Amelia Earhart
Amelia Earhart (1897–1937) was an American aviator and one of the most celebrated pilots of the 20th century. She became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic by air in 1928 (as a passenger), then the first woman to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic in 1932, and the first person to fly solo from Hawaii to the U.S. mainland in 1935. She set record after record in her red Lockheed Vega, helped found the Ninety-Nines, taught at Purdue University — which helped fund her Lockheed Electra — and in 1937 set out with navigator Fred Noonan to circle the globe at the equator. On July 2, 1937, their Electra vanished near Howland Island after a final radio message to the Coast Guard cutter Itasca. The U.S. Navy and Coast Guard conducted one of the great air-sea searches of the era; no trace was ever found. The documentary record — including recently declassified files at the National Archives — is the reliable guide to both the flight and the mystery.