1935
- Amelia Earhart was only 39 years old when she and her plane disappeared during her quest to become the first woman to fly around the world. One of her best known speeches—"A Woman’s Place In Science"—was a radio address given in 1935, less than two years earlier. It was part of a broadcast exploring the[...]
Amelia Earhart was only thirty-nine years old when she and her plane disappeared during her quest to become the first woman to fly around the world.
One of her best known speeches — “A Woman’s Place In Science” — was a radio address given in 1935, less than two years earlier. It was part of a broadcast exploring the emerging roles for women in science.
Earhart was considered both then and now to be a pioneer of women’s equality. Her first flight was as a passenger in 1920 when she was twenty-three. It lasted just ten minutes but by the time plane returned to the runway, Earhart says she knew had to learn to fly. In 1922, she set the world altitude record for female pilots and in 1928, she completed a crossing of the Atlantic, the first woman to do so.
She became a huge celebrity and along with books and endorsements, spoke on a lecture tour. And she continued to pursue firsts, always determined to earn her acclaim and advance women’s roles in aviation and beyond.
Transcript
This modern world of science and invention is of particular interest to women, for the lives of women have been more affected by its new horizon than those of any other group.
Profound and stirring as have been accomplishments in the remoter fields of pure research, it is in the home that the applications of scientific achievement have perhaps been most far-reaching, and it is through changing conditions there that women have become the greatest beneficiaries in the modern scheme.
Science has released them from much of the age-old drudgery connected with the process of living.
Candle dipping, weaving, and crude methods of manufacturing necessities are things of the past for an increasing majority.
Today, light, heat, and power may be obtained by pushing buttons, and cunningly manufactured and appealing products of all the world are available at the housewife’s door.
Indeed, beyond that door she need not go, thanks to the miracles of modern communication and transportation.
Not only has applied science decreased the toil in the home, but it has provided undreamed of economic opportunities for women.
Today, millions of them are earning their living under conditions made possible only through a basically ordered industrial system.
Probably no scientific development is more startling than the effects of this new and growing economic independence upon women themselves.
When the history of our times is written, it must record as supremely significant the physical, psychic, and social changes women have undergone in these exciting decades.
The impetus of the sociological evolution of the last half-century should be largely credited to those who have toil in laboratories, and those who have translated into practical use the fruits of such labors.
One hears the lament that a mechanized world would not be a pleasant one in which to live.
Quite the contrary should be true, and it can be true if the fine minds which have accomplished so much in the realms of applied science will unite with the same enthusiasm to control their creations against social misuse.
Obviously, research regarding technological unemployment is as vital today as further refinement or production of labor-saving and comfort-giving devices.
Among all the marvels of modern invention, that with which I am most concerned is of course air transportation.
Flying is perhaps the most dramatic of recent scientific attainments.
In the brief span of thirty-odd years, the world has seen an inventor’s dream, first materialized by the Wright brothers at Kitty Hawk, become an everyday actuality.
Perhaps I am prejudiced, but to me it seems that no other phase of modern progress can try to maintain such a brimming measure of romance and beauty coupled with utility as does aviation.
Within itself, this industry embraces many of those scientific accomplishments which yesterday seemed fantastic impossibilities.
The pilot, winging his way above the earth at 200 miles an hour, talks by radio telephone to ground stations or to other planes in the air.
In thick weather, he is guided by radio beams and receives detailed reports of conditions ahead, gleaned through special instruments and new methods of meteorological calculations.
He sits behind engines, the reliability of which, measured by yardsticks of the past, is all but unbelievable.
I myself still fly a Wasp motor, which has carried me over the North Atlantic, part of the Pacific, to and from Mexico City, and many times across this continent.
Aviation, this young modern giant, exemplifies the possible relationship of women and the creations of science.
Although women as yet have not taken full advantage of its use and benefits, air travel is as available to them as to men.
As so often happens in introducing the new or changing the old, public acceptance depends peculiarly upon women’s friendly attitude.
In aviation, they are arbiters of whether or not their families shall fly, and as such are a potent influence.
And lastly, there is a place within the industry itself for women who work.
While still greatly outnumbered, they are finding more and more opportunities for employment in the ranks of this latest transportation medium.
May I hope this movement will spread throughout all branches of applied science and industry, and that women may come to share with men the joy of doing.
Those can appreciate rewards most who have helped create.
Obviously, research regarding technological unemployment is as vital today as further refinement or production of labor-saving and comfort-giving devices.
Among all the marvels of modern invention, that with which I am most concerned is, of course, air transportation.
Flying is perhaps the most dramatic of recent scientific attainments.
In the brief span of thirty-odd years, the world has seen an inventor’s dream, first materialized by the Wright brothers at Kitty Hawk, become an everyday actuality.
Perhaps I am prejudiced, but to me it seems that no other phase of modern progress can try to maintain such a brimming measure of romance and beauty coupled with utility as does aviation.
Within itself, this industry embraces many of those scientific accomplishments which yesterday seemed fantastic impossibilities.
The pilot, winging his way above the earth at two hundred miles an hour, talks by radio telephone to ground stations or to other planes in the air.
In thick weather, he is guided by radio beam and receives detailed reports of conditions ahead, gleaned through special instruments and new methods of meteorological calculations.
He sits behind engines, the reliability of which, measured by yardsticks of the past, is all but unbelievable.
I myself still fly a Wasp motor which has carried me over the North Atlantic, part of the Pacific, to and from Mexico City, and many times across this continent.
Aviation, this young modern giant, exemplifies the possible relationship of women and the creations of science.
Although women as yet have not taken full advantage of its use and benefits, air travel is as available to them as to men.
Author of the World War II Multimedia Database