Who Walks Alone

The Girl in Brown Who Walks Alone

A small town older sister, a drunken father, a miserable high school life, an illness that nearly took her life and the mysterious disappearance that still to this day stuns scientists. Just who is the childhood tomboy from Kansas? And how did she end up becoming an acclaimed pilot? Her story is more interesting than you might think.

Amelia Earhart (born Amelia “Millie” Mary Earhart) was born in Atchison, Kansas, at her grandfather (Alfred Gideon Otis)’s house. She was born to Samuel “Edwin” Staton Earhart, and his wife Amelia “Amy” Otis Earhart on July 24, 1897. She was the second oldest child (the first was stillborn in 1896) and was followed by Grace “Pidge” Muriel Earhart in 1899.

Both Amelia and Grace spent every day exploring their neighborhood, though their other hobbies included hunting rats with a rifle and sledding. Earhart was adventurous at a young age, in fact she and her uncle fashioned a ramp on the roof of their house, based off of a roller coaster she had ridden. Amelia then proceeded to ride down said ramp in a wooden box. She finished with a busted lip, but claimed to have enjoyed it nonetheless.

The first aircraft that famous pilot Amelia Earhart laid eyes on was a rickety old carnival plane and (when her father asked her if she and Grace wanted to go for a plane ride) she disagreed, later saying that it was “a thing of rusty wire and wood and not at all interesting.”

Amelia and Grace (now going by Muriel) were homeschooled for majority of their childhood. Amelia herself began at a public school at age 12. Unfortunately, her father was drawn into a drinking problem. This led to the Amelia’s childhood home getting sold (along with its contents) and Amelia’s father moving to Springfield, Missouri and she and the rest of her family moving to Chicago.

After much disagreement on which high school to attend, she tried many before choosing Hyde Park High School. Her yearbook caption said “A.E. – the girl in brown who walks alone.” She didn’t socialize much, but she quickly found interest in work as a nurse. She was influenced by seeing wounded soldiers returning from World War I. She soon became a nurse’s aide in the Spadina Military Hospital.

During the Spanish Flu Pandemic in 1918, Amelia originally began as a nurse, treating the ill. However, she actually caught the virus. Earhart had pneumonia and maxillary sinusitis beginning November 1918. She survived, but she had to wear a bandage over her cheek for a while afterwards due to aftereffects from the sickness.

After her experience with the flu, Amelia and a close friend of hers traveled to an air fair. An ace flying one of the many planes dived downwards towards Amelia and her friend. Amelia assumed that the pilot meant to scare them, however while her friend ran, she remained stone still and didn’t run, even when the plane was merely inches above her head. Unbeknownst to her at the time, this was the world renowned pilot’s first real experience with planes.

Her moment of destiny with aircraftcame when air racer Frank Hawks gave her a ten minute ride for ten dollars from her father. On that topic, she exclaimed, “By the time I had gotten two or three hundred feet off the ground, I knew I had to fly.” Earhart dabbled in a series of jobs in order to save enough money for flying lessons. A few of her jobs included a truck driver and photographer.

On January 3, 1921 she took her first lesson at Kinner Field, close by Long Beach. When she arrived, she met up with her teacher (a woman named Anita Snook) and said simply: “I want to fly. Will you teach me?” Six months after her first lesson, she purchased her first plane. It was a yellow KinnerAirster Biplane that she nicknamed “the Canary”.

In 1927, Amelia was asked to be a passenger in a transatlantic flight (a flight across the Atlantic). First declining, she soon agreed, however she was just an extra person and had only one duty: logging the flight. She commented on this experience, saying “Stultz”—the pilot—“did all of the flying—had too. I was just baggage, like a sack of potatoes. Maybe someday I’ll try it alone.”

Amelia Earhart became vastly popular from then on. She had her own clothesline, titled “Active Living” that sold in well over 50 stores. Along with that, she promoted a luggage line called “Modernaire Earhart Luggage”. Amelia’s first marriage was to a man named Samuel Chapman. Chapman was a chemical engineer from Boston. This engagement ended on November 23, 1928. George P. “GP” Putnam was married previously before Earhart, however he seemed attracted to her more specifically. He proposed to Amelia six times before she agreed.

Amelia was extremely independent, and she refused to go by “Mrs. Putnam”. After stating very strongly that she was an independent woman and she wasn’t to be “bound to him”, people started referring to GP as “Mr. Earhart”. Earhart and Putnam didn’t have any children, but Earhart shared a close connection with the three children from George’s previous marriage. The first was Dorothy Binney, the second David Binney Putnam, and the final was David BinneyPutnam. Amelia’s closest relation was to David, who visited her and George often. David unfortunately contracted Polio (disabling him from visiting as often), but he lived a long life, only recently dying in 2013.

After her marriage, Earhart’s career took off. She partook in a solo transatlantic flight in 1932, which was quickly followed by a solo flight from Honolulu to Oakland (California) in 1935. 1930 through 1935 she she set seven women’s speed and distance records.

