Amelia Earhart Flies Solo Across the Atlantic

In June 1928, Amelia Earhart stepped ashore at Burry Port in Wales as the first woman to cross the Atlantic Ocean by air. Although designated flight commander of the tri-motor seaplane Friendship, she had served primarily as a log keeper while pilot Wilmer Stultz and co-pilot Louis Gordon did the flying. Recognizing that the public acclaim directed at her far outpaced her role at the controls, Earhart famously downplayed her participation upon landing, remarking that she had felt like mere baggage and expressing a hope that she might one day attempt the passage alone.

Earhart had entered aviation several years earlier, taking her first flight lesson in early 1921 under instructor Neta Snook in California. Working as a telephone company clerk and photographer to fund her training, she bought a secondhand Kinner Airster biplane nicknamed The Canary. By October 1922, she established a female altitude record of 14,000 feet, and the following year became the sixteenth woman issued a pilot's license by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. After briefly resuming studies at Columbia University, she moved to the Boston area and worked as a social worker at Denison House, a settlement house, while remaining active in regional flying organizations.