Women in Transportation: Changing America's History

Women in

Transportation:

Changing America’s

History

Reference Materials

Office of Engineering, HNG-22

Office of Highway Information Management, HPM-40

March 1998

TABLE OF CONTENTS

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

Walking Toward Freedom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2

Harriet Tubman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2

Maritime Pioneers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3

Martha Coston . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3

Mary Patten . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3

Ida Lewis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4

Thea Foss . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5

Other Women and the Water . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Nettie Johnson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Mary Miller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Callie French . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Mary Becker Greene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Lydia Weld . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Mary Converse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Traveling Journalists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Nellie Bly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Balloonists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10

Mary Myers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10

Aida de Acosta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10

Jeannette Piccard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10

Early Civil Engineers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11

Emily Warren Roebling . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11

Elizabeth Bragg Cumming . . . . . . . . . . . .11

Elimina Wilson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12

Women Behind the Wheel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13

Anne Bush . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13

Alice Huyler Ramsey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13

Janet Guthrie . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13

Paving the Way in Transit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14

Helen Schultz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14

Working on the Railroads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

Mary Walton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

Olive Dennis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

Taking Off . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

Harriet Quimby . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

Amelia Earhart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

Bessie Coleman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18

Willa Brown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18

Jacqueline Cochran . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18

Phoebe Fairgrove Omlie . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19

Katherine Stinson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19

Louise Thaden . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20

Linda Finch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20

Women During World War II:

Rosie the Riveter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22

Urban Design and Livable Communities . . . . .24

Jane Jacobs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24

Chemical Engineers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26

Katherine Burr Blodgett . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26

Stephanie Louise Kwolek . . . . . . . . . . . . .26

Edith M. Flanigan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26

Other Contributions in Science

and Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28

Mary Engle Pennington . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28

Helen Blair Bartlett . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28

Gertrude Rand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

Elsie Eaves . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

Ivy Parker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

Traveling in Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30

Sally Ride . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30

Other Astornauts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30

Women Administrators in Transportation . . . . . . .

Beverly Cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31

Judith A. Carlson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31

Karen M. Porter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31

Mary Anderson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31

Alinda C. Burke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31

Elizabeth Dole . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31

Carmen Turner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32

Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34

Selected Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .35

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

ransportation has long been considered a man’s

field, but throughout time, women have made

significant contributions to the transportation

industry and laid the groundwork for future innovation.

Women have worked in every mode of transportation,

and in every type of job, from legislative and manager-

ial positions to maintenance work. Since the time when

travel was dominated by walking, horse-drawn

carriages, and sailing ships, through the era of the rail-

roads and automobiles, and now as aviation pushes

into the frontiers of space, women have been part of

the innovations, explorations, and manufacturing of

transportation. Moreover, women have made these

contributions to the transportation industry and to

American society despite the fact they did not receive

the right to vote until the 19th amendment was ratified

on August 26, 1920.

This guide describes innovative and remarkable

women who have pioneered and succeeded in a

predominantly male field. In this document, the

coverage of different transportation modes is uneven.

The easiest to find and largest quantity of research

material is on women in aviation, beginning with

Harriet Quimby. There is still much work to be done to

research and document the many contributions women

have made in this and other fields of transportation.

More research needs to be conducted at the U.S. Patent

Office, and the contributions of women at the major

automobile manufacturers today should also be docu-

mented. We hope this resource document is only the

first step in a long process to preserve the history of

women in transportation.

INTRODUCTION

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Harriet Tubman (1820-1913)

he “underground railroad” has become a symbol

of the abolitionist movement of the 1800’s.

Although it was not underground nor a railroad

in the physical sense, the term identifies the informal

system of escape routes used by southern slaves.

According to a National Park Service study of the

underground railroad, the system began operating with

the start of slavery in the Americas during the 1500’s.

The network extended from the southern colonies, not

just north to Canada, but also into the western territories,

Mexico, and the Caribbean. Although the impact of the

railroad was immense, very little factual information

about the system exists, because the conductors were

understandably concerned with protecting themselves

and the runaways. One of the best known conductors of

the mid-1800’s was Harriet Tubman, who helped more

than 300 slaves reach freedom through the underground

railroad. Tubman became known as “the Moses of her

people,” because like Moses, she led others out of

slavery.

Born a slave, Tubman was taken away from her family

and hired out three times by the time she was 10 years

old. At that age, she went to work in a neighboring

field, where she heard the first stories of slaves

escaping by means of the underground railroad.

Working in the fields, she gained the strength and

physical endurance necessary to ensure success during

her later journeys, leading slaves to freedom from the

South to the North. Although she married a free man,

John Tubman, in 1844, she remained a slave, because

marriage did not alter her slave status.

In 1849, Tubman was sold to a slave trader; uncertain of

her future, she escaped into the woods one night at dusk.

She traveled during the night and slept in the barns and

shacks of people who participated in the underground

railroad during the daytime. She made her way to

Pennsylvania and found work as a scrubwoman and

cook in Philadelphia.

In Philadelphia, she concentrated on devising a plan that

would help other slaves reach freedom in the North. In

addition, she became an abolitionist, associating with

such individuals as William Still, leader of the under-

ground railroad, and Thomas Garrett, a white

abolitionist. With their help, Tubman became an active

agent of the railroad.

In December of 1850, Tubman learned that several of

her sisters had escaped from the plantation where they

had grown up. She went to Maryland and guided them

to freedom through the railroad’s network of safe

havens. The following spring, she repeated the journey

to help her brother and two other men travel north.

Tubman continued making these trips. Her efforts

brought many men, women, and children to sanctuary

in the North and in Canada. By 1858, plantation

owners had joined forces to offer a $40,000 reward for

the capture of Harriet Tubman, based on rumors that

she had helped 300 people escape to the North via the

underground railroad.

The Emancipation Proclamation, followed by ratifica-

tion of the 13th amendment, ended slavery in the

United States, but Harriet Tubman’s efforts did not

end. She spoke beside Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth

Cady Stanton, advocating women’s suffrage and the

right to control property.

Harriet Tubman died in her home at the age of 93 on

March 10, 1913. She displayed bravery unequaled by

any other woman of her time. Her courageous and

fearless leadership transformed, not only individual

lives, but an entire society. She never lost a life on her

numerous trips to bring slaves to freedom, which was,

in itself, remarkable. Tubman’s dreams of freeing other

slaves first came to her after her journey to

Pennsylvania. When she arrived on free soil, she felt as

if she was in heaven. She wanted others to experience

the same feeling of freedom, and her courage helped

others make those dreams come true.

WALKING TOWARD FREEDOM

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Martha Coston (1826-?)

artha Coston was a prominent Washington

socialite who was widowed at age 21. She

met the challenge of providing for herself

and her children by inventing a system of maritime

signal flares. Starting with an unworkable idea she

found in her late husband’s notebooks, Coston eventu-

ally created signal flares that were sufficiently bright

and long lasting to allow ships at sea to communicate

with other ships or land bases through a code based on

color combinations. Coston relied on her husband’s

reputation by applying for the initial patent as his

administrator

and received patent #23,536 for her

system, known as Coston’s Telegraphic Night Signals,

in 1859. Later patents for system refinements were in

her own name.

The signals came with charts and directions for using

the flares and an explanation of the symbols repre-

sented by each color and combination of colors. The

colors of the small signals could be clearly distin-

guished from a distance of 4 to 6 miles, and the colors

of the large signals could be seen and distinguished

from 6 to 10 or 15 miles.

Coston’s efforts were rewarded in February 1859 when

C. S. McCauley, captain and senior officer of the

United States Navy, and others wrote in a letter to the

Honorable Isaac Toucey, then Secretary of the Navy,

“the Coston Signals are better than any others” known

at that time. The correspondents added that the Coston

signals “offer precision, fullness, and plainness.”

Coston sold her system to the Navy for $5,000.

After obtaining European patents on the signals,

Coston sold her U.S. patent rights for the original

system to the U.S. Navy for $20,000, while arranging

to continue their manufacture for the Navy. Later

refinements, including a twist-ignition device patented

in 1871, allowed Coston to sell the system to navies,

shippers, and other maritime-related industries and

groups around the world.

The system was adopted by

the governments of France, Italy, Denmark, the

Netherlands, and Haiti. As of the late 1970’s, the

Coston Supply Company, established by Coston, was

still in business. The system revolutionized naval

communication and its use continues today.

In the introduction to her autobiography, entitled A

Signal Success, Coston stated that, in developing and

perfecting the Coston signals, she was inspired by the

“intense and heartfelt desire to accomplish something

for the good of humanity.” She wanted to “in some

way lighten the load of watching and responsibility

that rests on the shoulders of the brave mariner and to

place in his hands the means of saving not only

property but precious human life.”

Coston clearly demonstrated that, with “integrity,

energy, and perseverance, they [women] need no extra-

ordinary talents to gain success and a place among the

world’s breadwinners”; however, she also noted that

she had to be “ready to fight like a lioness” to avoid

being undercompensated or dismissed because of her

sex. Coston was acutely aware of her nontraditional

position as a female inventor and businesswoman, and

her autobiography includes the observation, “[w]e hear

much of chivalry of men towards women, but…it

vanishes like dew before the summer sun when one of

us comes into competition with the manly sex.”

Mary Patten (1837-1861)

As the wife of a clipper ship captain, Mary Patten

learned navigation during the 101-day maiden voyage

of Neptune’s Car in 1855. At that time, it was custom-

ary for captains to bring their wives with them when

sailing their clipper ships, despite the acknowledged

danger of crew revolt as a result of poor food, low

wages, and harsh working conditions. Patten put her

navigational skills to good use during her next and last

voyage to sea as the only woman to take command of a

clipper ship.

In July 1856, Neptune’s Car set sail for San Francisco

with 26-year-old Captain Joshua A. Patten in command

and his wife, Mary, also aboard. The gold fields of

California and the West had opened in 1848, drawing

MARITIME PIONEERS

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

New Englanders to try their luck. Intended to be one of

the fastest clippers afloat, Neptune’s Car was a giant at

66 meters (216 feet) and 1,632 metric tons (1,616

tons). Speed and size were important, because competi-

tion was stiff among the clipper ships. Crewmembers

often placed bets on which ships would return to port

first and would then try to sabotage the progress of

their own vessels to win the bets. Apparently, trouble

started early on Neptune’s Car, when Captain Patten

discovered that his first mate was sleeping on watch

and keeping the ship under reefed sail to slow its

progress. Eventually, the first mate was placed in irons

to minimize disruption of the crew.

The loss of a watchkeeper and his refusal to delegate

the first mate’s duties to another officer forced Captain

Patten to remain on duty constantly during the passage

around Cape Horn. According to newspaper accounts

of the day, “the Neptune’s Car was off Cape Horn 18

days with strong westerly gales.” Captain Patten fell ill

before the ship cleared the storms off the Cape.

