Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1928-10-14
lean Women Take to Flying With Remarkable Success

ager of an airplane distributing agency
in America. Her Office is at the Oak
land, Calf, airport. She learned to fly
because she thought she should know
everything about the aircraft she sells
even to looking after the motors.
Still another California girl, Evelyn
Trout of Los Angeles, took up flying be-
cause the mechanical side of aviation
interested her. Although she had been
student in the College of Architecture
at the University of Southern California,
she abandoned this career TO tinker with
motors at the automobile service station
she owned. Subsequently 1le sold her
business to take flying lessons, including
courses lin aviation and meteorology.
After four months of training she was
given her wings and after seven hours
She obtained private license. And now,
at %, she is ready to qualify for COM
mercial ncenSe.
Although they fly only for pleasure,
| Katherine S. Van Vechten, society girl
! of Colorado Springs; Florence Maddox
| of Titusville, N. j.; Evangeline Dahl
niger Of Detroit; Geraldine Grey of Buff
| falo. and Mrs. Frank H. Freedman u
Little Rock Ark, have gone about their
| lessons so efficiently that they have won
private licenses. Mrs. Friedman be-
| lieves that women will never fill impor-
| tant posts in commercial aviation, but
will use planes for sport and visiting
friends just as they now use roadsters.
The opposite school of thought is rep
resented by Sacha Peggy Hall of Santa
Ana, Calf, who holds limited COM
mercial E;1ot's license, and by Elizabeth
| Warner of Washington, one of the most
recently qualified of the woman pilots.
Miss Warner is the sister of E. P. War
ner, Assistant Secretary of the Navy in
Charge of Aviation. She received her
training at Hoover Field. Washington,
and was given license late in May.
18th Elder, the aviatrix from Lake
| i~nI, Fla, whose $3.50 flight was
bccked Ivy the business men Of Wheeling,
w. Va, thus far has made more money
from her adventures than any of the
other woman pilots. While her at
tempted flight to Europe was avowedly
for publicity purposes, she is bona tide
pilot, and the records show that she
made grade of 80 per cent on her writ
ten test.
THE woman pilots of today have taken
up flying in far different spirit
from these prominent in the sport of
Is years ago. Most of these women are
flying for pleasure, although four of the
Il8 hold some form of commercial license.
The famous aviatrices of an earlier day
were inpelled to take up flying from
far different motives. To them 1t meant
loops and StuntS-spectacular exhibit
tions that made money and brought
fame. And only two of the most famous
of that pioneer group are living today.
Occasionally somebody asks. What
has happened to Ruth Law? She made
the most brilliant record of any Amer
lean woman aviator, but now she is
crowding 40. and 40 is old for flying.
When she got a license back in 1912
she was the third woman to qualify IN
this country. She was the first Amer
lean woman to loop the loop; she was
the first person to hop from New York
to Chicago and back. and in 1917 she
broke the worlds altitude record with
14,217 feet and then toured the States
as the head of the Ruth Law Flying
Circus. When the war broke out she
tried to enlist, but was not accepted
and so she did Red Cross work. In 1913
and 1919 she gave exhibitions in China
and Japan. But in private life she Is
Mrs Charles Oliver, and six years ago
she finally consented to give up flying
to spare her husbands nerves! The
divers are now living quietly in Bev-
erley Hills, where Ruth Law, who can
not abandon all interest in flying, is
said to be interested in developing the
helicopter.
The other woman pioneer of the air,
Katherine Stinson, likewise has given
up flying-also at her husbands re-
quest, some say. Her career was most
picturesque, for she took up flying at
the age of Is. She was the first woman
to fly over London, and as long ago as
1915 she went sky-writing in ma
chine containing an engine Salvaged
from the wreck of Lincoln Beacheys
plane. At one time she was an air
mail pilot.
Prior to the war only eight women
had been granted pilots licenses in this
country They were Harriet Quimby,
Mathilde Moissant, Julia Clark. Kath-
crime Stinson, Bernette A. Miller, Ruth
Law, Mrs. Richard Hornsby and Dor
othy Pierce.
OF this group Harriet Quimby's life
was the most dramatic, though her ex-
perience covered less than year. She
was a special writer on the staff of a
magazine. Becoming interested in avi-
alton. she trained at John Moissant's
School on Nassau boulevard. Long Is
land, receiving her license in August
1911 After exhibition flying in this
country for about six months she de
cided to attempt to be the Srst woman
20 fly the English Channel.
This she accomplished in 1912, and
on returning home was received with
| SICdL cllIIluSldotH. 1LlCII SIlC d4IN
Blanche Steward Scott became the avi-
| alton heroineS of the time. Exactly IL
months to a day after she had taken
| out her license she met with her first
accident She was taking part in a
meet in Boston when defective plane
became u4lnnanageable owing to bad
| winds. She and her companion were
thrown from an elevation of 1000 feet
and killed instantly. Her close friend,
Miss Scott, was in the air at the same
time. saw the crash, made a perfect
| landing and tainted. Another con-
| temporary. who was a friendly rival,
Mathilde MoisSant, soon afterward gave
up flying when her machine was de-
stroyed in a crash.
The first woman licensed after the
war, in 1919. was Laura Bromwell, who
set out after records. She Topped the
loop 1873 times just two weeks before
she crashed to her death at Curtiss
Field in 1922.
But the days Of spectacular flying and
transforming appear to have ended fol
woman pilots. This country Is not In
terested in aviatriceS who perform dare
devil feats. Throughout the States thu
people were so apathetic to this form Of
entertainment that Thea Rasche. Ger
man aviatriX, abandoned her program
of exhibition flights last Summer be-
cause of the lack of response.
Although woman pilots are few in
number at present. they appear to D
setting and adhering to new standard: