| Louise McPhetridge Thaden, 1905-1979 Born in Bentonville, Arkansas, Louise Thaden left college to sell airplanes for Walter Beech’s Travel Air Corporation in California. In 1928, she earned her pilot’s license and set an altitude record of 20,260 feet. She set a U.S. women’ s endurance record, staying aloft more than 22 hours. In 1929, she became only the fourth woman to earn a transport pilot license. Louise won the 1929 Women’s Air Derby, called the Powder Puff Derby, beating friends Amelia Earhart and Pancho Barnes. During the 1930s, Louise chalked up one altitude, endurance, and speed record after another, becoming the one of most famous female aviators of what is now considered “the golden age of aviation.” She set the 109.58mph speed record in 1936. She and Amelia co-founded the Ninety-Nines, an organization of women pilots which thrives today. Thaden and other women aviators toured the United States, marking geographic references on rooftops and hillsides to aid pilots. Louise won the National Air Races' Bendix Trophy in 1936, the first year in which women were allowed to compete, setting a new east-west record of just under 15 hours. During World War II, Louise attained the rank of Lieutenant Colonel with the Civil Air Patrol. In her 1938 memoirs, High, Wide and Frightened, Louise wryly noted that a pilot who claims never to have been frightened is lying. |
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