General

🌐 WOMEN’S STORIES _ Bessie Coleman

Tom Nash, The Heroine Collective

The First Aviatrix

The air
is the only place free from prejudice.

For
Bessie Coleman, the sky had no limits. Not just the first female pilot of
African-American descent, but the first ever African-American to hold an
international pilot’s license. The aviatrix was an incredible risk-taker – a
fearless woman who strove to follow her passion, to realise her potential and
to fight for her right to equality. By the time of her death at only 34, she’d
become one of the most famous black women on Earth and paved the way for
generations of women to come.

If I can
create the minimum of my plans and desires there shall be no regrets.

Bessie
was born in Texas in 1892. The Texas of her time was plagued with racial
intolerance. African-Americans weren’t allowed to vote, suffered strict
segregation, and were commonly beaten or lynched all across the Southern
States.

In these
painful early days, her mother Susan opened Bessie’s eyes to her own potential.
The daughter of slaves, Susan was unable to read or write herself, but she was
determined that her children would have an education and a better start in life
than she’d had.
When she
started school at the age of six, Bessie proved herself to be academically
gifted, particularly at maths. Later she would manage to save enough money from
cotton-picking to complete one term at university, but without the funds to
sustain her studies, she had little choice but to head home to Texas. Jobs were
few and far between for black women in the hostile environment of the South, so
at 23 Bessie followed her brothers to the more black-friendly city of Chicago.
But in
truth, Chicago didn’t present many more opportunities for her. She began
working in a barber shop as a manicurist but she remained desperate, in her own
words, “to amount to something.”
Her
brothers would tell her stories of seeing terrifying, breath-taking aviation
exploits during World War I and Bessie became fascinated by aviation. Her
brothers talked of the white French women who could fly, had careers — women
who’d made something of themselves. In fact, it was incredibly rare for any
woman at that time to have a pilot’s license but still, it bothered Bessie. She
began searching for someone to teach her to fly, but all the American flying
academies refused her entry on the grounds of her race and gender.

I refused
to take no for an answer.
 

It was in
Chicago that Bessie met Robert Abbott, founder of the Chicago Defender (often
called ‘America’s first black newspaper’) and civil rights activist. Robert persuaded
her that the French flying academies were less racist and sexist than their
American counterparts.

So with
her savings, she learned French and after winning the financial support of
Abbott and wealthy banker Jesse Binga in 1920, Bessie travelled to France, her
mind set on achieving her goal.
In just
seven months, she had completed a ten-month aviation course at the Fédération
Aéronautique Internationale, one of the most prestigious flying academies in
the world. In June 1921, she was awarded an international aviation licence.
Not only
did Bessie Coleman become the first American of any race or gender to earn this
licence from the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, she also became the
first black woman in the world to own an international pilot’s licence. Bessie
returned to America three months later to a media storm, and although she would
venture back to France to hone her aviation skills even more, it was in America
that she’d focus her talents as an exhibition-flyer.
“Queen
Bess” was a big hit. Her events were well-attended and the press loved her. In
the air, Bessie took the same risks she took in life. She wowed the crowds with
seemingly impossible manoeuvres, breaking a leg and five ribs on one occasion.

I decided
blacks should not have to experience the difficulties I had faced, so I decided
to open a flying school and teach other black women to fly.
 

Bessie
was hired for engagement after engagement, and not just to fly: people wanted
to hear her speak. Although she had no training in public speaking, she saw the
microphone as an opportunity to give a voice to others. She used her public
platform to decry prejudice, and to encourage black men and women to rise up to
achieve their potential. She refused to speak at segregated events, and with speaking
engagements flooding in, she began to save her money to achieve her next dream:
to open an aviation school in America, where black men and women could learn to
fly side-by-side.

Tragically,
she didn’t live to see this dream realised. Bessie died on 30 April, 1926 in
the passenger seat of her new plane, a Curtiss JN-4, while scoping out the
terrain for a parachute jump the next day. She was just 34 years old.

Yet her
short but spectacular life inspired the world and shortly after her death The
Bessie Coleman Aero Club was founded to teach African-Americans how to fly. In
1977, a group of African-American women founded the Bessie Coleman Aviators
Club, a club devoted exclusively to teaching women aviation. Bessie’s
determination to champion women and people of colour in the aviation industry
has received global recognition. She leaves a considerable legacy.

© Picture by Keisha Okafor