First Black and Native American woman to hold an international pilot license. She received it in 1921 from the Swiss-based international aeronautical federation. Jim Crow America would never license a female minority pilot. Born into a family of Texas sharecroppers, she moved to Chicago, where Robert Sengstacke Abbott, publisher of the “Chicago Defender” advised her to go to flight school in France to obtain a license. She flew in American air shows under the stage name of Queen Bess until she died in a crash in 1926.
Sources:
“The Year 1926: Bessie Coleman is Killed.” Route Magazine (online).
Accessed 26 December 2021.
Kerri Lee Alexander. “Bessie Coleman (1892-1926).” Women’s History Website, Education Resources. National Women’s History Museum, Alexandria, VA.
Accessed 26 December 2021.
“Bessie Coleman.” Wikipedia (website). Accessed 26 December 2021.