Completely exhausted, he told his wife his head ached

and he felt feverish.

The ship’s medical book provided little help, because

the captain was suffering, not from pneumonia, but

from an illness known as brain fever, which is charac-

terized by periodic blindness and deafness alternating

with periods of complete insensibility and bouts of

feverish raving. Mary Patten found herself in an explo-

sive situation.

Fending off the first mate’s demand to be restored to

authority, Patten informed Mr. Hare, the second mate,

who was a good sailor but unable to navigate, that she

would take command of the vessel and navigate the

ship to San Francisco. For the next fifty days, Patten

was so involved with the responsibilities of command

and caring for her husband that she took little time for

sleep or to care for herself, despite being pregnant with

her first child. According to the New York Daily News

March 18, 1857, the crew supported her efforts after

watching her make the twice daily navigational obser-

vations necessary to maintain the proper course and

continuing to study the medical books for a cure for

her husband.

Patten was partially successful with both tasks. By the

time the ship was nearing the vicinity of Valparaiso,

her husband had recovered somewhat. He relapsed

shortly after formally deposing the first mate for

continued attempts to delay arrival in San Francisco.

Mrs. Patten continued to navigate the ship up the

Chilean coast, taking full advantage of the winds.

Unfortunately, a week’s sail out of San Francisco, the

wind died, leaving Neptune’s Car lagging off the coast

for 10 days in the summer heat. Finally, Neptune’s Car

made port under a light breeze. Mrs. Patten noted in

the log that the journey had taken 136 days.

The publicity stemming from newspaper accounts of

the journey raised sufficient funds for Mrs. Patten to

return with her husband to New England on the

steamer George Law. A letter from the Atlantic Mutual

Insurance Company, insurers of Neptune’s Car, praised

her efforts, saying that the company knew of no

instance “on record where a woman has been called

upon to assume command of a large and valuable

vessel, and exercised a proper control over a large

number of seamen, and by her own skill and energy

impressing them with a confidence and reliance

making all subordinate, and obedient to that

command.”

Lauded by the press and feminists, Patten continued to

focus on her husband’s care. She gave birth to a son,

Joshua Adams Patten, on March 10, 1857. In July,

Captain Patten died from his illness. Worn down by his

care and the birth of her son, Mrs. Patten never recov-

ered from the rigors of her historic voyage. Mary

Patten died in 1861 at age 24.

Ida Lewis (1842-1911)

Idawalley Zorada (Ida) Lewis became a nationally

acclaimed heroine in 1869. The act of bravery that put

her in the public eye was her rescue of two soldiers

from the icy waters of Newport Harbor during a snow-

storm. As the best known lighthouse keeper of her day,

Lewis is officially credited with 18 rescues during the

58 years she tended the Lime Rock Beacon outside

Newport Harbor.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Lewis began tending the lighthouse four months after

her father, Captain Hosea Lewis, became its keeper.

Lighthouse keeping was an extremely well paid

position for the times. The Government provided a

good annual salary, well built housing, and basic food

stuffs and other supplies annually; therefore, when her

father had a stroke, Ida took over the light-tending

responsibilities to maintain the family’s income.

Beyond the everyday tasks of cleaning the lamp and

reflectors and checking the fuel level during the night,

she also became proficient at handling a rowboat,

because the lighthouse could be reached only by boat.

Lewis’ first official rescue was of four young men

whose small boat had capsized. On another occasion,

she used her dory to lead a schooner in distress to

safety. Her most unusual rescue involved three shep-

herds who were attempting to save a prize sheep; after

rescuing the men, Lewis towed the sheep to shore as

well. Her 1869 rescue of the two soldiers resulted in

tremendous publicity.

After the rescue, one of the soldiers presented Lewis

with a gold watch, and she received the Congressional

Medal for lifesaving. Both President Ulysses S. Grant

and Vice President Schuyler Colfax traveled to Lime

Rock specifically to meet Lewis. During the

Independence Day celebration, the citizens of Newport

awarded Lewis the Rescue, a mahogany boat with

gold-plated oarlocks and red velvet cushions. She

became the highlight of Newport’s Independence Day

parade as she traveled through the streets in her boat,

which was equipped with wheels for the occasion.

Lewis did not become the official lightkeeper at Lime

Rock until 1879. She continued at her post until her

death in 1911. Her last recorded rescue was at age 63,

when a close friend fell overboard while rowing out to

the lighthouse. Lewis launched her lifeboat and hauled

the woman aboard with all the vigor of youth.

Officially, she is credited with 18 rescues; unofficial

counts are as high as 25. Among the honors she

received during her lifetime were the U.S. Life-Saving

Service’s 1881 award of its first gold medal

and the

award in 1906 of a lifetime pension from the Carnegie

Hero Fund.

Since her death, the Rhode Island

Legislature changed the name of Lime Rock to Ida

Lewis Rock, and the U.S. Life-Saving Service honored

her by renaming the Lime Rock Beacon as the Ida

Lewis Lighthouse. Lewis is the only lightkeeper to be

honored in this way. More recently, the first of a new

class of U.S. Coast Guard buoy tenders was named the

Ida Lewis; the ship was launched in 1995 and commis-

sioned in 1997.

Thea Foss (1858-1927)

Starting in 1889, Thea Foss parlayed a $5 investment

in a rowboat into an oceangoing tugboat business that

remains active today.

Born in 1858 in Eidsberg,

Norway, Thea immigrated to the United States in 1881

to join her fiancé Andrew Foss, in St. Paul, MN. The

harsh winters in Minnesota caused Andrew’s health to

deteriorate, so the family moved to Tacoma, WA, in

1889. Because carpentry and boatbuilding jobs were

scarce in Tacoma, Andrew went to work in a shipyard

a day’s sail away.

During his absence, Thea scraped together every penny

she could find, which amounted to $5 in coins, and

bought her neighbor’s rowboat for roughly half its

value. After cleaning and sprucing the boat up with

green and white paint, she sold it for $10, then turned

around and bought more boats for resale. Thea

operated the business out of her one-room floating

home, which had been built by Andrew. When she

could afford to keep the rowboats, she began to rent

them to Tacoma residents for recreational use. Andrew

returned home to find that his wife had made more

money in two weeks than he had in two months at the

shipyard. He then began building rowboats for the

business.

Recreational rowboats remained popular in Tacoma

until the advent of the automobile. In an effort to move

with the times, the Foss family shifted focus from

recreation to providing supplies for sailing ships and

water taxi services for crewmembers. The Foss

Maritime Company entered the tugboat business in

1912 and remains in business today. The company

continues to use Thea Foss’ original green-and-white

color scheme for all its ships and has retained her

motto, “Always Ready.”

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

The waterway on which Thea Foss began her venture

is now known as the Thea Foss Waterway. In May

1990, she and her husband were inducted into the

National Maritime Hall of Fame for their contributions

to our American marine heritage. Earlier in 1990, they

were inducted into the Puget Sound Business Hall of

Fame.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Nettie Johnson

The first woman to be licensed as a master on the

inland waterways, Nettie Johnson owned a small steam

packet in the 1870’s. With her husband as pilot,

Captain Johnson pioneered operations on the Ohio

River. She remained active through World War I,

when she helped transport war supplies.

Mary Miller

Mary Miller, the wife of a Kentucky steamboat man,

became a licensed pilot on the Ouachita River in 1884.

She gained practical experience in navigation while

traveling with her husband along the rivers. In 1882,

the Millers sailed their steamboat to New Orleans to

enter the Oauchita River trade. When Captain Miller

became incapable of command, Mrs. Miller passed the

examination for her license and carried on.

Callie French

Callie French was a licensed river pilot on the

Mississippi and Ohio Rivers in 1888. By 1895, her

license covered almost all the navigable waterways in

the region and she had earned her master’s license.

Working with her husband, Mrs. French specialized in

running showboats.

Mary Becker Greene (1868-1949)

Mary Becker Greene received her riverboat pilot’s

license in 1896, earning captain’s rank in 1897. She

helped manage and operate her husband’s riverboat

company, the Greene Line, which ran a fleet of packet

boats carrying passengers and freight on the Ohio and

Mississippi Rivers. Greene died aboard the Delta

Queen in 1949. The company continues to operate

today as the Delta Queen Steamship Company.

Lydia Weld

After attending Bryn Mawr, Lydia Weld studied naval

architecture at MIT, graduating in 1903. She was

initially employed by a Virginia shipbuilder as a naval

ship designer. Although she became an associate

member of the American Society of Mechanical

Engineers in 1915, she did not become a full member

until 1935. Weld retired in 1917 because of ill health.

Mary Converse (1872-1961)

Between 1938 and 1940, Converse logged more than

48,000 kilometers (30,000 miles) during four sea

voyages in order to renew the pilot’s license she had

earned 30 years previously. In 1940, at the age of 68,

she became the first woman to earn captain’s papers

(for yachts of any tonnage) in the U.S. Merchant

Marine.

During World War II, Converse taught navi-

gation to Naval Reserve officers. She made several

unsuccessful attempts to have the working changed

from “he” to “she” on the scroll licensing her to

command crafts.

OTHER WOMEN AND THE WATER

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Nellie Bly (1865-1922)

Elizabeth Cochrane Seaman was a journalist who

wrote social commentary urging reform of the condi-

tions poor women faced in their workplaces and in

charitable institutions. She wrote under the pen name

“Nellie Bly,” a pseudonym she received from a

Pittsburgh editor who took the name from a Stephen

Foster song.

Bly began writing as a teenager for the Pittsburgh

Dispatch to support herself following her father’s

death. In 1887, she left Pittsburgh for New York. Her

novel ideas, coupled with her perseverance and enthu-

siasm, enabled her to land a job at The New York

World. Her first assignment was to feign insanity in

order to be committed to the Blackwell’s Island

asylum. From this experience, Bly was able to expose

the mistreatment of patients, which led to a grand jury

investigation and the ultimate reform of the asylum.

Bly continued to use undercover investigations to

expose the conditions of working women in various

factories, shops, and prisons. She had herself arrested

for theft to expose the environment in women’s

prisons; masqueraded as an invalid to investigate free

medical care; worked in department stores and facto-

ries to experience the plight of underpaid employees;

and posed as an unemployed servant to reveal employ-

ment agency practices. In essence, Bly pioneered the

concept of investigative reporting.

Despite all her accomplishments as a champion of the

poor working woman, Bly’s greatest achievement came

in 1889 when, at the age of 24, she raced around the

world in an attempt to beat the record of Phineas Fogg,

the fictional hero of Jules Verne’s romance novel

Around the World in Eighty Days. Traveling alone and

with nothing more than what she was able to fit into

one small piece of luggage, Bly was determined to beat

the 80-day record. She set sail from the Hoboken Pier

in Jersey City on the morning of November 14, 1889,

at exactly 9:40 a.m. She completed her trip around the

world on January 25, 1890, at 3:51 p.m., exactly 72

days, 6 hours, and 11 minutes from the day she began.

