Note her initials under the eagle on her cap.
April
30, 1926: Bessie Coleman crashes in Jacksonville, Florida. "Queen
Bess," the 1st black woman, and the 1st person identifying
as Native American, to receive a pilot's license, was 34 years old.
Elizabeth Coleman was born on January 26, 1892 in Atlanta, not the big city in Georgia but the small town in the northeastern corner of Texas. Her mother was African-American, and her father claimed to be a Native American of the Cherokee tribe. They moved to Waxahachie, Texas, where they were sharecroppers, before the father left when she was 9. She did well in school, and briefly attended what's now known as Langston University, in Oklahoma, before her money ran out, and she had to go back home.
She moved in with some of her brothers in Chicago, and heard stories of pilots who'd come home from World War I. No American flight school would admit a woman, or a black person, so she took a French class at Berlitz in Chicago, went to France, and learned how to fly there. In 1921, the Fédération aéronautique internationale made her the 1st black woman and the 1st Native American person they honored with a pilot's license, allowing her to fly anywhere in the world -- even in the segregated United States. Upon returning to America, she was a media sensation.
Since commercial air travel wasn't yet a thing, there was no war to serve in, and the postal service wasn't going to hire a black female "airmail" pilot, the only way she could make money as a pilot was in stunts -- "barnstorming." She went back to Europe, and learned the necessary tricks from none other than Anthony Fokker, designer of fighter planes in the recent war, including the red triplane flowing by Manfred von Richtofen, the Red Baron.
On September 3, 1922, at Roosevelt Field in Garden City, Long Island, New York (where the Roosevelt Field mall would later be built), she made her 1st appearance at an American air show. The event honored the all-black 369th Infantry Regiment, "the Harlem Hellfighters." Six weeks later, back in Chicago, she performed at a show honoring the 370th Infantry Regiment, "the Black Devils." At both, she was billed as "the world's greatest woman flyer," with mention made of her gender, but not of her race.
She crashed in an airshow in Los Angeles on February 4, 1923, breaking ribs and a leg, but was flying again a few months later. She refused to perform at shows that did not admit black people. She continued to advocate for women and black people in aviation.
She was legally married to a man named Claude Glenn on January 30, 1917, but she rarely acknowledged the marriage, and it is often considered a private matter that ended almost immediately. She never lived with him, sometimes stating she was never married. With this apparent exception, she is not known to have had any romances, and never had a child.
In 1926, she bought a Curtiss JN-4, or "Jenny," in Dallas, for a show she wanted to do in Jacksonville, Florida. Her mechanic and publicity agent, 24-year-old William D. Wills, flew the plane in, and had to make 3 landings along the way, because of poor maintenance by the previous owner. Her friends and family told her to back out of the show, or at least use a different plane, for safety reasons. She wouldn't.
On April 30, she and Wills took off for a test flight. On takeoff, Wills was flying the plane, with Coleman in the other seat. She was planning a parachute jump for the next day, and was unharnessed, as she needed to look over the side to examine the terrain.
About 10 minutes into the flight, the plane unexpectedly went into a dive and then a spin, at 3,000 feet above the ground. Coleman was thrown from the plane at 2,000 feet, and was killed instantly when she hit the ground. Wills was unable to regain control of the plane, and he died as soon as it hit the ground.
With the successes over the next few years of white men Richard Byrd, Charles Lindbergh and Wiley Post, and white woman Amelia Earhart, Bessie Coleman was forgotten outside Black America for many years. The Civil Rights Movement reignited interest in her. In 1995, the U.S. Postal Service honored her with a stamp.
On May 5, 1917, Eugene Bullard, a native of Columbus, Georgia who had enlisted in France's Foreign Legion, became the 1st black person to receive a pilot's license. He shot down 2 German aircraft, and the French nicknamed him "the Black Swallow of Death." He lived until 1961.
*
April 30, 1926 was a Friday. These baseball games were played:
* The New York Yankees beat the Washington Senators, 7-2 at Yankee Stadium. Urban Shocker outpitched Stan Coveleski. Babe Ruth went 2-for-4 with a home run and 2 RBIs. Lou Gehrig went 2-for-5 with an RBI.
* The New York Giants lost to the Boston Braves, 5-4 at Braves Field in Boston. Bernie Neis hit a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the 10th inning, to score Jimmy Welsh with the winning run. Frankie Frisch did not play.
* The Brooklyn Robins (as the Dodgers were known under Wilbert Robinson's managing from 1914 to 1931) beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 8-4 at Ebbets Field. Zack Wheat and the unfortunately-named Dick Cox hit home runs for Brooklyn.
* The Philadelphia Athletics beat the Boston Red Sox, 5-2 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia.
* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Cincinnati Reds, 13-4 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Glenn Wright went 3-for-4 with 2 home runs and 4 RBIs. Hazen "Kiki" Cuyler went 3-for-5 with 2 RBIs. Harold "Pie" Traynor went 1-for-4 with an RBI. Paul "Big Poison" Waner had made his major league debut 17 days earlier, but did not play in this game. His brother, Lloyd "Little Poison" Waner (not quite as good a hitter but actually an inch taller) arrived the next season.
* The Chicago White Sox beat the Cleveland Indians, 3-2 at League Park in Cleveland. Eddie Collins went 2-for-5 with an RBI for the ChiSox. Indians player-manager Tris Speaker went 1-for-3 with a walk.
* The Chicago Cubs beat their arch-rivals, the St. Louis Cardinals, 11-8 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Back-to-back doubles by Percy Jones and Lewis "Hack" Wilson in the bottom of the 11th inning won the game for the Cubs, making Jones the winning pitcher. Charles "Gabby" Hartnett went 2-for-4 with 3 RBIs. Rogers Hornsby went 0-for-4 with 2 walks.
* And the Detroit Tigers beat the St. Louis Browns, 7-6 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. Tigers player-manager Ty Cobb went 0-for-2, but drew 2 walks. George Sisler and Ken Williams homered for the Browns.
