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Amelia Earhart

Where did Amelia Earhart grow up?

Amelia Earhart was born
on July 24, 1897
in Atchison, Kansas.

She spent a lot of her
childhood playing with
her younger sister Muriel.

Growing up Amelia and her sister had all sorts of adventures. They collected insects and frogs. They liked to play sports like baseball and football. Amelia even learned to shoot a .22 rifle and she also used it to kill rats in her Dad's barn.

Amelia's first "flight" was when she was olny seven years old. With the help of Muriel and her uncle Amelia made a homemade roller coaster.

When Amelia was eleven years old, she saw one of the Wright Brothers first airplanes at the Iowa State Fair. She had no interest in flying and didn't think much of the plane at the time.

Before Flying

After graduating from high school, Amelia wasn't sure what she wanted to do. She first went to the Ogontz School in Pennsylvania, but she dropped out to become a nurse's aide tending wounded soldiers from World War I. Then she studied to become a mechanic, but soon Amelia was back in school studying for a career in medicine. Eventually she decided to go into medical research.

First Time Flying

On December 28, 1920 Amelia visited an air show in California with her father. She went on her first plane flight that day. Later she said that "I knew I had to fly" as soon as the plane was just a few hundred feet off the ground.

First Woman to Cross the Atlantic

In 1928 Amelia was invited to take part in a historic flight across the Atlantic. Together with pilot Bill Stultz and co-pilot Slim Gordon, Amelia flew across the Atlantic Ocean. On June 18, 1928, after twenty-one hours of flying, the plane landed in Wales. She was the first woman to make the flight across the Atlantic.

Amelia was not satisfied, however. She wanted to make the same trip across the Atlantic, but this time she wanted to pilot the plane and make the flight by herself. On May 20, 1932, she took off from Harbour Grace, Newfoundland aboard a bright red single-engine Lockheed Vega aeroplane.

Crossing the Atlantic Solo

The flight was very dangerous. There was bad weather, thick clouds, and often her windshield and wings were covered with ice. Fourteen hours later she had crossed the Atlantic Ocean but had to cut the flight short, landing in a cow pasture in Northern Ireland.

Earhart was received back in the United States as a hero. They had a ticker-tape parade for her in New York City and she even got to meet the President at the White House.

Amelia became only the second person after Charles Lindbergh to successfully fly across the Atlantic Ocean solo. She received many awards including becoming the first woman to receive the Distinguished Flying Cross from Congress.