by Susan Butler
page 214: “a perfect landing ...”: NYT, Sept. 1, 1928.
page 214: “taken the precaution ...”: Cosmopolitan, Dec. 1928.
page 215: Miss Earhart had visited ...: NYT, Sept. 1, 1928.
page 215: number of white flags ...: Muskogee Daily Phoenix, Sept. 5, 1928.
page 215: There is a prophetic 1928 photo ...: AE, 20H, p. 298.
page 215: No money in the world ...: NYHT, June 6, 1928.
page 216: It had gotten to the point ...: PA, Aug. 1928.
page 216: “She said she hated ...”: Muskogee Daily Phoenix, Sept. 5, 1928.
page 217: She followed her last compass course ...: AE, Los Angeles Times, Sept. 18, 1928.
page 218: Suddenly the Avian was nose down ...: Yuma Morning Sun, Sept. 15, 1928.
page 219: “I am going to find out ...”: Salt Lake Tribune, Oct. 1, 1928.
page 219: how it thinned ...: Mariana Gosnell, Zero 3 Bravo.
page 219: Amelia was signed on ...: for the November issue.
page 219: “the” hot media topic ...: WABC had a Friday-night “Aviation Hour.”
page 220: “the year of 1929 is ...” Cosmopolitan, Mar. 1929.
page 220: usually a mystery story.: Cosmopolitan, Jan. 1931.
page 221: Indeed, years later, ...: JM, LITHW, SLRC.
page 221: I talked at the Better Times dinner ...: AE, letter to Mr. Hesley, Dec. 10, 1928, Special Collection Manuscripts, Wald Collection, Columbia.
page 221: that she could be a resident.: JM, LITHW, XII pp. 9-10, SLRC.
page 221: came to the settlement house....: Records of Greenwich House, Tamiment Library, NYU.
page 223: If she had stayed in social work, ...: JM, LITHW, XII pp. 10, 12, 13, SLRC.
page 223: “Are you interested to know ...”: JM, LITHW, XII p. 12, SLRC.
page 224: She spoke at the children’s annual ...: Records of Greenwich House, Tamiment Library, NYU; Mary Simkhovitch, Neighborhood: My Story of Greenwich House.
page 224: She also arranged ...: AE, letter to AOE, Aug. 9, 1929, SLRC.
Dreams Come True
page 225: He had been stunting ...: NYT, July 2 and 3, 1929.
page 226: “very drunk,” ...: NYHT, July 6, 1929.
page 226: a combination air-rail trip ...: R. E. G. Davies, Airlines of the United States Since 1914, p. 85.
page 227: No effort was spared ...: Dorothy Binney Putnam, in Sportsman Pilot, Aug. 1929.
page 227: By the time Amelia’s ...: NYHT, July 30, 1929; John Underwood, Madcaps, Millionaires and “Mose,” p. 46.
page 227: another TAT plane crashed, ...: Anne Lindbergh, Hours of Gold, p. 122. The accident was January 19.
page 228: She weighed in with the following blast, ...: NYT, July 12, 1929.
page 229: She settled on a five-passenger model ...: Aircraft registration 6911 NASN, Historical A/C Listing, NASM file.
page 230: the foulest plane he had ever flown.: AE, LF, p. 14.
page 230: “A chance to play the game ...”: Woman’s Journal, Oct. 1929.
page 230: the $8,000 jackpot ...: Glenn Buffington, “History Relived 60 Years Later,” IWASM.
page 231: second day, landing at Yuma ...: Bobbi Trout, interview with author.
page 231: she had loaded herself down ...: C. B. Allen, “The Vindication of Amelia Earhart,” NASM.
page 231: The fliers won ...: Doris Rich, Amelia Earhart, p. 94.
page 232: She rounded up the four pilots ...: Fay Gillis Wells, interview with author.
