Before Amelia (27 page)

Hardy, Harriet's French mechanic, insisted that the machine was in perfect order as far as the guiding apparatus was concerned. He asserted “without reserve” that the accident was due to the loss of balance in the machine; beyond that, he made no further technical comment. Privately, he may have thought the pilot needed more experience flying the sensitive machine, that her speed was too great, her abrupt descent too acute, but he kept these thoughts to himself. The death of his boss was a tragic loss. She embodied charm, competence, and tremendous confidence— too much for her own good.

Shakir S. Jerwan, a member of the first class of students and later director of the Moisant School, recalled in an article for the
Sportsman Pilot
that he rode with Harriet in her new two-seater Blériot on her second trial of the machine as “ballast” and copilot. He noticed as they flew around above Long Island that the machine had a tendency to nose over and, upon landing, he cautioned her about this. Harriet didn't take the criticism seriously, or she would never have carried a passenger on the fatal flight. Overconfidence led her to take risks, when she needed more practice on the new Blériot to learn its eccentricities.

The death of America's first licensed woman pilot, as might be expected, produced much editorial comment. Men were falling out of the skies daily, at a faster rate than women, but that was men's work. When Harriet was killed, the
New York Times
suggested that “it would be well to exclude women from a field of activity in which their presence is unnecessary from any point of view.” It is debatable if women gave up thoughts of flying because of Quimby's tragic accident. Certainly, those women who were flying or training continued to do so. Like her, they found flying exciting, fulfilling, and profitable, and enjoyed pushing the barriers that kept women back.

Ironically, a few days before leaving for Boston, Harriet had dinner with a friend who advised her to quit.“I will after I make enough money to pay for my aeroplane. I feel awfully poor with the debt hanging over my head.” Matilde Moisant said years later that Harriet was anxious to make money, with two elderly parents to care for. Money concerns were ingrained in her consciousness.

Even in death, the fiction surrounding her life continued. Her age was given as twenty-eight—she was really thirty-seven—she was born in California, according to her father, in the press, but her death certificate is blank. Harriet was buried first in Woodlawn Cemetery on Staten Island, then reburied in the Quimby family plot in Kensico Cemetery, Valhalla, New York, at her mother's request, where she joined her daughter on her death. William Quimby was buried in Greenville, Michigan, which he considered his hometown. The Quimby fiction ended.

In one of the ironies of fate surrounding Harriet, her article on superstition was published after her death. In it, she declared that all women pilots were superstitious and proceeded to give examples, much of it describing her own beliefs. Harriet would have us believe that all the misfortune she had experienced was the work of a small brass idol to which she attributed occult powers. “I am always knocking on wood for fear something will happen,” she once wrote, behavior that is hard to reconcile with the decisive, clever woman who had forged a career in journalism and aviation.

Harriet's articles focused the public's attention on aviation and the roles women might play. She predicted that “women could and would fly passengers and freight, take aerial photographs, train students, and do everything connected with aviation.” She knew they were capable—it was only a matter of time.

In 1991, the U.S. Postal Service issued a stamp honoring Harriet Quimby, pioneer pilot and trailblazer.

THIRTEEN DAYS AFTER Harriet Quimby won her license, Matilde Moisant followed her into the Aero Club of America records. Born into a close–knit French–Canadian family, Matilde (newspapers frequently used “Matilda” instead of the French “Mathilde” she was christened with) took up aviation after the death of her brother John, a charming daredevil of a flier who gave the American public something to cheer about.

Born September 13, 1878, in either Manteno, Illinois, or Earl Park, Indiana (her Aero Club of America license named Earl Park as place of birth), Matilde was the sixth child of Medore and Josephine Fortier Moisant, who came from French–speaking stock that had immigrated from Canada. Medore was industrious and made a living for his growing family by farming in the summer and working as a carpenter in the winter; in addition, he bought real estate as his earnings permitted. The 1880 Manteno census lists the family at home: Medore, forty–one; Josephine, thirty–nine; George, fourteen; John, ten; Annie, six; and Matilde, two. (When she won her pilot's license, Matilde, the spelling of her name on the license, did what was not uncommon among women fliers— she dropped several years off her true age for publicity purposes. Matilde explained several years later that she lowered her age for fear she would not be accepted as a pilot at age thirty–three.) The older boys, Alfred and Edward, were already working away from home. Louise, born on April 18, 1883, was listed as the twelfth child, of which only seven survived beyond childhood.

