Beatrice Gormley - Amelia Earhart: Young Aviator

Dear Reader:

The Childhood of Famous Americans series, seventy years old in 2002, chronicles the early years of famous American men and women in an accessible manner. Each book is faithful in spirit to the values and experiences that influenced the persons development. History is fleshed out with fictionalized details, and conversations have been added to make the stories come alive to todays reader, but every reasonable effort has been made to make the stories consistent with the events, ethics, and character of their subjects.

These books reaffirm the importance of our American heritage. We hope you learn to love the heroes and heroines who helped shape this great country. And by doing so, we hope you also develop a lasting love for the nation that gave them the opportunity to make their dreams come true. It will do the same for you.

Happy Reading!

The Editors

Amelia Earhart
Young Aviator

Illustrated by Meryl Henderson

Dedicated to Shannon Gormley

Illustrations

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Amelia Earhart
Young Aviator

One morning in the late spring of 1904, a girl with long blond braids leaned out the window of a train in the Kansas City railroad station.

All aboard! shouted the conductor from the platform. The last passengers hurried to climb into the cars. Porters in uniforms boosted the last trunks into the baggage car.

Were already aboard, called seven-year-old Millie Earhart. The yellow bows on the ends of her braids brushed the side of the railroad car. Were going to the Worlds Fair in St. Louis!

Millie often rode the train from Kansas City, where the Earharts lived, to Grandmas house in Atchison. But that was just a short trip of an hour and a half. Todays trip was special.

The train ride to St. Louis would take all day, and they would stay there for a week. On their trips from Kansas City to Atchison, the Earharts always sat on hard wooden seats. But the seats in their Pullman car on this train were as soft and comfortable as the armchairs in the library at Grandmas house.

Millie (Amelia) sat next to her father, Edwin Earhart. In the two facing seats sat her mother, Amy Earhart, a pretty, slender woman, and Millies younger sister, Pidge (Muriel). Like Millie, Pidge had big bowsgreen oneson her braids. The girls both wore ruffled dresses of dotted swiss, long black stockings, and high-button shoes.

Unpinning her hat with the wide upturned brim, Mrs. Earhart handed it to her husband. Thank you, Edwin. Her delicate-featured face was beaming.

Smiling back with a little bow, Mr. Earhart put her hat and his own jaunty straw boater in the overhead rack. His wife pulled off her gloves, patted her upswept shiny brown hair, and settled the long skirts of her traveling dress.

Meet me in St. Louie, Amy, Mr. Earhart sang to his wife. He was handsome, his dark straight hair slicked down with pomade. He wore a light summer suit and a silver watch chain across his vest.

Dad, said Pidge seriously, Amy doesnt rhyme with Louie. Silly four-and-a-half-year-old Pidge! Millie grinned at her father, and he winked back. Dad knew that Millie knew he was having fun with a popular song, Meet Me in St. Louis, Louis.

Just for a moment, Millie wondered why Grandma didnt think this trip was a good idea. The day before yesterday, Mother had arrived in Atchison to pick up Millie for the summer. She had told Grandma and Grandpa about the coming trip to St. Louis. Millie remembered Grandpa saying to Mother, I suppose Edwin has bought tickets for a Pullman car. Grandma had put in, with a disapproving sniff, As if this jaunt to the fair werent extravagance enough!

Mother had flushed and answered them, The trip will take all day. Edwin wants us to be comfortable. Then the grown-ups noticed Millie, and they had stopped talking.

Now the train pulled out of the cavernous Kansas City station and into the bright light of the May morning. The two girls knelt on their seats to look out the window. As the wheels clicked faster and faster, the train slid past the drab narrow houses where poor people lived. Their backyards were barely big enough for a clothesline, where their long underwear hung out for everyone to see.

For a split secondbut it seemed longerMillie stared into the solemn face of a girl her age, sitting on the rickety steps of one of the houses. Then she turned away to see her mother watching her. Mother, said Millie, I wish everyone could go to the Worlds Fair.

So do I, dear, said Mrs. Earhart.

The train left the city behind, and now farmland spread out as far as they could see. Rows of corn, already tall, flicked past like the riffled pages of a book. Look, Pidge, said Millie, look at the telegraph poles by the tracks, how fast theyre going by. Her little sister obediently blinked at the line of poles flashing past the train window. Now look at that barn and silo across the field, how slow theyre going. See? You can make the train seem to go fast or slow, just by looking here or there.

The train would pull them all the way across the state of Missouri. Mother had showed Millie and Pidge on a map. When we cross the Missouri River here, Mother had said, tapping the squiggly line with a shapely fingernail, well be halfway to St. Louis. When we cross it again, well be almost there.

Soon the girls were tired of looking out the window, and Millie got Dad to tell one of his made-up stories about the Wild West. Just then another shot rang out. Mr. Earhart clutched his chest, slumping in his seat. Theyve got me, Mac, I groaned.

Then Mother read aloud from Black Beauty, a story about a horse. They had gotten to the part in which a drunken man whipped Black Beauty to make him gallop, although the horseshoe had fallen off one hoof. As the girls listened, tears welled up in Pidges eyes. But Millies eyes flashed. I would make that man stop whipping his horse, she said.

Ill bet you would, too, said Dad, giving her shoulders a squeeze.

The train clickety-clacked across the Missouri River on high trestles, and it was time for lunch in the dining car. This was as fancy as dinners at Grandmas, with a white linen tablecloth, flowers in a vase, and silver forks and knives. The Earharts ate chicken fricassee, new peas, and lemon layer cake.

Back in the Pullman car after lunch, Pidge fell asleep with her head in Mothers lap. Millie and Dad and Mother played quiet games of old maid.

Later, Dad read to them from a newspaper about the Worlds Fair. The first day, there would be a grand procession. There would be elephant rides and a Ferris wheel. There would be people from the other side of the world: from Africa, Japan, the Philippine Islands. There would be exhibits of amazing inventions: a railroad car with