page 233: “There is something ...”: Margery Brown, Ninety-Nine files, Will Rogers Airport, Oklahoma City, Okla.
page 233: Amelia helped defray ...: Wells interview.
page 233: There was one place, ...: NYT, Feb. 24, 1929.
page 234: membership of more than three thousand ...: “Oak Trees from Acorns,” American Women’s Association collection, SLRC.
page 234: Ten thousand women showed up ...: NYT, Apr. 13, 1929.
page 236: “I don’t know why ...”: Trout interview.
page 236: writing jubilantly in her logbook, ...: Richard S. Allen, Revolution in the Sky, p. 94.
page 236: as she had mentioned ...: Bobbi Trout, just Plane Crazy, p. 87.
page 237: A knottier problem to solve, ...: AE, letter to Ruth Nichols, Apr. 18, 1930, IWASM.
page 238: As The New York Times reported, ...: NYT, Aug. 6, 1930.
page 238: by October 1930 ...: Davies, Airlines of the United States, p. 93.
page 238: The NYPWA flew between ...: Ibid., p. 154.
page 239: Amelia flew over the line ...: AE, FOI, p. 115.
page 239: “and get along with men; ...”: JM, LITHW, XIII, SLRC.
page 239: On the last day of 1930 ...: NYT, Jan. 1, 1931.
page 239: amusing old prints ...: Helen Ferris, Five Girls Who Dared, pp. 7—8.
page 239: “It is the disgruntled one ...”: AE, FOI, p. 112.
page 239: “If you have spent ...”: Eugene Vidal, letter to AE, University of Wyoming, American Heritage Center.
page 240: She started in Hamilton, ...: AE itinerary 1931, SLRC.
page 240: “almost inarticulate....”: AE, letter to AOE, SLRC.
page 240: just the day after ...: NYT, Apr. 30, 1931.
page 240: “As a matter of fact, ...”: NYT, May 9, 1931.
Courtship and Marriage
page 241: Not even Muriel ...: MEM interview, Aug. 7, 1988.
page 241: “I am no longer engaged ...”: NYT, Dec. 23, 1928.
page 242: “The tapering loveliness ...”: GPP, SW, p. 215.
page 242: (Gordon Selfridge thought ...: JM, LITHW, XIV p. 7, SLRC.
page 242: George also wrote, ...: GPP, SW, pp. 91-92.
page 243: “In this period when ...”: Ibid., p. 77.
page 243: “Your hats! ...”: Ibid., p. 78.
page 243: As George wryly admitted, ...: Ibid., p. 59.
page 244: “My interests are usually plural.”: GPP, WM, p. 288.
page 244: So that by the time ...: GPP, SW, pp. 58-59.
page 244: In New York in November, ...: NYT, Dec. 2, 1928.
page 244: George wrote a promotional article ...: Sportsman Pilot, July 1929.
page 244: in an effort to impress Amelia, ...: GPP, WM, pp. 284-86.
page 245: “You are apt to take less time ...”: GPP, SW, p. 80.
page 245: It was during a party ...: Mary Lovell, The Sound of Wings, p. 153.
page 245: “Of course everyone ...”: Stabler interview.
page 246: I am still unsold on marriage ...: GPP, SW, p. 74.
page 247: “To marry Miss Amelia Earhart ...”: BG, Feb. 8, 1931.
page 247: even the New York Times ... : NYT, Dec. 20, 1930.
page 248: “I need advice badly ...”: Carl B. Allen manuscript draft of a review of The True Amelia Earhart Story, in NASM, courtesy of Doris Rich.
page 248: Swinburne’s Atalanta ...: Charles Swinburne, “Atalanta in Calydon.”
page 248: A contemporary Radcliffe study of wives who worked ...: “The six requisites for the happy combination of a professional pursuit with married life are 1) a husband’s active cooperation, 2) health to stand the strain of conflicting interests, 3) adequate household assistance, 4) training and experience before marriage, 5) work with short or adjustable hours, 6) complex arrangements for the children.” WEIU file, SLRC.
