Harriet Quimby: First Licensed U.S. Woman Pilot

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The little monoplane was flying at 200 feet when it broke into the clear. Though dazzled by the rising sun, Harriet could see the shores of France ahead. She sighted a deserted stretch of beach dead ahead and soon passed over the Cape Grisnez Lighthouse. She flew briefly toward Boulogne, and then spiraled down to a landing on a flat, sandy fishing beach where she was quickly surrounded by villagers. By a stroke of luck she was at Hardelot, not far from the Blériot hangar, about 25 miles south of her planned destination, Calais.

Despite the Blériot’s cruise speed of almost 60 miles an hour, the 22-mile crossing had taken nearly an hour because of the climbing and landing spirals, the long, slow ascent to 6,000 feet, and the course variation.

Harriet Quimby, now ‘Queen of the Air,’ was feted in London and Paris and returned to the United States as a celebrity on two continents. She performed at air meets throughout the country, occasionally carrying passengers.

In June she entered the 1912 Boston meet to be held at Harvard Field in Squantum on the shores of Dorchester Bay, scene of big international meets in 1910 and 1911. The 1912 meet proved a troubled affair from the start as the management, a group of local promoters, squabbled with the Aero Club of America, the rules maker for such competitive meets. The meet, which attracted many famous fliers of the time, eventually ended $25,000 in debt and with the licenses of seven aviators suspended for the rest of the year. Worse, it brought death to two of its key figures.

Monday, July 1, the second flying day of the meet, went quite well, according to the news accounts, ‘with some good flying during the day.’ Just before 6 p.m., with the competitive events concluded, Quimby took off with a passenger, William A.P. Willard, the meet manager, for a flight around Boston Light, about eight miles away in Boston’s island-dotted outer harbor. Willard, father of Charles F Willard, a noted Curtiss exhibition pilot, had tossed a coin with another son, Harry, two days before to see which would fly first with Quimby. Harry had won and went up for a short flight earlier that day. The elder Willard had been looking forward to his own flight as ‘a great ad for his show,’ in which he had invested heavily with family funds.

After taking off, Quimby and Willard circled the field and headed east toward the Light, climbing to a height of 6,000 feet. Quimby sat in the front cockpit of the new 70-hp Blériot (the craft she had ordered in Paris), the plane’s white wings extending from just below and to either side of her. Willard, a large man of 190 pounds, rode the rear cockpit about three feet behind the pilot. The plane’s center of gravity was forward, at the wings, so Willard’s weight kept the fuselage level, replacing sandbags usually carried to prevent the tail from rising too high when Quimby was flying alone.

Returning from the Light some 20 minutes later, the Blériot descended in a wide circle and, heading eastward, reached a point near the mouth of the Neoponset River, midway between the Squantum and Dorchester shores. The plane, already in a steep glide, suddenly slanted even more sharply down and started a turn to the left, presumably to make its final approach to the field.

Then the unbelieveable and horrifying occurred. Willard was seen to hurtle clear over the nose of the plane, followed a second or two later by Quimby. Both plunged into the muddy river 1,000 feet below which, with the tide out, was barely three or four feet. deep. Death was instantaneous. Ironically, the plane recovered from its dive, crashlanded in the river and, tripped by its landing gear, flipped upside down with only minor damage. It was intact enough for a thorough inspection of its controls.

Quimby’s flying career had spanned a scant 11 months, and she was 28 (or 37, Michigan version) when she died.

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Tags: Adventurers & Trail Blazers, Aviation History, Historical Figures, Women's History

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