Jules Verne sent her a cable with one word, “Bravo!”

Joseph Pulitzer, owner of The World, promoted Bly as

a front-page heroine, “personifying the independent

American girl, the fascination of travel and the excite-

ment of journalism.”

Most stories about Bly’s journey

were written by other reporters, because she was busy

traveling; however, on her final dash from California to

New York by train, she dictated notes of her adven-

tures for publication. During her trip, Bly traveled by

various modes, including steamship, railroad, rickshaw,

and sampan. The trip was important, because it showed

Americans that travel abroad was safe and exciting,

even for a woman. Moreover, the success of Bly’s trip

was an indication that long-distance travel was fast.

This event also marked the first time that a national

celebrity was used to advertise a variety of products,

from clothes, to games and toys, and soaps.

Bly continued her journalism career for five more

years after her around-the-world stunt, writing to

expose poor social conditions across the country, until

she married Robert Seaman. She died in 1922, but the

contributions she made to American society continue

to be acknowledged.

Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore (1856-?)

As an explorer and travel writer in the late 1800’s,

Eliza Scidmore is best known for her vivid descriptions

of the voyage of the first passenger ship, the Idaho, up

the Inside Passage to Alaska in 1883. Her book,

Alaska: Its Southern Coast and the Sitkan Archipelago

(Boston: D. Lothrop, 1885), was viewed as the

ultimate travel guide for Alaska and continues to be

used by tourists in the region. The Scidmore Glacier in

Glacier Bay National Park is named for her.

Scidmore’s frequent trips to Alaska, which resulted in

insightful articles in newspapers and magazines across

the United States, led to a jump in tourism to the terri-

tory. From 1884 to 1890, the number of visitors to

Alaska increased from 1,650 to over 5,000.

TRAVELING JOURNALISTS

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Scidmore traveled in the Far East as well, becoming a

recognized expert on the Orient. She wrote China: The

Long-Lived Empire in 1900. Her first visit to Japan in

1885 led her to propose that Japanese cherry trees be

planted in Washington, DC, as a symbol of friendship

between the two nations. In 1909, First Lady Helen

Taft, who had lived in Japan, responded to the proposal

with enthusiasm. In 1912, 3,020 cherry trees of 12

varieties were donated by the City of Tokyo and

planted around the Tidal Basin, on the White House

grounds, and in East Potomac Park. About 1,000 of the

original trees continue to bloom; others have been

replaced over the years to perpetuate the beautiful

cherry blossoms every spring.

Scidmore’s insightful travel journalism and photogra-

phy ultimately led to her invitation in 1888 to join the

National Geographic Society. She joined the Society as

its first female officer and later became the first

woman elected to its Board of Managers. Scidmore’s

work was so admired by the Emperor of Japan that,

after her death, her ashes were carried to Japan and

buried there.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Mary Myers

Mary Breed Hawley Myers became the first American

woman credited with piloting her own balloon on July

4, 1880, in Little Falls, NY. Billing herself as “Carlotta,

the Lady Astronaut,” Myers completed more balloon

ascents between 1880 and 1890 than any other then-

living person in the world. She collaborated in many of

her ventures with her husband, Carl, a mechanically

gifted aeronautics pioneer. Together, they conducted

experiments, gave ballooning demonstrations, and

patented a balloon glide-control device that they

claimed gave them some control of the balloon’s

movements. Myers saw nothing unusual in her activi-

ties, attributing their success to her knowledge of

balloon construction, the steering device, and her good

health.

Aida de Acosta

At the helm of a dirigible just outside Paris on July 9,

1903, Cuban-born American Aida de Acosta preceded

the Wright brothers into the air by five months.

Coached by Alberto Santos-Dumont, the Brazilian diri-

gible designer, de Acosta piloted the craft from Paris to

Bagatelle, following hand signals from Santos-Dumont

as he bicycled below her. She landed on a polo field,

interrupting an important game between the United

States and England. Despite dire warnings from friends

at the game and the crowd’s objections, de Acosta

returned safely to Paris in the dirigible after the game.

This initial use of a guided aircraft by a woman caused

considerable outrage in the press and sent de Acosta’s

parents into shock, because they believed the adage

that a lady’s name should appear in newsprint only

twice: when she is married and when she dies. The

negative publicity and parental outrage caused Santos-

Dumont to conceal the identity of the pilot, describing

her only as “the heroine, a young and very pretty

Cuban, prominent in New York Society” in his book

Dans L’Air. Helen S. Waterhouse, aviation editor for

the Akron Beacon Journal, wrote a full account of the

story in Sportsman Pilot in July 1933.

Jeannette Piccard (?-1981)

Atmospheric reasearcher Jeannette Piccard held the

women’s altitude record for her balloon ascent on

October 23, 1934, until Valentina Tereshkova entered

outer space in 1963. The balloon, which measured

16,990 cubic meters (600,000 cubic feet) and was

filled with hydrogen, had been used to promote the

1933 World’s Fair. Piccard guided the craft to 17,550

meters (57,579 feet, slightly less than 11 miles), while

her husband, Jean, conducted scientific measurements

inside the gondola. Taking off before a crowd of

40,000 in Dearborn, MI, the couple landed, shaken but

unharmed, eight hours later and 300 miles away in

Cadiz, OH. To Jeannette’s sorrow, the balloon was

damaged in the landing.

Before the flight, the Piccards had decided that the

success of their research depended on having a reliable

pilot in control of the balloon. As Jeannette pointed out

in a later interview, “How much loyalty can you count

on from someone you hire?”

Jeannette took her first

flight on May 15, 1934, and soloed a month later.

The decision that Jeannette should be the one to obtain

the pilot’s license created problems when the Piccards

attempted to raise funding for their efforts. Traditional

backers of scientific research wanted nothing to do

with sending a mother into danger. The couple eventu-

ally obtained the donation of the balloon and raised

sufficient funds through private backers.

Jeannette Piccard later became the first woman to be

ordained a minister by the Episcopal Church.

BALLOONISTS

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Emily Warren Roebling

When the Brooklyn Bridge was opened on May 24,

1883, it was heralded as one of the most important

construction projects of the 19th century. At the

opening ceremonies, Congressman Abram S. Hewitt

praised Emily Roebling with these words:

. . . this bridge will ever be coupled with the

thought of one, through the subtle alembic

of whose brain, and by whose facile fingers,

communication was maintained between the

directing power of its construction and the

obedient agencies of its execution. It is thus

an everlasting monument to the self-sacrific-

ing devotion of woman, and of her capacity

for that higher education from which she

has been too long debarred. The name of

Mrs. Emily Warren Roebling will thus be

inseparably associated with all that is

admirable in human nature, and with all that

is wonderful in the constructive world of

art.

Despite Congressman Hewitt’s praise and her name on

the commemoration plaque, very few people realize the

important role Emily Roebling played during construc-

tion of the Brooklyn Bridge. During the project,

Colonel Washington Augustus Roebling, Emily’s

husband and chief engineer, was involved in building a

caisson, which is a sealed enclosure that enables under-

water construction. In this case, the Manhattan caisson

was 24 meters (78 feet) beneath the high-water mark of

the river. During the work, Colonel Roebling fell

victim to the bends, or caisson disease, the nemesis of

caisson workers worldwide at the time. The bends left

Colonel Roebling virtually paralyzed, partly blind,

deaf, and mute. Because she was the only person able

to communicate with him, Roebling’s wife, Emily,

became his most important assistant.

At the beginning of Roebling’s illness, Mrs. Roebling’s

primary duties were to care for him, while maintaining

good public relations about his health and the future

success of the bridge. As Colonel Roebling’s health

continued to deteriorate, he became “the man in the

window,” watching construction through a spyglass,

and Mrs. Roebling served as his eyes and ears on the

construction site.

Colonel Roebling began to write a

comprehensive and detailed set of instructions for the

completion of the bridge, which Mrs. Roebling used as

the basis for overseeing the ongoing construction.

To retain control of the bridge project, Colonel

Roebling taught his wife higher mathematics, including

the calculation of catenary curves, strength of materi-

als, stress analysis, bridge specifications, and the

complexities of cable construction.

Although her

training was informal, Mrs. Roebling is considered the

first woman engineer, and she was, in essence, in

charge of the day-to-day construction of the Brooklyn

Bridge. Without official position or title, Mrs. Roebling

was surrogate chief engineer for the bridge between

1872 and its opening in 1883.

In 1883, before the bridge opening, Mrs. Roebling

became the first woman to address the American

Society of Civil Engineers, successfully arguing

against her husband’s formal removal as the director of

construction for the bridge.

Elizabeth Bragg Cumming

(? - 1929)

Elizabeth Bragg became the first woman in the United

States to receive a civil engineering degree when she

graduated from the University of California at

Berkeley in 1876, one of the 30-member class. Her

thesis was entitled “Solution of a Peculiar Problem in

Surveying.” After graduation, Bragg married George

Cumming and apparently never worked as an engineer.

The California Alumni Fortnightly, v. XI, no. 5, March

1918, included an article on “Women of the

University” by Aurelia Henry Reinhardt, in which Mrs.

Cumming is described as “known for her participation

in civic work of the most useful kind.” Mrs. Cumming

died on November 10, 1929.

EARLY CIVIL ENGINEERS

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Elmina Wilson

In 1892, Elmina Wilson graduated from the Iowa State

College civil engineering program. She went on to

become the first female instructor at the college until

she withdrew in 1905.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Anne Bush (?-1962)

In 1900, Anne Rainsford French Bush, apparently the

first woman to receive a license to drive a car, obtained

a “steam engineer’s license,” which entitled her to

operate a “four-wheeled vehicle powered by steam or

gas.” She died in 1962 and is buried in Concord, MA.

Alice Huyler Ramsey (1887-1983)

As the first woman to drive coast-to-coast, Alice

Huyler Ramsey transformed herself from a 22-year-old

housewife and mother from Hackensack, NJ, into an

automobile adventurer. In 1909, one year after Ford

Motors brought out the Model T, the Maxwell-Briscoe

Company used Ramsey in its promotion of the Model

AA as a suitable car for families of modest means.

Starting out from Manhattan on June 9th, Ramsey and

three nondriving female companions reached San

Francisco 59 days and 6,115 kilometers (3,800 miles)

later with no maps and very few paved roads. In her

book, Veil, Duster and Tire Iron, Ramsey tells of

crossing Wyoming where, “if we got lost, we’d take to

the high ground and search the horizon for the nearest

telephone poles with the most wires. It was a sure way

of locating the transcontinental railroad which we

knew would lead us back to civilization.”

