Significance

Amelia Earhart was more than a successful pilot with a tragic ending. She was a feminist who stood up for equality between genders and inspired women from all walks of life, despite her and other female pilots being looked down upon by others. She set out to prove that women didn't have to fit into the roles that society laid out for them by breaking many barriers in very male-dominated industries. Her courage to achieve her goals ultimately drove her to breaking multiple barriers that impacted women all over the world, all before she was forty years old. She broke many barriers in the world of aviation, helped change the way that women were perceived in the workplace, and the way that was acceptable for women to dress. If Amelia Earhart didn't commit all that she did to change the way that women were perceived, women would not be where they are today. Her courage and achievements have helped women all over the world to break barriers of their own, inside and outside of the workplace. 

(Critical Past, 1932)

Amelia Earhart takes off on her Transatlantic flight in 1932.

“It would have been impossible to be a child growing up in America [in the late 1920s and ’30s] and open your newspaper every day or hear your radio programs every night and not hear the stories about these women." 

-Keith O’Brien, Fly Girls: How Five Daring Women Defied All Odds and Made Aviation History

(Library of Congress, 1932)

Earhart stands surrounded by a crowd of admirers.