The first U.S. woman to qualify as an aviator
August 2011 will be the 100th Anniversary of the first U.S. woman to qualify as an aviator. Ms. Harriet Quimby was her name, and she was a photojournalist from San Francisco, California. After being assigned by a weekly journal to cover the Belmont Park (New York) International Aviation Tournament for a feature story, like many of us today, Harriet immediately became smitten by aviation, and soon started taking flying lessons.