page 249: Both she and Lucy went to college ...: Antich interview.
page 250: “She wore something as simple...”: GPP, SW, p. 75.
page 250: “The ceremony itself, performed by ...”: NYT, Feb. 8, 1931.
page 251: There are some things ...: GPP, SW, p. 76.
page 251: “a sad little letter, ...”: Ibid., p. 75.
page 253: “a curious mixture ...”: Carl Allen, “The Vindication of Amelia Earhart,” NASM.
page 253: share a meal ...: Once, to Katch’s horror, she asked a reporter into Katch’s house to have lunch with them; KCP interv
iew.
page 253: “The candlesticks were sweet....”: Jean Backus, Letters From Amelia, p. 116.
page 254: be underwritten by 49.5 Club ...: AP news, Dec. 29, 1933.
page 255: “No client of any counselor ...”: GPP, SW, p. 88.
page 255: PLEASE TRY ...: NYHT, Mar. 19, 1937.
The Lindbergh Trail
page 256: “follow the Lindbergh trail” ...: Neu, York World Telegram, Apr. 21, 1931.
page 257: “at Newfoundland I will await ...”: NYT, May 16, 1931.
page 258: on the Lindbergh trail ...: Clarence Young, letter to the secretary of state, Sept. 19, 1931, giving department approval “to Miss Elinor Smith’s request for permission to make a flight to Newfoundland, Ireland and France,” NASM.
page 258: Her backer, ...: Don Dwiggins, They Flew the Bendix Race, p. 82.
page 258: great publicity... : The NYT promptly ran an article, Dec. 20, 1930.
page 258: On a spring day in April, ...: There is some confusion about when Amelia soloed because she erroneously claimed in The Fun of It that she took that first flight “on a bright spring day” and soloed later the same day, making it all sound much easier than it was. Perhaps, given her marriage, she was uncharacteristically distracted and forgot about the December flights.
page 258: not a “stunt altitude flight,” ...: NYT, Apr. 1, 1931.
page 258: Shortly after noon ...: GPP, SW, p. 208; NYT, Apr. 9, 1931.
page 259: a professional pilot ...: Frank Kingston Smith, Legacy of Wings, p. 188.
page 259: a windstorm ...: NYT, June 13, 1931.
page 260: the second accident....: Helen MacElwee, letter to author.
page 260: But writing to her mother ...: AE, letter to AOE, Sept. 17, 1931, SLRC.
page 260: within a few hours ...: NYT, Sept. 13, 1931.
page 261: At the end of March she wrote ...: AE, letter to Helen Earhart, Mar. 26, 1932, SLRC.
page 261: The three of them ...: LC, diary, for Apr. 16 and the following days.
page 263: To increase the Vega’s range, ...: Eddie Gorski, in Spotlight, July 1987; FAA records; Harvey H. Lippincott (corporate archivist, United Aircraft), letter to Richard S. Allen, Oct. 18, 1974; NASM files, original Department of Commerce documents.
page 263: “dropping bombs,”: Gorski, in Spotlight, July 1987.
page 265: knocked unconscious....: Richard S. Allen, Revolution in the Sky, pp. 61-62.
page 266: “across the South Atlantic.”: C. B. Allen, “The Vindication of Amelia Earhart,” NASM.
page 267: talked the townspeople ...: Bill Parsons, The Challenge of the Atlantic, p. 14.
page 268: Twenty-four miles away ...: NYT, May 22, 1932.
page 268: made the opposite decision ...: NYT, May 22, 1932.
page 268: “it just oozed.”: Bill Parsons, letter to author.
page 268: WESTERN FLYING WANTS ...: telegram from AE to Mrs. H. V Thaden, sent on May 20, 1932; Ninety-Nine files.