After her expedition, Ramsey began capturing head-

lines by frequently defeating men in car races held in

cities or at county and State fairs. Eventually, she was

banned from the newly forming race car associations.

Despite the ban, Ramsey continued to challenge male

drivers to races, which she frequently won.

Janet Guthrie (1938- )

Born on March 7, 1938, Janet Guthrie followed a

diverse career track on the way to becoming the first

woman to compete in the Indianapolis 500. Before

becoming a race car driver, Guthrie worked as a pilot,

flight instructor, aerospace engineer, technical editor,

and public representative for major corporations. She

had been on the sports car road-racing circuit for 13

years before being invited to test a car for Indianapolis

in 1976, the same year she became the first woman to

compete in a NASCAR Winston Cup race. On May 7,

1977, she became the first woman to qualify for (by

setting a qualifying lap-speed record), and compete in,

the Indianapolis 500. For her role in opening profes-

sional motorsports to women, Guthrie has been

honored as one of the first to be inducted into the

Women’s Sports Hall of Fame and by the 1997

Specialty Equipment Market Association’s Salute to

Women in Motorsports.

WOMEN BEHIND THE WHEEL

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Helen Schultz

In the United States, the bus transportation industry

began in the 1910’s and the 1920’s, mostly as a small-

scale, family enterprise. Those who entered the early

business faced fierce competition, poor trade prospects,

inadequate vehicles, bad roads, and daredevil attitudes.

Pioneers in the business were usually men, and the few

women in the industry inherited the companies from

their husbands, fathers, or other relatives.

Helen Schultz established the Red Ball Transportation

Company in 1922. She encountered a number of chal-

lenges in the early days of bus transportation. First, she

had to secure capital of $500 for a vehicle alone. She

also needed a reserve sum to cover the monthly

payments on the bus and pay her drivers, advertise in the

local newspapers, and rent an office and bus depot. To

cover the operating costs, Schultz hoped the bus line

would quickly return some income. She received loans

from various banks and purchased a bus from White

Manufacturing. Schultz started local operation in April

1922 using word-of-mouth publicity. She began with two

round trips daily between Charles City and Waterloo, IA.

There were designated stops, but the bus also picked up

people that flagged it down along the way.

Days after the first run of the bus, Schultz’s operation

had a serious problem. Heavy rain broke up the dirt

road her bus traveled on. The bus was stranded for two

weeks with mud up to its axles. The bus driver quit,

and Schultz was in desperate need of a solution. After

the rain subsided and the road dried up, Schultz hired a

full-time driver to make the bus runs and gradually

built up a clientele that consisted primarily of women

shoppers and traveling salesmen.

Schultz defeated the weather and emerged from the

mud of 1922 with her company still intact; however,

by the fall of 1923, the Red Ball Transportation

Company was heavily in debt. Schultz began to capi-

talize on her newsworthy image as an attractive, young

woman fighting the mighty railroad corporations. A

local newspaper, the Des Moines Register, named

Schultz the “Iowa Bus Queen.”

Nonetheless, the Red Ball Transportation Company

continued to have serious financial troubles. In June

1930, Edgar Zelle offered to buy the company for

$200,000. Schultz agreed to the price and retired from

the bus business.

PAVING THE WAY IN TRANSIT

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Mary Walton

Reacting to the rampant air and noise pollution that

resulted from the Industrial Revolution, Mary Walton

made major technical contributions that improved the

quality of life in New York City.

In 1879, Walton received patent #221,880 for a method

of deflecting smokestack emissions through water

tanks to capture pollutants, which were then carried by

the water through the city sewage system. She adapted

the system for use on locomotives as well.

Later, Walton turned her attention to noise pollution. In

the 1880’s, many cities developed a mass transit

system using elevated trains. These trains produced

intolerable levels of noise as they rattled along on

elevated tracks. Sociologists of the day ascribed

nervous breakdowns and neuroses among some city

dwellers to the increase in noise levels.

Living in Manhattan, Walton set out to solve the

problem by setting up a model railroad in her

basement. She used the model to develop a sound-

dampening system that cradled the track in a wooden

box lined with cotton and then filled with sand. After

successful field trials that fitted her apparatus under the

struts on existing elevated track, Walton received

patent #327,422 for the system on February 8, 1881.

She then sold the rights to the Metropolitan Railroad of

New York City.

Olive Dennis

Olive Dennis was the Baltimore & Ohio (B&O)

Railroad’s engineer of service and held patents for

several rail-related inventions. Dennis graduated from

Goucher College with degrees in science and mathe-

matics. She was the second woman to graduate from

Cornell with a civil engineering degree and held a

master’s degree in mathematics and astronomy from

Columbia University.

Dennis’ sex made it difficult for her to find work as an

engineer. Finally, on September 22, 1920, Dennis

began working for the B&O Railroad designing

bridges as a draftsman in the engineering department.

Fourteen months later, in an effort to retain the patron-

age of female passengers as automobiles and intercity

buses became increasingly common, the president of

B&O designated Dennis the engineer of service.

Her

responsibilities were to improve passenger service on

the B&O. She rode on more than 8,000 kilometers

(5,000 miles) of B&O track, covering 70,810 kilome-

ters (44,000 miles) the first year and nearly that much

each year afterwards.

Between 1920 to 1951, Dennis contributed to passen-

ger comfort in many ways. Among her patents is the

Dennis ventilator, which was inserted in the window

sashes of passenger cars and controlled by passengers.

Other areas to which she contributed were the inclu-

sion of air-conditioned coaches, dimmers on overhead

lights, individual reclining seats, and stain-resistant

upholstery.

Olive Dennis is one of the notable women who worked

in the American railroad industry. She became the first

female member of the American Railway Engineering

Association. During her long career with the B&O, she

never felt that gender stood in the way of advancement.

WORKING ON THE RAILROADS

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Harriet Quimby (1875-1912)

Born on a farm near Coldwater, MI, on May 11, 1875,

Harriet Quimby lived as an adult in California and

New York, working as a journalist.

By 1906, she was

the drama critic and woman’s page editor for Leslie’s

Illustrated Weekly. Quimby challenged existing beliefs

about appropriate behavior for women, using the

Weekly as a platform to air her beliefs.

In October 1910, Quimby witnessed John Moisant’s

flight between Belmont Park and the Statue of Liberty

during an air race. She decided to learn to fly.

Undeterred by Moisant’s death in a flying accident in

December 1910, Quimby began flying lessons during

the spring of 1911.

For a variety of reasons, including to avoid criticism

and possible embarrassment for her employer, Quimby

disguised herself as a man and took her lessons at

sunrise. Eventually, a reporter discovered the charade,

which resulted in considerable publicity and the sobri-

quet of “the Dresden China Aviatrix.” The first official

acknowledgment of Quimby’s flying lessons was a

May 25, 1911, article entitled, “How a Woman Learns

to Fly,” followed on June 22 by “Exploring the Air

Lanes.”

As a woman of post-Victorian American society,

Quimby was hampered by society’s image of proper

behavior and dress. Although trousers and a man’s

shirt were the most practical costume for flying the

planes of the era, wearing them was considered

immodest and unacceptable for most women. The

alternative of hobbling the voluminuous skirt about the

knees was not only awkward, but uncomfortable and

dangerous. Consequently, Quimby worked with a tailor

to design an outfit that she believed would “establish

the aviation costume for women in this country, if not

the world.” Appearing to be a conventional walking

skirt, the final costume consisted of a one-piece purple

satin outfit with full knickerbockers reaching below the

knees, black knee-high lace-up boots, flying goggles,

driving gloves, and a long coat for cold-weather flying.

On August 1, 1911, Quimby received pilot’s license

number 37. She was the first woman in America to

receive her license. On September 5th, she became the

first woman to fly at night. During a flying tour of

Mexico, Quimby decided to become the first woman to

fly the English Channel. She made the attempt on April

12, 1912, despite poor visibility due to fog and rain—

an amazing achievement given the aviation technology

of the time. Her success was overshadowed by news of

the Titanic disaster, which had occurred the previous

evening.

Harriet Quimby visualized aviation as a “fruitful occu-

pation for women. I see no reason they cannot realize

handsome incomes by carrying passengers between

adjacent towns, from parcel delivery, taking

photographs or conducting schools of flying.”

Unfortunately, at the time, women aviators were seen

as a novelty, not to be taken seriously, so Quimby was

unable to find a job as a flight instructor. She turned to

exhibition flying and was killed during a flight over

Boston.

Amelia Earhart (1897-1937)

Amelia Earhart secured a place in the hearts of

Americans with her daring flight achievements during

the 1920’s and 1930’s. She opened the doors to

aviation for other women by providing them with a

role model. She was a pioneer, as well as an explorer

of new technology.

In 1920, Earhart began as a barnstormer with Frank

Hawks in Glendale, CA. Earhart began flying solo

within the first year of taking lessons from Neta Snook.

When her parents sold their house, Earhart’s mother

helped her buy her first airplane, a second-hand, bright

yellow Kinner Airstar she named Canary. Amelia and

Canary quickly set a new women’s altitude record of

4,267 meters (14,000 feet).

TAKING OFF

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

In 1927, Charles Lindbergh made the first nonstop solo

flight across the Atlantic. One year later, George

Putnam chose Earhart to fly as a passenger on a

transatlantic flight to become the first woman to cross

the Atlantic Ocean by air. Exactly 20 hours and 40

minutes after leaving Newfoundland in Canada, pilot

Bill Stultz, mechanic Slim Gordon, and captain Amelia

Earhart landed in Wales, in the west of England. When

she arrived, Earhart was greeted by only a handful of

stunned farmers, not the cheering crowds that had

welcomed Lindbergh; however, her flight demonstrated

to the public that air travel was safe. Stereotypes of the

time held that women were incapable of flying. People

reasoned, therefore, that if a woman could travel by air

across the Atlantic, air travel must not be dangerous.

Earhart’s book, 20 Hrs 40 Mins, published in 1928,

recounts the journey.

With her newfound fame, Earhart bought another

airplane and flew solo from New York to California

and back, becoming the first woman to make a coast-

to-coast return flight. Annoyed that she had not been

the pilot for the flight that made her famous, Earhart

set out to repeat the cross-Atlantic journey on the fifth

anniversary of Lindberg’s flight. She flew across the

Atlantic in 14 hours and 56 minutes on May 21-22,

1932, becoming the first woman to fly across the

Atlantic Ocean alone. The public response was stupen-

dous. Earhart received the Distinguished Flying Cross

from Congress, the Cross of Knight of the Legion of

Honor from the French Government, and the Gold

Medal of the National Geographic Society, presented

by President Hoover.

Earhart continued to set new flying records. In January

1935, she became the first person to fly solo across the

Pacific Ocean by going from Honolulu to Oakland,

CA. She set a speed record for flying from New York

to Los Angeles. She also made the first-ever flight

from Los Angeles to Mexico City and was the first

woman to cross North America in a nonstop flight.