By 1881 the family was living in Chicago, where Medore owned real estate and worked as a carpenter. The family spoke French at home, but the children were completely bilingual and, in future years, they added Spanish to their language skills. All had a “sound high school education”; Annie, four years older than “Tillie”—her nickname among family and friends—was the only one to attend college.

Medore died in 1887, before reaching fifty years of age, but hard work and thrift left the family comfortably provided for. Alfred—“Fred” to his siblings—took over as head of the family and in the next year moved the Moisants to California, where the Alameda city directory for 1888 listed Alfred J. as a “commission merchant.” By lucky chance, the Moisants' arrival coincided with Alameda's emergence as a boom town. In short order, Alfred's ambition and business acumen were put to good use, and the Moisants were established in local society.

As opportunity arose, Alfred looked south to Central America, making his first trip to Guatemala in 1890. In the next decade the family invested in coffee and sugar plantations in El Salvador and Guatemala. The Moisants carved out an idyllic plantation—Santa Emilia—from the jungle in El Salvador; this was home to the younger Moisants for ten years. It was a time when fortunes could be made with hard work—the yearly profits from Santa Emilia averaged one hundred thousand dollars—but financial power relied on which faction was on top in the ongoing revolutions in the area. The family profited from banking positions, lost them in a government turnover, then regained them again. John, an adventurer at heart, took part in some of the fighting with the enthusiasm of a gun–slinging desperado from the West.

When aviation burst upon the scene, with its potential for gain, Alfred and John became enthusiastic supporters. Alfred moved to New York City to further commercial enterprises, with Matilde and Louise in tow, while John went to France in 1909, determined to build his own aeroplane and fly.

His initial attempt in France was a disaster, but John signed up for lessons with the Blériot School, bought a new monoplane, and passed his tests for a license, to the satisfaction of the French Aero Club. The license was transferred to the American Aero Club, which issued him license No. 13. In August 1910 he flew the Channel with Albert Fileux as passenger, an aviation first. Unconcerned by a series of breakdowns once he reached England, he was jubilant on reaching London. “We have broken a lot of wood, but we are in London,” he told Fileux, in typical John fashion. His seat–of–the–pants flying style would make a name in aviation circles, while Alfred, assuming the leadership reins, would build aeroplanes and open a school to train aviators.

Alfred's vision of a thriving aviation business, building Moisant machines modeled on the Blériot and teaching would–be pilots in a planned setting of one hundred hangars, developed slowly. The grandstand with clubhouse and restaurant failed to appear; when financing and construction lagged, his big plans for family enrichment slowed. John did his part to kindle interest, making his debut at the 1910 Belmont Aviation Meet. With the cream of society present, he beat Grahame–White's time in the Statue of Liberty speed race by thirty–eight seconds (or forty three, depending on the reporter) in a machine bought on the spot to win the applause and hearts of the American public. Months later, when the judges declared the English pilot the winner, Matilde and the family insisted it was due to “maneuvering.” Actually, it was due to a technicality: Moisant began the race after the specified start time. GrahameWhite won the ten thousand–dollar pr ize money, but John had the glory.

Following his debut, John made appearances around the South with the Moisant International Aviators. At New Orleans, he planned to try for the Michelin Cup for distance and endurance. Again, his penchant for doing the unpredictable was his undoing. On December 31, flying René Barrier's Blériot (John's machine was not in great shape), Moisant started to land with the wind at his back at a new site, when a gust upended his tail. Moisant pitched forward and out from about fifteen feet, breaking his neck. The short, daring aviator was suddenly gone, one of thirty–eight flying fatalities worldwide by the end of 1910. He died “gloriously,” a “pioneer in a new pursuit,” editorialized the
New York Times,
still charmed by his audacity.