page 269: weather began to deteriorate; ...: Stuart Porter (scientific services meteorologist, St. John’s), letter to author, Sept. 3, 1987: “It is not surprising that she would pick up icing in this cloud at 12,000 feet.”
page 269: (When Ben Howard ...: Ben Howard, Columbia OH.
page 269: As dawn broke, ...: GPP, SW, p. 108. Her barograph showed an almost vertical drop of three thousand feet, marking the moment her plane iced up and went into a spin.
page 269: fuel line was defective ...: NYT, May 22, 1932.
page 270: “Tell my friends ...”: Ibid.
page 271: Wrote American columnist ...: GPP, WM, p. 295.
page 271: A while later ...: Literary Digest, June 4, 1932.
page 271: Finally she asked ...: LC, diary, 1932.
page 272: “My first impression ...”: Gordon Selfridge, interview by JM, SLRC.
page 273: She had entered a realm beyond stardom.: Gore Vidal.
page 273: Haveyou everlonged ...: AE, “Flying the Atlantic,” American Magazine, Aug. 1932.
page 273: “Miss Earhart has ...”: NYHT, Nov. 7, 1932. Elinor Smith never forgave Amelia for beating her out, and from then on she tried to smear Amelia’s reputation. In fact, she denied there had ever been a race to be the first woman to fly the Atlantic. She may have been unaware that her request to the State Department for permission to fly to Newfoundland, Ireland, and France had been filed with other information about the Vega, which had indeed been hers. She claimed her plan had been to fly to Rome across the Alps and that it hadn’t come off because her backer didn’t have sufficient funds to buy the latest instruments. “The odds against making a safe crossing of the Alps at night without an earth inductor compass were just too great in my mind,” she wrote in her book Aviatrix, which wasn’t true—when she bought the plane, one of its unusual pieces of equipment had been an earth inductor compass. She also claimed she had sold the plane to Amelia, which was also not true: a month after Amelia’s flight, she sold the plane, by then in her husband’s name, to William W Harts, Jr. He sold it to Amelia, after she sold her own Vega to the Franklin Institute, FAA Registry files, Oklahoma City, Okla.
Having Her Cake
page 275: “I thought ...”: Jean Backus, Letters from Amelia, p. 128.
page 275: “most treasured” ...: GPP, SW, p. 115.
page 276: stufloflegend: ...: Obituary, Eugene Luther Vidal, Class of November 1918, West Point, West Point alumni publication.
page 277: their marriage was on the rocks.: Gore Vidal, Palimpsest, pp. 67-71.
page 278: “When you see a pilot dance ...”: JM, LITHW, VI p. 8, SLRC.
page 278: She had blossomed, ...: KCP interview.
page 278: Amelia drove ...: LC, diary, July 15, 1932.
page 278: By the time they arrived, ...: LC, diary July 23-Aug. 1, 1932.
page 279: Her hair blew ...: New York World Telegram, Aug. 25, 1932; photo just after landing in Newark.
page 280: “The impossible ...”: Joseph Corn, Winged Gospel, p. 14.
page 280: “George low.”: LC, diary, Oct. 16, 1932.
page 280: notes the historian ...: Doris Kearns Goodwin, No Ordinary Time, pp. 89-90.
page 280: “I think that every woman ...”: Cosmopolitan, Apr. 1933.
page 280: Her closest friend ...: Doris Faber, The Life of Lorena Hickok.
page 281: (They would be limited to women ...: Hickok, Reluctant First Lady, p. 108.
page 281: “Thank you very much ...”: Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, FDRL.
page 281: “I hope to know ...”: Poughkeepsie Eagle-News, Nov. 20, 1932; Sunday Courier, Nov. 20, 1932.
page 282: rode the bobsled ...: Faber, Life of Lorena Hickok.
page 282: taught to shoot ...: NYT, Feb. 21, 1934.
page 282: “The question now ...”: GPP, SW, p. 132.