Between 1935 and 1937, Purdue University in

Lafayette, IN, provided Earhart with a visiting faculty

position to conduct research in aviation and counsel

female students. To facilitate the research, the Purdue

Research Foundation bought Earhart a new aircraft. In

July 1936, she took delivery of Electra, a Lockheed

10E, the biggest, fastest, most powerful craft she had

ever flown and the aircraft she would use for her

around-the-world flight.

Earhart’s attempt to circle the globe was not the first,

but the equatorial route she intended to follow would

make it the longest at 46,670 kilometers (29,000

miles). Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, began

their first attempt traveling westward from Oakland,

CA, to Honolulu on March 17, 1937. A blown tire

during the landing in Honolulu caused the plane to

make a sudden, sharp turn, called a ground loop, and

sustain severe damage.

Following repairs in Oakland, Earhart and Noonan

traveled to Miami, FL, to begin the second attempt,

which would take them eastward across the Atlantic

Ocean, over Africa, and then across the Indian Ocean.

By June 29th, the pair had successfully completed

35,400 kilometers (22,000 miles) and 23 legs of their

46,670-kilometer (29,000-mile) journey. On July 2nd,

the two departed Lae, New Guinea, on the next leg of

the voyage, which was 4,135 kilometers (2,570 miles)

to Howland Island, a small island in the South Pacific.

Hours after they were due to land, the Coast Guard

cutter Itaska recorded the last transmissions from

Earhart. Extensive air and sea searches have found no

traces of Amelia Earhart, Fred Noonan, or their

aircraft.

Amelia Earhart was a role model for women during her

life and continues to inspire women and girls through-

out the world. She became a charter member and the

first president of the Ninety-nines, an organization

founded by 99 of the 117 licensed women pilots in

1929. The original purpose of the organization was to

coordinate the interests and efforts of women in

aviation.

Her three autobiographical books and the

aviation column she wrote for Cosmopolitan were

immensely popular at the time.

Earhart became active

in the fledgling commercial aviation industry. She

explored new boundaries and often spoke on women’s

rights issues.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Bessie Coleman (1893-1926)

Like Amelia Earhart, Bessie Coleman began flying in

the early 1920’s, becoming the first African-American

pilot. Born on January 26, 1893, in Atlanta, TX,

Elizabeth (Bessie) Coleman’s initial pursuit of a formal

education in aviation was rejected by administrators of

the newly formed aviation schools in the United States,

because she was an African-American woman. White

pilots refused to instruct her. To pursue her dreams,

Coleman sought advice from Robert Abbot, editor and

publisher of the Chicago Defender, a publication for

African-Americans. Abbott suggested that Coleman go

to France, which was also a leader in the field of

aviation but had more liberal attitudes about women

and people of color.

Armed with French lessons and her life savings,

Coleman registered in the Ecole d’Aviation de Fréres

Caudron, the most famous flight school in France in

1920.

Despite the fact that she witnessed the death of

a fellow pupil during a flying test, Coleman persisted

with her training, walking 14 kilometers (9 miles) to

school each day for 10 months.

After earning her

license from the prestigious Federation Aeronautique

Internationale, Coleman became the only licensed

black female pilot.

Returning to the United States in September 1921,

Coleman was unable to find a position in commercial

aviation. Still determined to succeed, Coleman returned

to France in 1921 and specialized in parachuting and

stunt flying. She returned to the United States as a

“barnstormer,” performing in air shows around the

country. After capturing the attention of white audi-

ences, Coleman concentrated on performing for the

predominantly African-American audiences in the

South. Many of her appearances were associated with

carnivals, circuses, and fairs on the Theater Owners

Booking Association circuit, which included theaters

for black patrons that showed documentary film

footage of Coleman’s achievements between acts. In

addition to her great accomplishments in aviation,

Coleman lectured in black schools and churches in an

attempt to launch an aviation training school for

African-Americans. Coleman died in a flying accident

on April 30, 1926, ending her dream of establishing the

school.

Willa Brown (1906-1992)

Inspired by Bessie Coleman, Willa Brown began flying

lessons in 1934, going on to become the first African-

American commercial pilot in 1937 and the first

African-American female officer of the Civil Air Patrol

in 1942. She taught aviation courses in Chicago high

schools and later founded a flying school based at

Harlem Airport. In 1937, Brown was instrumental in

forming the National Airmen’s Association of America

to promote African-American aviation. She was also

cofounder and director of the Coffey School of

Aeronautics in 1938, which became the test site for the

U.S. Army’s experiment in allowing African-

Americans into the Army Air Force.

The Coffey

School taught approximately 200 pilots during the next

seven years; several trainees later joined the 99th

Pursuit Squadron of Tuskegee Institute. In 1972,

Brown became a member of the Women’s Advisory

Committee on Aviation for the Federal Aviation

Administration.

Jacqueline Cochran (?-1980)

Orphaned at birth, Jacqueline Cochran received almost

no formal education; she learned to read by reading the

sides of railroad boxcars. After starting work at age 8

for 6 cents an hour in a cotton mill, Cochran went on

to found a cosmetics company that became her empire.

On the advice of her fiancé, Floyd Odlum, she learned

to fly, soloing in 2 days and earning her license 18

days later.

Fiercely competitive, Cochran was the first woman to

enter the Bendix Race from New York to Los Angeles

in 1935, the first year women were allowed to

compete. Although she did not win, she acquired a

taste for setting records. By 1940, she had set three

speed records, won the Harmon Trophy three times,

and set a world altitude record.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

At the beginning of World War II, Cochran was instru-

mental in recruiting female pilots for the war effort.

Leading by example, she became the first female trans-

Atlantic bomber pilot, ferrying planes to the British.

Later she was tapped to head the Women’s Airforce

Service Pilots (WASP), recruiting over 1,000 pilots and

directing their activities until WASP was disbanded in

1944. Cochran remained in the Air Force Reserve until

retiring in 1970 with the rank of colonel.

Cochran remained active in aviation until heart

problems grounded her at age 70. At the time of her

death in 1980, she held more speed and altitude records

than anyone else in the world. Cochran was also the

first woman to break the sound barrier, flying an F-86

Sabre Jet with Chuck Yeager as her chase pilot on May

20, 1953.

Phoebe Fairgrove Omlie

(1902-1975)

Phoebe Fairgrove Omlie was born in Des Moines, IA,

and, at age 15, moved to St. Paul, MN, with her family.

The popularity of air shows at the time featuring stunt

pilots, wingwalkers, and parachutists made her decide

to become a parachutist. As Omlie got ready for her

first jump, she found she could not lift the parachute

pack, so the airport manager sent her home.

After

putting herself through a rigorous weight-training

program to build up her strength, Omlie returned to the

airport for lessons in parachuting. Before long, she was

appearing in air shows nationwide and setting altitude

records.

Omlie’s association with pilots led to her own training

and licensing during the 1920’s. She became the first

woman licensed as a transport pilot. Omlie was also a

charter member of the Ninety-nines when they formed

in 1929.

During the presidential campaign of 1932, Franklin D.

Roosevelt asked Omlie to fly him from town to town

across the country. After his election, Roosevelt invited

Omlie to become Special Assistant for Air Intelligence

of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics

(forerunner of NASA). In this role, Omlie helped

develop the National Air Marking and Mapping

Program as an aid to aerial navigation. Under the

program, the names of small towns were placed on the

tops of buildings or adjacent hillsides using 3.6-meter

(12-foot) letters. Some town names were removed

during World War II, but the system is still in use

today.

Katherine Stinson (1897-1977)

Although she was born in Texas, Katherine Stinson’s

original dream was to study music in Europe and

return to the United States to become a great piano

teacher. Her family was not wealthy, however, so

Stinson knew she would have to pay for the trip and

lessons herself. A newspaper article claiming that air

show pilots could earn up to $1,000 a day was the

inspiration for her pursuit of pilot training.

Despite her father’s initial resistance to the idea,

Stinson took her first airplane ride in January 1912.

Her enthusiasm led her to Max Lillie for flying lessons.

She flew alone after four hours of lessons and had her

pilot’s license by July 12th, becoming the fourth

licensed female pilot in the United States. Stinson was

the first woman to successfully perform a loop-the-

loop; she was also the first to add a snap roll to the

beginning of the stunt. In 1916, she performed loops at

night, attaching flares to her wingtips for dramatic

effect. Stinson traveled to China and Japan as part of

an aviation promotional tour, the first woman to fly in

either country. She also learned how to take care of her

airplane and engine by disassembling and assembling

them for transport, because she frequently traveled

between air shows by train.

Stinson brought the rest of her family into aviation

through her own enthusiasm. Her sister, Marjorie,

became the youngest female pilot in the country when

she received her license. The two sisters and their

mother opened the Stinson School of Flying in San

Antonio, TX. In addition to teaching many American

and Royal Canadian Flying Corps pilots, the Stinsons

also taught their brother, Edward, to fly. Edward later

became well known for his leadership of the Stinson

Aircraft Corporation.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

When the United States entered World War I, Stinson

volunteered for service but was turned down because

of her sex. She then used her flying skills to raise over

$2 million for the American Red Cross. In 1918, the

Army again rejected her application as a reconnais-

sance pilot, despite her recent long-distance flying

record of 982 kilometers (610 miles) in 9 hours and 10

minutes on December 11, 1917.

After becoming the first woman to win an air mail

delivery contract, Stinson went to Europe to become an

ambulance driver. Toward the end of the war, she

contracted influenza, which later progressed to tuber-

culosis. She succeeded in overcoming the disease but

never flew again.

Louise Thaden (1905-1979)

During the “Golden Age” of aviation, the 1930’s,

Louise McPhetridge Thaden was considered the second

most famous American female pilot. She became the

first woman to win several major flying events and

awards, setting new records along the way. She

believed, “In an age where some men didn’t think a

woman should drive a horse and buggy, much less

drive an automobile, it was a job to prove that females

could fly.”

Born and raised in Arkansas, Thaden did not learn to

fly until after she moved to the San Francisco bay area

as a salesperson for the Travel Air Corporation, an

aircraft manufacturer. She soloed in 1927, earning

certificate number 74, which was signed by Orville

Wright. Within two years, Thaden became the fourth

woman to hold a transport pilot rating.

She began competing in flying events after her

marriage to Herbert Thaden, a former U.S. Army pilot

working on the first American all-metal aircraft, in

1928. Thaden set her first world record on December

1, 1928, when she reached an altitude of 6,175 meters

(20,260 feet). She followed this with a women’s

endurance record on March 17, 1929.

Thaden’s first win came for the first Women’s Air

Derby, a transcontinental race from Santa Monica, CA,

to the site of the National Air Races in Cleveland, OH,

in 1929. Amelia Earhart, Pancho Barnes, and Blanche

Noyes all experienced equipment problems, giving

Thaden control of the race from Fort Worth to

Cleveland.

