Amelia Earhart: Accomplishes a Transatlantic Flight

Born into a wealthy family in Atchison, Kansas on July 24th, 1897, Amelia Earhart developed a passion for adventure at an early age, steadily gaining flying experience from her twenties onward, until her disappearance in 1937. during a Pacific Ocean flight from Lae, New Guinea to Howland Island.

Nicknamed Lady Lindy after Charles Lindbergh’s 1927 solo flight across the Atlantic, the following year, Earhart became the first woman to fly the Atlantic with pilot Wilmer Stultz and copilot and flight mechanic Louis Gordon, departing from Trepassey Harbor, Newfoundland in a Fokker F.VIIb, landing near Burry Port South Wales 20 hours and 40 minutes later.

Since most of the flight was on instruments and Earhart had no training yet for that type of flying, when asked by a reporter if she helped fly the plane, she answered,

“Stultz did all the flying—had to, I was just baggage, like a sack of potatoes. Maybe someday I’ll try it alone.”

She did just that five years to the day after Lucky Lindy’s flight across the pond, flying from Newfoundland to Ireland in just under 15 hours. On the morning of May 20th, 1932, 34-year-old Earhart set off from Harbour Grace with a copy of the Telegraph-Journal, given to her by a reporter to confirm the date of her flight in a Lockheed Vega 5B.

After contending with strong northerly winds, icy conditions and mechanical problems, Earhart landed in a pasture at Culmore, Northern Ireland. The landing was witnessed by Cecil King and T. Sawyers, and when a farm hand asked “Have you flown far?” Earhart replied,

“From America.”