Magnificent Girls in Their Flying Machines – AMELIA EARHART: FLIGHT FASHION by Amber Jane Butchart

In 1929 the famed aviatrix Amelia Earhart became the first president of the ‘Ninety-Nines’ organization of women pilots. This ushered in an unprecedented decade of female aviation that saw an intrepid group of women fight for equality in the sky as well as the ballot box. It was a decade in which women set speed records (Jacqueline Cochran, 1939), solo flying records (Amelia Earhart, 1935) and beat male pilots at the Bendix Trophy Race (Louise Thaden and Blanche Noyes, 1936). Names such as Amy Johnson and Beryl Markham garnered celebrity status and in Hollywood coveted aviatrix roles went to stars of the day such as Katherine Hepburn, Myrna Loy and Kay Francis.

But despite the unprecedented rise of the aviatrix, there is one to whom the fashion world repeatedly returns. Amelia Earhart was not only the first female aviator to fly solo across the Atlantic (among setting a plethora of…