AMELIA EARHART, THE FINAL TAKE OFF

Amelia Earhart was born July 24, 1897, in Atchison, Kansas. She helped to establish the Ninety-Nines, an organization for female pilots, and was a member of the National Woman’s Party. In 1932, Earhart was awarded a Distinguished Flying Cross when she flew a red Lockheed Vega from Newfoundland to Northern Ireland and became the first woman to make a transatlantic flight. Standing here, the former location of Miami Municipal Airport, on May 25, 1937, Amelia Earhart announced her intent to fly around the world at the equator. After supervising extensive repairs to her Lockheed Electra by Pan American World Airways’ mechanics, Earhart took off June 1, 1937, with her navigator Fred Noonan for Puerto Rico. After numerous stops in South America, Africa, the Indian subcontinent, and Southeast Asia, the pair arrived at Lae, New Guinea. Earhart’s next refueling stop was Howland Island, a tiny speck in the South Pacific Ocean, located 2,556 miles away. Although July 2, 1937, was a clear day, Earhart and Noonan never landed at Howland. A massive search effort for them, involving nine U.S. Navy ships and 66 aircraft, recovered no remains or evidence of the aircraft.