In 1936, Thaden, with Blanche Noyes as her copilot,

won the Bendix Cup, an annual race from New York to

Los Angeles, which was opened to women competitors

the year before. In doing so, the team also set a new

east-to-west record of 14 hours, 54 minutes. This win

resulted in Thaden receiving aviation’s highest honor,

the Clifford Burke Harmon Trophy, in 1936.

Thaden retired from full-time competition in 1938 to

devote more time to her family. However, she

remained active in flying, achieving the rank of lieu-

tenant colonel in the Civil Air Patrol during World War

II. She published her memoirs, High, Wide and

Frightened, in 1938.

Linda Finch

On March 17, 1997, the 60th anniversary of

Amelia Earhart’s departure to circumnavigate

the globe, Linda Finch, an accomplished pilot

and aviation historian, attempted to recreate

and complete Earhart’s heroic expedition in 1937.

According to Finch, the purpose of her journey

was to “pay tribute to a special woman who

demonstrated courage and perseverance. She [Earhart]

believed that with hard work, people

can have their dreams . . .”

Although she was not the first person to attempt

Earhart’s flight, Finch was the first to do so using the

same make and model aircraft, a Lockheed Electra

10E, with only a pilot and navigator at the controls.

For the attempt, Finch used an Electra 10E, almost an

exact replica of the 1935 aircraft flown by Earhart. In

fact, Finch’s Electra was powered by a similar pair of

Pratt & Whitney 600-horsepower engines. Inside the

aircraft, however, Finch had all the advantages of

modern aviation, including a Global Positioning

System, flight management gear that allowed her to

precisely locate her position at the push of a button.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

This technology was not available to Earhart 60 years

earlier.

Finch left Oakland on March 17, 1997, and returned

after 73 days, 23 stops in 19 countries, and 45,865

kilometers (28,500 miles) on May 27, 1997, complet-

ing her mission to retrace Amelia Earhart’s 1937 route.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

uring the Great Depression, a time of massive

unemployment nationwide, women were

expected to “sacrifice their personal ambitions

and accept a life of economic inactivity.” Married

women were perceived to be working for extra “pin”

money, not earning wages vital to the household

budget. Twenty-six States passed laws prohibiting

employment of women.

Congress-woman Florence

Kahn, a Republican from California, spoke for most of

her colleagues when she said that a woman’s place

should be in the home, rather than in the business

world competing with men who had families to

support. Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, the first

woman cabinet member, denounced the rich “pin

money worker” as a menace to society. The Civil

Service then ruled that only one family member would

be employed by the agency. Consequently, employers

were free to refuse to hire women, especially married

women.

When the United States entered World War II on

December 8, 1941, attitudes changed dramatically.

“Rosie the Riveter” became the symbol for the woman

worker in American defense industries during the war.

The diversion of men from the labor pool into the

military, as well as the increased production levels

required to support the war effort, prompted the

Federal War Manpower Commission and the Office of

War Information to undertake nationwide propaganda

campaigns to recruit women into the labor force. Many

engineering schools established special training courses

for women under the sponsorship of the War

Department, the Signal Corps, and other Federal

agencies. Aircraft companies inaugurated their own

special programs for engineering aides.

Lured by high wages and a sense of patriotic duty,

women took the place of men in factories producing

aircraft, ordnance, and ships. They became streetcar

conductors, taxicab drivers, business managers,

commercial airline checkers, aerodynamic engineers,

and railroad workers. Women operated machinery,

streetcars, buses, cranes, and tractors. They unloaded

freight, built dirigibles and gliders, worked in lumber

and steel mills, and made munitions. They tested new

airplanes, ferried aircraft, and served as flight instruc-

tors for the military. Between 1940 and 1945, the

number of female workers rose 50 percent, from 12

million to 18 million. In 1940, women constituted 8

percent of total workers employed in the production of

durable goods. By 1945, this number increased to 25

percent.

At the beginning of 1943, 31 percent of the

aviation workforce consisted of women.

Throughout the war years, most women who took jobs

entered a world that had always been reserved for men,

but they proved that women were able to work as well

as men, if not better. In spite of difficult and often

dangerous working conditions and discrimination in

wages, most women were determined to succeed.

Moreover, they were enormously proud of what they

accomplished and expressed newfound self-confidence

gained from performing work they had never previ-

ously had the opportunity to try. By the end of the war,

women had found jobs in almost every aspect of

industry. As an article in the August 23, 1943, issue of

Newsweek reported: “There are practically no jobs, it

has been found, that cannot be adapted for women

workers.”

The article also noted that, in 1920, women

made up 20.4 percent of the total labor force; by the

end of 1943, that number had risen to 30 percent.

Furthermore, in some key industries, such as aircraft

manufacturing, the number of women employees rose

from none to hundreds of thousands.

According to an article entitled “Women At Work,”

which appeared in the August 1944 issue of National

Geographic: “The balance of power rests in women’s

hands. Literally. Behind the whine of sawmills and roar

of blast furnaces, the hammer of arsenals and thunder

of machine shops—in shipyards, factories, foundries,

slaughterhouses, and laboratories—women are manipu-

lating the machinery of war.” The article went on to

describe the extraordinary variety of work performed

WOMEN DURING WORLD WAR II:

ROSIE THE RIVETER

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

by women and ended with the following statement:

“It’s a man’s and woman’s world [emphasis added].”

On August 14, 1945, World War II officially ended.

The men returning from the battlefield forced a demo-

bilization of the women. The Office of War

Information asked magazine editors to publish stories

about jobs for women in the postwar job market. In

contrast to the technical jobs held during the war, tradi-

tional “women’s” jobs, such as teaching, nursing, and

clerical work, were promoted as the best careers for

women in postwar America. Government and industry,

which had appealed to the patriotism of America’s

women to get them into the labor force, summarily

expected women to leave once the war was over. The

door to nontraditional job opportunities that opened for

women during the crisis of war closed when the Nation

regained peace.

Women had gained new skills and developed indepen-

dence and social awareness during the war years,

however, and could not be entirely dismissed.

Although demobilization caused 3 million female

workers to leave the labor force by 1946, more women

remained as workers than before the war began.

Overall female employment stood at 17 million in

1947. By 1948, the number of women in the workforce

started to increase again, despite limited job opportuni-

ties. In the 1990’s, record numbers of women continue

to enter the labor force.

In sum, Rosie the Riveter was told she could do

anything during the war and that was exactly what she

did. To use the words of an article in the August 9,

1943, issue of Life, “they have proved that in time of

crisis, no job is too tough for American women.”

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Jane Jacobs (1916- )

Jane Jacobs was born in Scranton, PA, in 1916. After

graduating from high school, she worked for the local

newspaper as an unpaid assistant to the editor of the

women’s page. She left Scranton during the middle of

the Depression for New York City. Jacobs held various

positions in New York and struggled through periods

of unemployment. She met her husband, architect

Robert Jacobs, while working for the Office of War

Information. After 30 years in New York City, Jacobs

and her family moved to Toronto in 1968, where she

currently resides and writes.

Through her own observations of the dynamics of city

life, Jacobs formulated philosophies about the city that

are well respected by practicing planners, as well as

students of city planning. She does not have profes-

sional training in the field of city planning, but her

ideas, which are sometimes unorthodox, shed light on

the inherent qualities that breathe life into a city.

Over the years, Jacobs has written numerous books.

Her writings cover the fields of urban design, urban

history, regional economics, and morality of the

economy and ethics. Her first published work was

entitled The Death and Life of Great American Cities.

Published in 1961, the book, which focuses primarily

on the economy of cities and regions, is one of the

most influential in the history of city planning. Jacobs

criticized traditional planning style that hailed open

space as the symbol of successful cities and destroyed

communities, separated land uses, and rebuilt sterile

areas. She argued that planners should seek to protect

neighborhoods, mix land uses, and pay attention to

design details that will be useful to people and that will

bring people together.

According to Jacobs, people who live in big cities

should be able to enjoy security on city streets. This

security, she argues, will never come just from the

activities of a vigilant police force. Instead, an intricate

social system is required, which will automatically

achieve the desired effect.

Security is achieved from

“public actors”; from habitual street watchers, such as

storekeepers, doormen, and interested neighbors; and

from more or less constant use of city streets at differ-

ent hours. This is possible only if a rich mixture of

activities in buildings of varying ages and characters is

embedded in the city.

Central to Jacobs’ philosophy is the theme that people

do not just want to be in an active neighborhood; they

want to live there. Young children and elderly people

similarly need lively surroundings. Jacobs protests that

traditional city planners do not understand these

requirements, because they continue to build civic

centers, low-density residential areas, and housing

projects segregated by income. These developments

combine to produce “boring homogeneous cores which

generate traffic for limited periods and then lapse after-

ward into dead or dangerous districts.”

Moreover, the

high rents in the area serve to squeeze out marginal

activities, such as the small business that is just getting

started, the colorful shops with strange and exotic

merchandise, and the little restaurants and bars. These

“deviant, bohemian, intellectual or bizarre” things are

what Jacobs says lend spice, charm, and vigor to an

area. What makes a big city, district, or street rich is

diversity, including diversity of people, of activities, of

uses, of buildings, of public and private enterprises.

Where such diversity exists, vitality, variety, conve-

nience, and interest, as well as safety, will

automatically follow.

To brighten neighborhoods and “unslum” slums,

Jacobs suggests that cities act contrary to what urban

experts have advised. She proposes the following

ideas:

1. Attract mixed activities that will

generate dynamic cross-use of land.

2. Cut the length of blocks.

URBAN DESIGN AND

LIVABLE COMMUNITIES

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

3. Mingle buildings of varying sizes,

types, and conditions.

4. Encourage dense concentrations of

people.

To Jacobs, massive housing projects that are not built

with these objectives in mind are dull and unhealthy. In

seeking to make similar changes in transit and commu-

nity planning, the Federal Transit Administration’s

Livable Communities Initiative clearly reflects Jacobs’

call for greater sensitivity to the needs of individual

communities in city planning.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Katherine Burr Blodgett

(1898-1979)

Armed with her education from Bryn Mawr and a

master’s degree in physics from the University of

Chicago, Katherine Burr Blodgett became the first

female scientist hired at General Electric’s research lab

in Schnectady, NY, in 1917. Initially, she assisted

Nobel Prize winner Irving Langmuir in his work with

monomolecular coatings, which are oily chemical

compounds that cover water, metal, or glass surfaces

with a coating one-molecule thick. With the encourage-

ment and influence of Langmuir, Blodgett became the

first woman to receive a Ph.D. in physics from the

Cavendish Laboratory of Cambridge University in

1926.

Over several years of work, Blodgett developed a prac-

tical application for monomolecular coatings when she

found a way to cut reflected glare through glass by

layering the compounds on the glass. Commonly

referred to as “nonreflecting glass,” her invention

allowed images to pass through glass without distortion

or loss of light. Blodgett’s work resulted in a patent in

1938 and found immediate application for eyeglasses,

periscopes, telescopes, cameras, and microscopes.

Since then, the theory has been used in many other

ways, including a process that accelerates the de-icing

of airplane wings, greatly improving aviation safety.

Stephanie Louise Kwolek (1923- )

Born in New Kensington, PA, Stephanie Kwolek

received her B.S. in chemistry from the Carnegie

Institute of Technology in 1946. While working for E.I.

duPont in Buffalo, she pioneered low-temperature

processes for preparing condensation polymers, which

are long-chain, petroleum-derived molecules. As she

carried out experiments to make stronger and stiffer

fibers, Kwolek discovered polymer science-liquid crys-

talline polymers and the technology for spinning the

polymers into fibers.

Kwolek’s most famous development was Kevlar, a

polymer fiber five times stronger than an equivalent

mass of steel. Originally developed as a reinforcement

for rubber in radial tires, Kevlar is now used for

products as varied as sails, mooring and fiber optic

cables, bullet-proof vests, and aviation parts.

Kwolek retired from duPont in 1986 but remains active

as a consultant and serves on committees for the

National Research Council and the National Academy

of Sciences. Her name appears on 17 patents issued

between 1961 and 1986. She has received numerous

awards for her efforts, including the Howard N. Potts

Medal from the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia,

1969; the Chemical Pioneer Award, American Institute

of Chemists, 1980; Creative Invention Award,

American Chemical Society, 1980; and the Harold

DeWitt Smith Memorial Award, American Society of

Testing and Materials, 1988.

In 1995, Kwolek was

inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

Edith M. Flanigen (1929- )

Earning 102 U.S. patents during her career, Edith

Flanigen is one of the most inventive chemists of all

time. Born and raised in Buffalo, NY, Flanigen was

class president and valedictorian of her graduating

class at D’Youville College. In 1952, Flanigen received

an M.S. in inorganic-physical chemistry from Syracuse

University, before beginning her 42-year career in the

research department of Union Carbide. Initially, she

specialized in the identification, extraction, and purifi-

cation of silicone polymers that would then be used in

further chemical processes.

In 1956, Flanigen shifted focus to work on the

emerging technology of “molecular sieves.” These are

crystalline structures that contain molecule-sized pores.

The compounds, with their tiny pore sizes, can be used

to filter and separate a complex mixture into its

constituent parts or as catalysts for accelerating

chemical reactions. During her career, Flanigen

invented or developed over 200 synthetic substances;

CHEMICAL ENGINEERS

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

“zeolyte Y” is considered the most important for its

role in the refinement of petroleum.

Crude oil, or petroleum, is a highly complex substance

that varies substantially in quality and chemical content

from source to source. To be used as a reliable fuel,

crude oil must be broken down into its constituent

parts, including gasoline and diesel, through a process

called “catalytic cracking.” Zeolyte Y works as a

catalyst to optimize the breakdown process. Molecular

sieves have made gasoline production more efficient,

cleaner, and safer worldwide.

Flanigen’s sieves have tremendous application beyond

the petroleum refining industry; molecular sieves are

used in both water purification and environmental

cleanup work.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Mary Engle Pennington

(1872-1952)

Mary Pennington was a bacteriologist who redesigned

railroad refrigerator cars to improve food safety around

the turn of the century. Fascinated by chemistry after

reading one of her father’s books, Pennington pursued

a science degree at the University of Pennsylvania in

Philadelphia. After she completed all her coursework,

the board of trustees refused to grant her a degree. In

1895, however, her professors elected to award

Pennington an advanced Ph.D. after declaring hers a

special case. Later that year, she enrolled in Yale

University’s biological chemistry program.

When Pennington completed her studies at Yale, she

went to work as a bacteriologist focusing on bacteria

toxicity levels in diary products. She was hired in 1905

by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of

Chemistry, where she researched fish and poultry

packing and freezing methods. After the Pure Food and

Drug Act of 1906, Pennington became the head of the

newly created Food Research Laboratory, where she

remained until 1919.

This work led Pennington to examine rail transporta-

tion of food products. As cities grew, their rail links to

agricultural centers became increasingly important.

People wanted fresh food to put on their dining tables,

but rail technology for food preservation was crude.

Produce was typically carried in refrigerator cars called

“reefers.” The refrigeration system consisted of a set of

air vents that allowed cooler outside air to flow

through the reefer when the train was underway. The

air-flow system was later replaced by ice-filled

compartments, but long journeys required the ice to be

replaced at intervals along the route, slowing the train’s

progress and increasing travel time for the food

products.

To study the problem more thoroughly, Pennington

equipped a railcar with testing equipment. She

arranged to have this rolling laboratory included in

freight trains, located next to a reefer. She could then

test the food being transported under typical railroad

conditions, while checking the reefer’s temperature and

humidity. Pennington’s research found that the insula-

tion used in reefers was typically too thin and their

method of construction allowed cracks to form in the

exterior shell, exposing the insulation to weather

effects and letting outside air into the car. Worse,

Pennington found that water tended to accumulate in

the cars, either through condensation from the humid

air or ice melt. This water and humid air became laden

with bacteria and contaminated the foodstuffs in the

car.

Based on her research, Pennington designed a reefer

with added insulation, improved storage racks, better

drainage, and a forced-air system that maximized air

circulation in the car. The added expense of these

improvements caused railroad officials to resist making

the changes for several years, but Pennington eventu-

ally prevailed.

Helen Blair Bartlett (1901-1969)

After receiving her Ph.D. from Ohio State in 1931,

Helen Bartlett went to work for AC Spark Plug, where

she stayed until her retirement in 1966. Bartlett used

her knowledge of petrology and mineralogy in her

studies of how to use alumina ceramics as insulation

for spark plugs.

A geologist by training, she was

unusual in her field, because she held several patents.

In his memorial to Bartlett, Karl Schwartzwalder,

Director of Research and Development for AC Spark

Plug, noted that she was the first woman to achieve a

high technical status in General Motors, of which AC

was a division.

She was also one of the few female

members of the American Ceramic Society.

OTHER CONTRIBUTIONS IN

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Gertrude Rand (1886-1970)

In 1952, while teaching at Columbia University,

Gertrude Rand became the first female fellow of the

Illuminating Engineering Society of America, a techni-

cal association dealing with the various aspects of

illumination. Throughout her career, Rand applied her

training in psychology to the effects of illumination on

color perception and industrial lighting, pioneering the

field of physiological optics with her husband,

Clarence E. Ferree, during the 1910’s.

From 1928 to 1943, Rand was employed in the Wilmer

Ophthalmological Institute of Johns Hopkins

University. While there, she and Ferree worked on the

lighting system for the Holland Tunnel between New

York City and Jersey City, NJ. During the war, the pair

developed standards of visual health and acuity for

airplane pilots and ship lookouts. They held numerous

patents for lighting devices and instruments.

In recognition of her contributions to the body of

knowledge about the interaction between illumination

and vision, Rand received the Illuminating Engineering

Society’s Gold Medal in 1963. She also became the

first woman to receive the Edgar D. Tillyer Medal of

the Optical Society of America in 1959.

Elsie Eaves (1890-1983)

Elsie Eaves was a graduate of the University of

Colorado in coal engineering. She joined the

Engineering News-Record (ENR) in 1926 and later

became manager of ENR’s Construction Economics

Department.

During her tenure in this position, Eaves

directed ENR’s measurement of “Post War Planning”

in the construction industry. The collected data were

used by the Committee of Economic Development and

the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) to

estimate what work could go forward promptly when

World War II ended. Eaves then converted the data into

the first continuous data base of construction in the

planning stages.

Eaves’ efforts to develop construction cost indexes and

trends and apply them nationwide resulted in several

valuable tools for the construction industry, the public

sector, and other industry sectors that supply or receive

services from the construction industry. Eaves was also

instrumental in establishing industry standards cited in

legislation and legal proceedings.

Among the other firsts in her career, Eaves became the

first woman member of ASCE when she joined in

1927 and the first woman to join the American

Association of Cost Engineers in 1957. In recognition

of her achievements, Eaves was the first woman to be

elected as an honorary member of ASCE in 1979. The

American Association of Cost Engineers also awarded

her Honorary Life Membership; Eaves was the first

woman to receive this honor.

Ivy Parker (1907- )

Dr. Ivy Parker, chemist and research engineer for the

petroleum industry, specialized in the causes and

prevention of corrosion in pipelines. She began

working for Shell in the 1930’s, later moving to the

Plantation Pipe Line Company of Atlanta, GA. Parker

viewed pipelines as systems that needed to be kept in

tune; her research encompassed data collection on

product quality, corrosion protection, pipeline cleanli-

ness and maintenance, filtration, and storage tank

maintenance. In 1944, she became the first editor of

Corrosion, the official publication of the National

Association of Corrosion Engineers. Parker retired

from the position in 1965.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

omen have been involved in space explo-

ration since its inception. Although it is not

well known today, in the late 1950’s, the

National Advisory Committee for Aviation (forerunner

of NASA) conducted preliminary screening on women

as potential astronauts. Before the program was shut

down, 2 women had completed all three stages of the

same physical and psychological tests used to select

the Mercury astronauts.

Geraldine (Jerrie) Cobb was

the first woman to report to the Lovelace Clinic, in

Albuquerque, NM, for the Phase I testing. Based on

her test results, an additional 25 women underwent the

first phase of testing, while Cobb was sent to Pensacola

to undergo standard Navy pilot testing.

Following public pressure against NASA’s intent to use

women as astronauts, the agency canceled all further

testing in July 1961. Congressional hearings into the

decision resulted in NASA’s announcement that the

program had been canceled, because women could not

complete jet pilot training. Such training was closed to

women until the 1970’s.

Sally Ride (1951- )

Sally Ride was the first American woman to go into

outer space. She began her studies in physics at

Swarthmore College and finished at Stanford

University, earning her B.S. in physics and B.A. in

English literature. Ride received her doctorate in

physics at Stanford University in 1978.

During her graduate studies, Ride learned that NASA

had begun a recruitment effort aimed at encouraging

women to apply for scientist-astronaut positions. Ride

was selected as an astronaut candidate by NASA in

January 1978. In August 1979, she successfully

completed a 1-year training and evaluation period.

Following training assignments as the on-orbit capsule

communicator for missions STS-2 and STS-3, Ride

served as a mission specialist on the space craft called

STS-7, which launched from Kennedy Space Center in

Florida on June 18, 1983. She accompanied Captain

Robert L. Crippen (spacecraft commander), Captain

Fredrick H. Hauck (pilot), and fellow mission special-

ists Colonel John M. Fabian and Dr. Norman E.