In 1935, Amelia began planning for a plane trip around the world. After countless hours of study, she chose her navigator. He was a man named Fred Noonan, and he wasn’t her first choice. In fact, her first choice was Captain Harry Manning, who had captained a ship called President Roosevelt. Noonan had experience in the navy, so he was familiar with both aquatic and aerial navigation.

On March 17, 1937, Earhart flew from Oakland (California) to Honolulu (Hawaii), in a first attempt at the worldwide trip. Her official crew was: Fred Noonan, Harry Manning and Paul Mantz (Mantz was her early on navigation teacher). Apparently, it was a problem with the plane’s “pitch mechanism” that stopped the flight. The pitch mechanism controls the propeller’s turning, so obviously it was an issue when there was a problem with that.

After repairs, the second takeoff took place in Luke Field. Unfortunately, the plane “ground-looped”, which means that it angled to one side and one of the wings dragged on the ground. The plane was all but wrecked and shipped to Lockheed Burbank for repairing.

The second attempt at the trip was smaller, taking off from Miami on June 1. Fred Noonan was the only remaining member of the team with Amelia. During the trip they stopped in Africa, South America and Southeast Asia, finishing in Lae, New Guinea. The majority of the trip (22,000 miles) had been completed. Only 7,000 miles were left, the 7,000 would be over the Pacific Ocean.

The duo left Lae on July 2, 1937, at midnight. They were scheduled to land on Howland Island, an island in the Pacific. The radio was to be used, but Noonan had earlier stated that there were problems with the radio navigation system. A lot of people noticed that Amelia didn’t seem to like the large new equipment in her plane, she even cut a large radio antenna (supposed to be used in the long rage transmissions) in half because she didn’t like to pull it back into the plane every day.

During the trip to Howland Island, the duo was supposed to stay in radio contact, checking in every few hours. At 2:45 AM and directly before 5 AM on July 2nd, two calls were made. The calls were indecipherable, probably because the plane was still quite a ways off from their destination. At 6:14 AM, Amelia and Fred called in and gave the receivers information saying they were within 200 miles of the island. In order to help assist the receivers in tracking the signal, Amelia whistled continuously into the microphone.

The crisis then arose.

The radio operators couldn’t home in on the plane’s signal. At 6:45 AM, Amelia asked for assurance that she was on track, claiming that her navigation system said she was 100 miles out.

At 7:42 AM, Earhart called in and said, “We must be on you [the island], but we cannot see you—but gas is running low. Have been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying at 1,000 feet.” At 7:48 she radioed back and informed the receivers that she couldn’t hear their transmissions, even though the receivers later discovered that was the time she was closest to them. She said she couldn’t figure out which direction they were in, leaving the plane lost with nowhere to land.

Her final received transmission was, “We are on the line 157 337. We will repeat this message. We will repeat this on 6210 kilocycles. Wait.” She left for a couple minutes, until she returned and said, “We are running on line North and South.” Unfortunately, Earhart and Noonan thought they had homed in Howland Island, but they were off by five nautical miles.

The Itasca (the boat receiving the messages) tried using both smoke signals and Morse code signals, but both failed. There were various times where the Itasca thought they had gotten more transmissions, but none of them were strong enough to verify the possibility.

A large search began on July 6th, 1937. Howland Island, and every nearby island were the first to be checked. Plenty of the ocean was flown over in an attempt to spot the missing plane and pilots. Gardner Island (now called Nikumuroro) , an uninhabited island, actually showed signs of people surviving on it when the search party arrived. One of the most popular modern theories is that she survived on the island for a long period of time, but no matter how she died, she did and her remains were scavenged by giant coconut crabs (which can get as big as medium sized dogs).

The search finished on July 19th, 1937, but ships and planes were still advised to be on lookout. Her husband, Putnam, asked that she was given a seven year waiting period so he could manage her finances. Amelia wasn’t officially named dead until January 5th, 1939.

There are countless theories on what happened to Earhart. Did she survive on that island? Or did she simply run out of fuel and crash into the ocean? Could she have been abducted by the Japanese? Or were Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan secretly spies for the Franklin Roosevelt administration, sent to spy on Japan? Some people think she turned back, trying to reach Britain, but instead crashing 40 miles southwest of Raubul, New Britain. A wrecked plane actually sits in that jungle to assist the theory.

Another popular theory is that of Irene CraigmileBolam. The female pilot and banker was wrongfully accused of being Earhart. People said that she was Amelia Earhart, she had just changed her name and remarried. These theories were disproved after several facial differences were pointed out, and proof of Bolam’s early life were brought in.

Since then, her legacy has inspired an unnamable amount of female pilots to step forwards. Many flights have been held by female pilots in her honor, most of which included an authentic plane from the time (even the recent flights such as the one in 2013, piloted by Amelia Rose Earhart). Along with that, she also received many memorials and charities in her name.

Friendly, smart and brave, Amelia Earhart wasn’t just a pilot, she was an inspiration to anyone and everyone (male or female) who wanted to do something they loved. Starting out as “the girl in brown who walks alone”, Amelia Earhart soon became a world known pilot who will live on in our hearts forever.

Sources: