Amelia Mary Earhart

Amelia Mary Earhart

Amelia Mary Earhart
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 8 to 9
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	8.32

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		determined, unsuccessful, navigator, disappearance, serving, immigrant, gender, altitude, position, industry, twin, aviation, military, brief, number, east
	content words:		Amelia Earhart, During World War, Kinner Canary, On June, Atlantic Ocean, United States, Lockheed Electra, Fred Noonan, Pacific Ocean, New Guinea

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Amelia Mary Earhart
By Kathleen Redman

¹ Known as one of the world's most celebrated aviators, Amelia Earhart was born on July 24, 1897 in Atchison, Kansas. The family moved often and she completed high school in Chicago, Illinois in 1916. During World War I she worked as a military nurse in Canada and later taught English to immigrant factory workers. Her studies as a premed student were brief as her attention turned to airplanes.

Against her family's wishes, she learned to fly at the age of 24 and made her first solo flight in 1921. A few months later she purchased her first airplane, a Kinner Canary. Ms. Earhart achieved a number of aviation firsts and became known as the "First Lady of the Air". For years aviation had been dominated by men, but Earhart challenged gender barriers and influenced women's position in the aviation industry. Her flying career lasted for 16 years.

During those years her love of flying brought her several distinctions. In 1922 she broke the women's altitude record of 14,000 feet. On June 17 and 18, 1928, she became the first woman passenger to fly across the Atlantic Ocean. Four years later in 1932, she became the first woman pilot to cross the Atlantic and in doing so set a new time record of 14 hours and 56 minutes. Then in 1935 she flew solo from Hawaii to California -- a feat that had ended in disaster for other pilots. The distance, incidentally, is greater than from the United States to Europe.

Determined to set another "first", she decided to fly around the world in 1937. Her twin engine, propeller driven Lockheed Electra lifted off from Miami, Florida and headed east assisted by high altitude winds. Serving as navigator for this very long flight was Fred Noonan. As they were entering their last one-third of the flight over the Pacific Ocean, the Lockheed vanished somewhere between New Guinea and tiny Howland Island. Attempts then, and even now, to locate the plane, Ms. Earhart and Mr. Noonan have been unsuccessful. Their disappearance remains one of the great mysteries of aviation.

Amelia Mary Earhart died doing what she most loved -- and was only a few days from celebrating her 40th birthday.

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