The full story of Amelia Earhart’s life—including an explanation of the mystery of her disappearance and death—is told for the first time in this biography. It is a story of her girlhood in Kansas, her college years, her jobs as nurse and social worker, and her first adventures in flying as well as of her later years of achievement and triumph.
It was almost by chance that Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic. Overnight she found herself the most famous girl in the world. That was her decisive hour. She felt she had to prove worthy of her fame, to show the world that she was a great flier by right, not just by luck. What happened is explained by Colonel Railey in his Introduction:
“Genuinely as a tribute to her sex rather than for her own glorification, she accepted the honors that accrued; for the participation of women in aviation, which at all times she strove to encourage and pace, was the obsession which lured her to her death.”
Amelia Earhart went on to spectacular victories, setting up a flying record that is still a marvel of achievement and that puts her in the top rank of America’s hall of fame. A likable and modest woman, Amelia Earhart was a skilled and dedicated air pioneer, a true daughter of the sky, and her life story remains unique.
Jacket design by Larry Lurin
DUELL, SLOAN AND PEARCE
NEW YORK
PAUL L. BRIAND, JR.
Captain Paul L. Briand, Jr., was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1920. He received his primary and secondary education at parochial, private, and public schools in greater Boston, and his higher education at Boston University, the University of New Hampshire (B.A., cum laude, 1948), Columbia University (M.A., 1952), and the University of Denver (Ph.D., 1959).
He began his military career as a naval aviation cadet, transferred to the Army Air Forces where he earned the Air Medal as a combat crew member in Europe during World War II, and was commissioned from college as a Distinguished Military Graduate, Air Force ROTC, into the regular Air Force.