Ironically, when Harriet Quimby crashed nineteen months later, the
Times
questioned the presence of women in aviation. There was little glory for her in spite of her role as the first American woman to earn a license.

Years later, Matilde enjoyed telling this story, which appeared in the
Times
shortly after John's death:

John went to heaven, knocked on St. Peter's door, and said he would like to come in. St. Peter replied, “But you're an aviator, aren't you?” John said, “I fly, yes.” St. Peter informed him, “You know, we're awfully sorry but we don't allow aviators here.”

“Wouldn't you let me look around? I'm kind of inquisitive, I'd like to see what it looks like up here, even if I have to go below.” St. Peter agreed, and John looked around. “Isn't that Grahame White over there, under that tree?”

St. Peter looked. “Yes,” he said, “why?”

“Well,” said John, “he's a flyer.”

“Oh no,” said St. Peter. “He only thinks he is.”

Matilde would laugh at this point, adding that Grahame–White was going to sue the
Times
because of the story.

Grief did not halt Alfred's plans. The school came into being with André Houpert as instructor and, by spring of 1911, the first class of eager students was in training, including Harriet Quimby, a friend of Matilde's, who convinced Matilde she should fly—“You have as much sense as I have,” Harriet said. Matilde went to Alfred and told him she would like to fly. He regarded her seriously for a moment and asked why she wanted to fly. “Just for fun,” she replied. Her brother then agreed, provided she promised not to fly commercially, a curious stipulation, but perhaps Alfred thought it reflected on the family's status. He secured rooms at the Atlantic City Hotel for the prospective flier, and Matilde started lessons on July 1, 1911.

The vagaries of weather played an unpredictable role in learning to fly. Days were spent waiting for favorable conditions, during which students learned about the machine, but this didn't require a great deal of time due to the aeroplane's simplicity. Matilde remembered she spent the first twelve days just waiting to sit in the aeroplane. On the thirteenth, Houpert called to her that the wind was four miles an hour; if she hurried she would have time “to make a run on the ground.”

The old grass–cutter was called St. Genevieve, the saint who looked after aviators. It was slow, but it enabled Matilde, like Harriet before her, to learn how to manage a machine on the ground before trying the Grasshopper for hopping off the ground for five or six feet and landing. According to Matilde: “You lost your breath, and then you got it back again!” When the student was ready for more advanced work, a third, slightly faster aeroplane with a thirt y–five–horsepower motor, dubbed the Goat, was used to go up, circle the field, land, then repeat the process.

On that first day, Matilde, showing Moisant independence, ignored Houpert's directions and drove St. Genevieve to the other end of the field and back, using the rudder, as if in a boat, to turn around. Houpert could hardly scold her for a good performance. Early on, Matilde, who was a small woman, showed she had a mind of her own. She wanted only to fly; lessons about carburetors and motors held no interest, and she skipped them. Like her brother, she didn't think lessons were essential, if you were a natural. Of course, she was, as the official Aero Club time records indicate. Matilde's total when she qualified for her license was thirty–two minutes, something of a record even at that time. During this learning period, she was in a one–seater aeroplane—alone—a fact Matilde emphasized in later years.

Her first real flight was a thrill. The ability to control the machine while floating through the air was magical. She felt like one of the big buzzards she used to watch at Santa Emilia, lazily skimming over the countryside. It was “just so wonderful.” Watching her brother fly had made her nervous, but she didn't feel that way about her own escapades in the air. “I enjoy every minute without a thought of anything that might happen,” she said. On August 14, having progressed rapidly through the lessons, she passed her tests before Aero Club observers Baron Ladilas D'Orcy and William Bluet to become the second licensed woman pilot in the United States. And, miraculously, she was ten years younger! Her year of birth was given as 1888.