University of Missouri, St. Louis IRL @ UMSL Theses UMSL Graduate Works 7-24-2020 Amelia Earhart: Myth and Memory Amy Lutz University of Missouri-St. Louis, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://irl.umsl.edu/thesis Part of the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Lutz, Amy, "Amelia Earhart: Myth and Memory" (2020). Theses. 365. https://irl.umsl.edu/thesis/365 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the UMSL Graduate Works at IRL @ UMSL. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses by an authorized administrator of IRL @ UMSL. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Amelia Earhart: Myth and Memory Amy Lutz M.A. History, University of Missouri-St. Louis, 2020 A Thesis Submitted to The Graduate School at the University of Missouri-St. Louis in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Master of Arts in History August 2020 Advisory Committee Minsoo Kang, Ph.D. Chairperson Kevin Fernlund, Ph.D. Andrew Hurley, Ph.D. Copyright, Amy Lutz, 2020 1 INTRODUCTION Every summer, tens of thousands of visitors flock to Atchison, Kansas, a small town nestled on the bluffs of the Missouri River, for the annual Amelia Earhart Festival. The occasion attracts guests from all over the world and features outdoor concerts, a food and crafts fair, and the famous “Concert in the Sky” fireworks show.1 In between the cotton candy and country music, guests often exchange theories about Amelia Earhart, who was born in Atchison in 1897, and her disappearance. As a native of the small town whose given name is Amelia, I grew up in Earhart’s shadow, so to speak. I learned about the aviator’s life in classroom after classroom and during yearly museum trips to the Amelia Earhart Birthplace Museum. My classmates and I also became well-versed on theories of Earhart’s disappearance. Some theorists believe she simply crashed into the ocean after running out of fuel, while others suspect she and her navigator Fred Noonan survived on a deserted atoll for a time. The most intriguing theory, however, posited that Earhart and Noonan were captured by the Japanese and executed, possibly because they had been engaging in an espionage mission for the American government. As an adult, I could not help but wonder when and how that suspicion arose. “Well, then, thousands of years ago, I was born in Atchison, Kansas,” Earhart wrote in her 1932 book, The Fun of It.2 On July 24, 1897, the future record-breaking aviator was born in a small bedroom in her grandparents’ Victorian-style home overlooking the Missouri River. She was an adventurous child, always finding new ways of “getting into trouble,” often with her younger sister, Muriel. “I am sure I was a horrid 1 “Amelia Earhart Festival.” VisitAtchison.com. http://visitatchison.com/event/amelia-earhart-festival/ [Retrieved May 9, 2019] 2 Amelia Earhart, The Fun of It. (Chicago: Academy Press Limited, 1932), 4. 2 little girl, and I do not see how she [her grandmother] put up with me, even part time.” She was rambunctious and ambitious, once attempting to build an operational roller coaster in her backyard after not being allowed to ride one at the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904.3 As an adolescent, Earhart attended a small, parochial college preparatory school near her grandparent’s home in Atchison. By the time Earhart was in her early teens, it was clear to her entire family that her father was an alcoholic. He had difficulty holding down a job and, as a result, the family moved frequently. In 1905, they relocated to Des Moines, Iowa, where Earhart saw an airplane for the first time in 1908 at the Iowa State Fair. She was enthralled, but skeptical, and later commented on the contraption’s poor construction, “It was a thing of rusty wire and wood and not at all interesting.” However, after the Wright brother’s successful flight just a few years later, her interest in aviation soared. Safely gliding far above the clouds encased in metal and shrouded by wings finally seemed possible.4 The Earhart family moved once more, and the future aviator graduated from high school in Hyde Park in Chicago in 1915. For three years, she served as a nurse’s aid amid the chaos of the First World War and Spanish Flu pandemic. Following the end of the war, she moved to New York and enrolled in Columbia University, hoping to go into medicine. Earhart was not destined to join the medical field, however. A few short years later, she left New York and moved to Los Angeles, where she took her first flight with record-breaking aviator Frank Hawks in 1920. The following year, she enrolled in flying lessons with Anita (“Neta”) Snooks, the first woman to run her own aviation business and own a commercial airfield. Soon, with the help of her parents and savings from a job at a 3 Earhart, The Fun of It, 5. 