"The Joy of Accomplishment"

"The joy of achievement has no gender. 

It doesn't not mean beating anyone at anyone else's game. 

It simply means doing the best you can with what you have, whoever you are;

it's being true to oneself."

Amelia Earhart

Ruth Law getting some well deserved
recognition after her record breaking flight. 

When Earhart made these remarks perhaps she was thinking of Ruth Law, whose non-stop Chicago to New York flight in 1915 made her the first woman to fly at night. Numbed by freezing temperatures, piloting a rickety 100-horsepower Curtiss Pusher biplane perched on something resembling a lawn chair fastened to the root of the wing, she also broke two other records that day - American non-stop cross-country flight for men and for women and longest non-stop cross-country flight for women anywhere in the world. 

At a prestigious Hotel Astor dinner in her honor, attended by President Wilson and the 
First Lady, one speaker noted that a man could merit a dinner easily enough as a "Mason or a naughty Elk", but "for a woman to sit in glory at the Hotel Astor she must do something superhuman."

Superhuman indeed.

She dared to fly faster and higher than anyone before her, in dark, cold and nasty skies. Not only that, she pioneered in an era unaccustomed to women voting much less flaunting bold loops and spectacular stunts in the middle of the night - did I mention Law was an aerobatic pilot as well!
Doing all this made Ruth Law an instant celebrity but by her own account she did not do it for the fame or the fortune and with "no expectations of rewards", but for "the pure joy of accomplishment" 

In 1935 aviator Jean Batten, a New Zealand stunner said it so well after her flight in a closed-cockpit Percival Gull monoplane on a non-stop flight across the dark stretches of the Atlantic from Africa to South America - "I experienced once again the greatest and most lasting of joys: the joy of achievement."

Jean Batten -Always the lady!
Even while working on an airplane engine

Fame and fortune can be short lived but the feeling of having done something meaningful is everlasting. Accomplishments, no matter how big or small, count for something wonderful. 

Perhaps that's what motivates all of us.

My Place In Space

I have to say the question I am always asked is how I got into flying in the first place. My
automatic response had been, "My father flew and so did my brother - being a tomboy it seemed to be the path to follow." But  I've come to realize it was more than that. 
My father, with the rugged good looks of a modern day George Clooney, embodied the glory of aviation and while he certainly inspired my love of flying, my own desire to become a pilot came from somewhere deep inside. It was pure and spontaneous.

Captain "Gus" Tiburzi

Try to be me for a moment and imagine the beauty of flying at an altitude of 30,000 feet with a stunning 270 degree view of three brewing thunderstorms while you are at the controls of a 400,000 pound beast of a machine, nimbly darting through layers of tumultuous atmosphere. While the instrument panels blink urgently with complex technical readings and meteorological data, you delicately steer the airplane around rumbling patches of flashing gray and purple clouds to the east, in full view of a crystal blue sky to the west all a flame with the orange glow of the setting sun. On all sides, in perfect harmony, the sky explodes with magnificent colors and electricity.  The mass of the plane and the force of the wind are both awesome. You and your airplane engage in a daunting dance with the heavens themselves, while back in the cabin, two hundred passengers, to borrow from T.S. Elliot, "talk of Michelangelo."

Years of training, exhausting concentration, huge responsibility - and what a view!

At the end of the day what you remember is the sheer thrill of soaring through the skies and the quieter joy of accomplishment. Your two co-pilots and you have just crossed an ocean together in a tightly orchestrated, silent camaraderie. 

Who wouldn't want to be part of that world?

It is hard to believe that more than forty years earlier, I admired the same sky from 30,000 feet below while lying on my back in our back yard as a child. My heart followed each plane across the expanse of the sky. Where were they going? How did it work? I was fascinated by the sight and sound of the majestic aircraft as they approached the little landing strip. Ponderously heavy on those tiny tricycle wheels, yet so light and elegant in the sky. 

PBY-5 Catalina 

When my Dad took me up for my first flying lesson he was tanned and unshaven just back from a long three months of flying a tadpole look-a-like twin-engine PBY-5 Catalina airplane for the Air Transport Command in the Amazon Jungle.  We were at Danbury Airport, a small two runway airfield nestled between rolling hills in northwestern Connecticut not far from our home.  I was only eleven years old when I felt the sky wrap around our small two-seater Cessna. It seemed as though the sky was holding us up, like the night holds the stars. 

From that day flying had become a part of who I was. 

EVERYTHING I NEEDED TO KNOW I LEARNED FROM FLYING

EVERYTHING I NEEDED TO KNOW I LEARNED FROM FLYING

"Just watch all you men. I'll show you what a woman can do. I'll go across
 the country, I'll race to the Moon.  I'll never look back."
Helicopter pilot Edna Gardner Whyte - 1931

 

Amelia Earhart

Photo credit - Women Aloft, Time-Life Books

 

When I reflect on the female aviators who came before me the images aren't always the glamorous ones that most non-aviators conjure up.  Take Amelia Earhart - her happily-ever-after character is misleading at best and at worst, actually false. On the surface she was a stunning young woman who married a wealthy man who was able and willing to finance her passion for flight. She flew where she wanted to go, when she wanted to. She did not have to earn a living. Her publicist husband made sure that she had at least as much recognition as she deserved. Like Shirley Temple, she was America's sweetheart.