Thagard. This was the second flight for the Orbiter

Challenger and the first mission with a five-person

flight crew. The social implications of the first

American woman’s journey in space overshadowed the

technical accomplishments of the mission.

In 1987, Ride left NASA for a teaching position at

Stanford, partially as a result of her concern about the

continuing lack of women scientists and engineers in the

workforce. Since then, Ride has written children’s books

about space exploration. She is currently employed at

the California Space Institute, where she is conducting

research on the opportunities created by space science

and technology.

Other Astronauts

Since Sally Ride’s historic mission into space,

she has been followed by several other women

astronauts. Mae Jemison, for example, became

the first African-American woman in space on

September 12, 1992. The first American woman

to walk in space was Kathryn Sullivan during the 1984

mission 41-G. An oceanographer by training, Sullivan

became an astronaut in 1979. She participated in three

shuttle missions, 41-G (1984), STS-31 (1990), and

STS-45 (1992), spending

over 533 hours in space.

Another astronaut, Shannon

Lucid, now holds the record for the longest period in

space for any American (188 days and 4 hours). Her

journey to Mir, the Russian space station, began when

shuttle mission STS-76 launched on March 22, 1996,

and ended with her return aboard STS-79 on

September 26, 1996. Before the Mir mission, Lucid

had participated as mission specialist on four other

shuttle missions.

Finally, Lt. Colonel Eileen Marie

Collins is the first woman pilot in the space shuttle

program. Her first mission as a pilot was STS-63,

when Discovery was launched on February 3, 1995.

TRAVELING IN SPACE

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

any exemplary women have been employed

by the Department of Transportation (DOT),

the Federal Highway Administration

(FHWA), and other Federal, State, and local transporta-

tion agencies. The following sections highlight the

achievements of the first women to join these organiza-

tions.

Beverly Cover

Beverly Cover was sworn into office by Deputy

Administrator D. Grant Mickle on April 2, 1962. A

native of Cumberland, MD, and the second woman in

the long history of the Georgia Institute of Technology

to receive a Bachelor of Civil Engineering degree,

Cover was the first woman highway engineer to join

the Bureau of Public Roads, which later became the

FHWA. As highway engineer, she was involved with

traffic performance, highway capacity, and driver

behavior studies. She resigned in September 1964 to

devote more time to her family.

Judith A. Carlson

Judith A. Carlson was hired by the Bureau of Public

Roads as a highway engineer after graduating from

Michigan Tech with a degree in civil engineering in

June 1964. Her duties included reviewing, advising on,

and approving State highway activities from the

planning stages through completion of construction.

Karen M. Porter

A civil engineering graduate from Merrimack College

in North Andover, MA, Karen M. Porter joined the

Bureau of Public Roads in September 1964 as a

systems analyst. Her responsibilities included working

with hydraulic engineers to develop computer

programs to design highway culverts, helping bridge

engineers develop programs to compute the most

economical structures that can be built under given

conditions, and assisting planners in using data

obtained from household surveys to forecast future

traffic volumes and transportation needs.

Mary Anderson

Mary Anderson graduated from Prairie View

Agricultural and Mechanical College with a degree in

engineering and joined FHWA in January 1970 as a

highway engineer. She was the first woman to success-

fully complete FHWA’s 27-month highway engineer

training program.

Alinda C. Burke

On August 8, 1980, Alinda C. Burke became the first

woman to be sworn in as Deputy Administrator for

FHWA. She was formerly a Special Assistant to

Secretary of Transportation Neil Goldschmidt. As

Deputy Administrator, she assisted Administrator Jon

S. Hassell, Jr., in directing the $8 billion Federal-aid

highway program.

Elizabeth Dole

Elizabeth Hanford Dole was sworn in as the new secre-

tary of DOT on February 7, 1983. She spent 4 years as

Secretary of Transportation, overseeing a departmental

budget of $27 billion. She became the first woman to

head a branch of the armed forces (the Coast Guard

falls under the DOT during times of peace) and she

became the seventh woman to serve in the cabinet.

When Secretary Dole joined DOT, she made safety the

dominant theme of her administration. She was imme-

diately interested in studying possible ways of saving

lives in various forms of transportation. Research on

rear-end crashes showed that a brake light in the rear

window of an automobile greatly reduced the total

number of these crashes. DOT had earlier ruled against

WOMEN ADMINISTRATORS IN

TRANSPORTATION

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

requiring rear-window brake lights for all new

vehicles, but Secretary Dole reversed the decision.

Dole also oversaw an abundance of safety research,

and she began taking action on the issue of passive

restraints. She favored the air bag, even though

previous administrators had resisted requiring

automakers to place passive restraints in new models

of automobiles.

The Supreme Court ordered a further investigation on

the need for passive restraints. Secretary Dole sought a

solution that met both the current and long-term needs

of society. Under the DOT plan Dole and her staff

devised, all models of automobiles were required to

have some type of approved automatic passenger

restraints by 1990, unless two-thirds of the Nation’s

population lived in States with strict safety belt laws.

This concept was called Rule 208, and it influenced

people to use the safety belts that were already avail-

able in their cars. The concept also provided crucial

data for rear-end and rollover crashes. The same plans

also recommended that car manufacturers produce air

bags for the side and front paneling of cars.

Rule 208 was essentially a peacemaker. It ensured that

States would have to start passing laws that would

make the use of seatbelts mandatory and that, when the

automakers improved their technologies, new laws

would be passed requiring passive restraints in all new

car models. In 1984, only 14 out of 100 people wore

their seatbelts regularly, and the States did not have

laws requiring seatbelts to be worn. In 1990, almost

half of the people in a test group wore their seatbelts.

Dole has received many awards, but the one she values

most is the 1989 National Safety Council’s

Distinguished Service to Safety Award. As one of the

few women in a top-level administration job, the

former Secretary of Transportation was not only an

advocate for public safety, she also aided in the

advancement of women within the Department. Since

working at DOT, Dole has held other prestigious posi-

tions, including Secretary of Labor and President of the

American Red Cross.

Carmen Turner (?-1992)

In 1983, Carmen Turner became General Manager of

the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority

(WMATA) and the first African-American woman to

lead a major transit agency. She attended American

University and obtained her master’s degree in public

administration.

In 1970, Turner joined the Urban Mass Transportation

Administration in the agency’s Office of Civil Rights.

She became the Acting Director of Civil Rights for the

U.S. DOT in 1976 by special appointment of the

Secretary of Transportation. In 1977, former

Washington Metro General Manager Theodore Lutz

chose Turner as the Metro’s first Assistant General

Manager for Administration. In 1983, she became the

first and only Washington Metro General Manager to

be selected from within the organization.

At the beginning of her tenure, Turner successfully

handled an injunction that halted construction of the

Green Line east of the Waterfront station in the metro-

politan Washington area. Federal funds for construction

were put on hold until the issue of whether there were

enough railcars to meet future needs was addressed.

Turner was soon noted for her outstanding leadership

in the transit industry, especially because she tackled

these problems so soon after her appointment. Under

Turner, the Washington Metro earned the transit

industry’s highest honor, the Outstanding Achievement

Award from the American Public Transit Association

(APTA), in 1988. APTA also named Turner Transit

Manager of the Year the following year. During

Turner’s tenure as General Manager, Metrorail

expanded 40 percent, growing from 68 kilometers (42

miles) of track with 47 stations to 117 kilometers (73

miles) of track with 63 stations, while annual ridership

grew to 70 million passengers. The highlight of

Turner’s Metro career came in 1990, when Congress

authorized $1.3 billion to complete the 166-kilometer

(103-mile) Metrorail system. Turner’s major concerns

were completing the Metrorail system, controlling

costs of operating the bus and rail systems efficiently,

and making public transportation easier for passengers

to use.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Under Turner’s management, WMATA provided more

than 1 million bus and rail transit trips for Washington

area residents every weekday. In 1990, Turner’s last

year as General Manager, she was responsible for a

$200 million annual capital construction program for

fiscal year 1991, along with a $615 million operating

budget, and she managed approximately 9,000 employ-

ees.

Turner died on April 9, 1992. She was inducted into

APTA’s Transit Hall of Fame in October of that same

year.

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

Today, Americans travel more than ever before. We

walk, bike, drive, and take buses, trains, and planes.

Transportation is critical to the economy of the United

States. Our transportation systems must be effective

and efficient and must strive to be equitable. Not only

must we maintain the systems already in place, but we

must be willing to take chances and explore new ideas

that move our nation forward into the next century.

Women are an essential part of today’s labor force, yet

women are still underrepresented in the

technology areas. There are more than 60 million

women in the labor force today, yet women make up

only 8 percent of engineers, 18 percent of

engineering technicians, and 30 percent of natural

scientists.

Now that the automobile is the primary mode of trans-

portation for most Americans, automobile

manufacturers must design and build cars that meet the

national and state air quality and safety standards and

appeal to American drivers. Women hold key positions

with automobile manufacturers and continue to be

strong advocates for safety in automobile design.

Women working as chemical engineers, structural engi-

neers, highway engineers, planners, geographers, and

computer analysts all contribute to our mobility today.

The important contributions of women as administra-

tors in the U.S. DOT carry on today. Jane Garvey is

head of the Federal Aviation Administration, and

Jolene Molitoris is the Administrator of the Federal

Railroad Administration; other prominent women in

the current administration include: Gloria Jeff, Deputy

Administrator at FHWA; Nuria Fernandez, Deputy

Administrator at the Federal Transit Authority; Kelley

Coyner, Acting Administrator of the Research and

Special Programs Administration; and Nancy

McFadden, DOT General Counsel.

Women have not always been welcome in the field of

transportation. Women have had to make their own

opportunities and struggle to realize their career

dreams and goals. Now, however, much of that

struggle has been reduced, thanks to the early innova-

tors, pioneers, adventurers, engineers, scientists, and

inventors. Without the efforts of these women in the

past, the future of transportation would be diminished.

CONCLUSION

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

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NY: Associated Faculty Press, 1984),

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33 Sherr and Kazickas, p. 203.

34 Alice Huyler Ramsey, Veil, Duster and Tire Iron,

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W O M E N

T R A N S P O R TAT I O N : C H A N G I N G

A M E R I C A’ S

H I S T O R Y

WOMEN IN TRANSPORTATION: CHANGING AMERICA’S HISTORY

51 Macdonald, p. 307.

52 Penny Colman, Rosie the Riveter: Women

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53 Gant, http://www.ninety-nines.org/wia.html, p.2.

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57 Rodwin, p. 12.

58 Trescott, M. Moore, op. cit., p 198.

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64 Rossiter, p. 288.

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67 Trescott, M. Moore, op. cit.,

pg 177.

68 Gant, http://www.ninety-nines.org/wia.html,

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