4 Mary S. Lovell, The Sound of Wings. (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989), 15. 3 local telephone company, Earhart bought her first airplane and acquired her pilot’s license in 1923.5 In 1928, Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean as a passenger – despite her experience, she did not pilot the airplane. Aviator Wilmer Stultz and his mechanic Louis “Slim” Gordon had been at the controls. Regardless, Earhart’s popularity surged, and she became a worldwide celebrity. Her public notoriety was not only the result of her accomplishments, although they played no small part. Earhart was selected to participate in the flight by publisher George P. Putnam and the two quickly fell for each other. Putnam managed Earhart’s growing popularity and introduced her to the biggest names in Hollywood, the media, and politics. The two were married in 1931. The road to marriage was not without its stumbles, however. Earhart, ever protective of her independence and progressive in her politics, refused Putnam’s proposal multiple times before finally accepting. On the day of their marriage, she handed her fiancé a letter detailing her “terms” for the union. It read, in part, “On our life together I want you to understand I shall not hold you to any medieval code of faithfulness to me, nor shall I consider myself bound to you similarly…I must exact a cruel promise, and that is you will let me go in a year if we find no happiness together.”6 The two did “find happiness” together, however, and were married until Earhart’s disappearance in 1937. In 1932, Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean solo, and only the second person to complete the trip alone – Charles Lindbergh had been the first in 1919. She and Putnam traveled throughout Europe for weeks after her arrival and 5 “Amelia Earhart Biographical Sketch.” Amelia Earhart Collection, Purdue Libraries, Accessed June 18, 2020. http://collections.lib.purdue.edu/aearhart/biography.php 6 Lovell, Sound of Wings, 166. 4 before returning to New York in June 1932. Upon her return, she was greeted by a crowd of thousands and a tickertape parade in her honor.7 In 1935, Earhart joined the faculty at Purdue University, where she served as an advisor in aeronautics and as a counselor in the study of careers for women. In 1936, funds from the Purdue Research Foundation allowed her to purchase a new airplane, which she called her “Flying Laboratory.” By then, Earhart began to seriously plan a world flight at the equator.8 It is difficult to overestimate Earhart’s celebrity status during the 1930s. After her transatlantic flight in 1932, she and Putnam were granted an audience with Pope Pius XI. Benito Mussolini sent her a bouquet of red roses and the trio met while she was in Rome. Later, they met with the king and queen of Belgium in Brussels for a private meal, during which time Earhart was gifted the decoration of Chevalier of the Order of Leopold.9 Within a year of her flight across Atlantic Ocean, Earhart developed a friendship with President Franklin D. Roosevelt and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt (George Putnam had been acquainted with Franklin Roosevelt as a child). Amelia and Eleanor became good friends and she even took the First Lady for a brief flight in her airplane. The couples met frequently throughout the 1930s at the White House. In 1935, Earhart was awarded the title of America’s Outstanding Airwoman at the prestigious Harmon Awards. Soon afterwards, a poll conducted by journalism students at New York University revealed that the two best-known women in the world were Eleanor Roosevelt and Amelia Earhart (Franklin D. Roosevelt and Adolf Hitler were deemed the best-known men). Both Earhart and her husband were close friends with Gene Vidal, and it was through the Amelia’s 7 Ibid. 192. 8 “Amelia Earhart Biographical Sketch,” Amelia Earhart Collection, Purdue Libraries. 9 Lovell, The Sound of Wings, 191. 5 influence that Vidal was appointed Director of Air Commerce in 1935.10 Earhart gave frequent radio addresses and speeches about aviation and women’s rights and in November of 1936, she sent a letter to President Roosevelt updating him on her planned world flight.11 By that point, people around the world knew the name “Amelia Earhart” and were waiting in excitement for her most daring challenge. In March 1937, Earhart’s plans were temporarily cut short when she crashed trying to depart from Luke Field in Hawaii. She resumed her attempt a few months later, on June 1, taking off from Miami.