 

This fairy tale life doesn't really represent the history of women in aviation and that unique profile is not the true story - even for Amelia. Women in aviation prior to 1973 were denied, rebuffed and for the most part, unrecognized. They were relegated to flying jobs that men considered to be too dangerous or too poorly paid.  Many were forced to quit flying and move on to fields where they could at least make a living. Many died

while flying those flights men considered too dangerous.  Most died when there was no basis to believe that women would ever be treated equally in aviation. The history of female aviators is filled with unrecognized bravery, overwhelming prejudice and heartbreaking tragedy.

WOW! I've really painted a pretty grim picture but there is a happy outcome - promise. 

The legacy of women flyer's who actually broke into the world of aviation was truly amazing.

They were pioneer airwomen who worked at every type of flying - barnstorming, stunt flying, cross-country

racing, setting endurance and altitude records, flight instruction - everything except airline flying.  Those big paying jobs were reserved for the men.

 

Daredevils, risk-takers all, the names of the women who made it are now mostly forgotten.  It is a rich inspiring history of spirited individuals full of curiosity, passion. inner strength, the joy of accomplishment and a  sense of the sheer beauty of flight.  But today, when people think of female pilots, the only names that seem to come to mind are Amelia Earhart and Goldfinger's Pussy Galore.

 

For me the pioneering "aviatrix" embodied life itself. Their dreams were played out in real time. Their passions led them to face each new challenge with guts and gusto.  They lived the here-and-now, not waiting for someday knowing that illusive day might not ever come. They were exceptional women with full, complex and exceptional lives. They embodied characteristics that I realized I need to juggle a complex, successful and full life as a woman. The resourcefulness and courage they harnessed to master the skies was as much a part of their indomitable character as the flying itself.

These women didn't just break sound barriers; they blazed a trail for those of us who followed both in aviation and in life. They didn't set out to show any of us that you could "have it all". They simply wanted to do something that had never been done, so they had to buck systems, rules and all sorts of other obstacles to attain it. And by doing so they left a legacy of lessons that can guide and inspire men and women today.

They made flying a metaphor for life because it was full of risks and the unknown.  It was exhilarating and uncharted territory, a place where unexpected beauty was as often part of the scenery as was unexpected danger. Today flying is predictable yet unpredictable, beautiful and - in rare moments - cruel.
I became an airline pilot in March of 1973 and today, I also have two grown children, a husband and a home. Having all this, negotiating in a man's world, fighting to the top, where the few women there were all vying for the same places, took skill, humor, determination, optimism and passion.

And there you have it -  how I learned everything I needed to know about having a full life from flying and in my next few blogs I'd like to share some of the fascinating stories about these pioneer aviators with you.

Perhaps you too will learn something new about navigating your own life.



 

 



                                            CHILDLIKE CURIOSITY THAT LASTS

My daughter was only five years old when she joined me on one of my scheduled trips.
The 2 1/2 hour flight to the island of Bermuda, a jeweled oasis in the unforgiving waters of the Atlantic Ocean, was flawless -  sun gleaming and smooth air. The passengers sat in armchair comfort, munching and snoozing, having no thoughts of the goings-on beyond the cabin. Britt however, her little button nose pressed up against the porthole window was captivated by her fluffy companions, puffs of clouds floating in harmony around the Boeing 757 like rows of apple trees flush with spring blossoms. Their fanciful forms fascinated her.

Fifteen years later, and still fascinated with skyscapes, Britt took this photo while returning
home from her college graduation trip to the Far East with friends. She accompanied the photo with this wonderful quote from Alain de Botton's book The Art of Travel.

"The planes engines show none of the effort required to take us to this place. They hang there in the inconceivable cold, patiently and invisibly powering the craft, their sole request, painted on their inner flanks in red letters, being that we do not walk on them and that we feed them "oil only: D50TFI-S4", a message for a forthcoming set of men in overalls, 4000 miles away and still asleep.

There is not much talk about the clouds that are visible up here. No one seems to think it remarkable that somewhere above an ocean we are flying past a vast white candy-floss island that would have made a perfect seat for an angel or even God himself in a painting
by Piero della Francesca. In the cabin, no one stands up to announce with requisite emphasis that if we look out the window, we will see that we are flying over a cloud, a matter
that would have detained Leonardo and Poussin, Claude and Constable.

When scrutinised, our airborne companions outside the window do not look as we might expect them to. In paintings and from the ground, they appear to be horizontal ovoids, but up here they resemble giant obelisks made of piles of unsteady shaving foam.
Their kinship with steam becomes clearer: they seem more volatile, perhaps the product of something that has just exploded and is still mutating. It remains perplexing that it should be impossible to sit on one."

           This photo and quote sits beside my computer where I work most days.

Not only do I love my gift and the thought that my daughter was thinking of me while crossing the globe at 30,000 feet with her friends but it also inspires me each time I

look at it to keep finding the childlike curiosity in myself - even at my age!

 

Ready for Takeoff!

Hi I'm Bonnie Tiburzi Caputo and I've decided to write a blog . How fun will this be.  I am a retired Captain from a major commercial airline and if you are over the age of 50 you have probably flown
with me. I hope you'll join me while I explore the bloggersphere and will find my blog inspirational, fun and a great ride. So buckle up!