Kids’ Book Corner: The Valley’s Own Aviator Amelia Earhart

BY JO PERRY

Harry Pottered out? Sometimes a good biography is in order, especially when it’s about the life of a heroic figure with local connections. Amelia Earhart broke world speed and distance aviation records and was the first woman to fly alone across the Atlantic. Your young explorers will be uplifted when they read about her life and its local connections in Corrine Szabo’s “Sky Pioneer: A Photobiography of Amelia Earhart.”

Earhart was eleven when she saw her first airplane at the 1908 Iowa State Fair, five years after the Wright Brothers’ first powered flight. But it wasn’t until she was an adult and visiting her parents here in L.A. that she took her first ride in an airplane. Earhart loved the experience so much that she took flying lessons, purchased her own plane, and earned her pilot’s license.

Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean. On June 17, 1928, she and copilot Lou Gordon took off in a plane called Friendship from Trepassey, Newfoundland. They landed in Wales 20 hours and 40 minutes later. The flight made Earhart famous, but she wanted to pilot a plane by herself.

Earhart became the first woman to make a solo round-trip flight across the United States and in 1932, she embarked on a solo Atlantic flight. She piloted her Lockheed Vega from Harbor Grace, Newfoundland to a pasture in Londonderry, Ireland. Earhart succeeded despite a storm, faulty equipment, and ice on the plane’s wings. This flight earned her a heroine’s welcome in New York, complete with a ticker-tape parade.

Earhart went on to complete other record-breaking flights, received many awards and spoke on behalf of women’s rights. In 1937 Earhart and navigator Freed Noonan began an around-the-world flight along the Equator and flew 22,000 miles in about six weeks. On July 2, they took off from New Guinea for a 2,556 mile trip to Howland Island. No one knows exactly what went wrong, but Earhart and Noonan never reached the tiny island and the plane was never found.

Earhart lived in North Hollywood from 1928 – 1937, and her Vega was built in Burbank. Visit Amelia Earhart’s statue in North Hollywood Park at the corner of Tujunga and Magnolia on August 19, National Aviation Day.

Jo Perry has a Ph.D. in English, taught literature and writing, and worked as a college administrator and as a television writer and producer. She is a reviewer for BookBrowse.com and is an ongoing contributor to kidsLA Magazine for which she writes about the city, children’s books, and conducts interviews. For two years she wrote the Kids’ Book Club column for the L.A. Times’ Kids’ Reading Room page.