page 282: “My husband convinced me ...”: Eleanor Roosevelt, letter to AE, April 4, 1933.
page 282: “But I always fly ...”: PA, Apr. 1934.
page 283: “Amelia, lets see ...”: GPP, SW, p. 130.
page 283: “The example set ...”: AE, speech before the Daughters of the American Revolution, April 21, 1933.
page 283: Eleanor thought so much ...: JM, LITHW, XVI p. 6, SLRC.
page 283: it was arranged ...: AE, telegram to Louis Howe, Apr. 5, 1933, asking for a three-minute interview with the president “TOMORROW, THURSDAY, OR FRIDAY” and arranged for Wednesday, Apr. 12, at three thirty; FDRL. George did not have the same access; he had to write to Basil O’Connor and ask him to put his ideas before FDR (as he did May 19, 1933).
page 284: “force airplane designers ...”: Don Dwiggins, They Flew the Bendix, p. 16.
page 284: named for Vincent Bendix, ...: Ibid.
page 284: languishing in dead storage ...: FAA Aircraft Registry files, every change of ownership, noted as well as other detailed information.
page 285: The men waited longer, ...: NYT, July 2, 1933.
page 286: The only pilot ...: Ibid.
page 286: known to be dangerous planes.: Only seven were built. When Don Dwiggins wrote his history of the Bendix races, They Flew the Bendix, he titled one chapter, “Gee Bees—Born to Kill.”
page 287: white coveralls ...: NYT, July 9, 1933.
page 287: driver’s side, ...: Doris Rich, Amelia Earhart, p. 167.
page 287: “It is a business trip ...”: July 13, 1933, in Backus, Letters from Amelia, p. 147.
page 287: Amy Mollison, ...: LC, diary, July 23, 1933.
page 287: “Call for help ...”: Ibid., Aug. 14, 1933.
page 288: “We talked ...”: Ibid., Aug. 16, 1933.
page 288: Later in the week Amelia was ...: NYT, Aug. 22, 1933.
page 288: “After all I did not ...”: AE, letter to Dot Leh, Sept. 8, 1933, Ninety-Nines files.
page 288: Gene came ...: LC, diary, Sept. 22, 1933.
page 289: Instead he divided ...: Nick A. Komons, Bonfires to Beacons. The two assistant aeronautical directors, Carroll Cone and Rex Martin, were both eager to expand their powers.
page 289: nice perks ...: Gore Vidal, in New York Review of Books, Jan. 17, 1985.
page 289: The next day Amelia drove him ...: LC, diary, Sept. 22 and 23, 1933. Shortly thereafter Lucy became school editor for Vogue. The intimacy of Amelia and Gene’s relationship is fixed by Lucy’s diary entries; Lucy spent the next months visiting schools, not in Rye.
page 290: “Because I ventured ...”: AE, letter to FDR, Nov. 5, 1933; C. B. Allen, in NYHT, SLRC.
page 290: on Amelia’s recommendation ...: Rich, Amelia Earhart, p. 181.
page 290: They even had lunch ...: LC, diary, Jan. 8, 1934. “Gene came in” was Lucy’s cryptic entry.
page 290: he still managed to restore ...: C. B. Allen, in NYHT, Nov. 5, 1933.
page 291: “but damn little assistance.”: U.S. Air Services, Nov. 1936, quoted Nick A. Komons, from Bonfires to Beacons, p. 233.
page 291: “too amiable”: NYT, Feb. 28, 1937.
page 291: modeling clay ...: JM, LITHW, III p. 4, SLRC.
page 291: toward Amy Lowell ...: JM, LITHW, XVI p. 5, SLRC.
page 292: “she always wore my shorts ...”: Vidal, New York Review of Books, Jan. 17, 1985.
page 292: “Gene used to buy them ...”: Katharine Vidal Smith, interview with author.
page 292: “She adored my father,” ...: Gore Vidal, interview with author.
