This young reader edition is adapted by the author, Keith O’Brien, from his adult book of the same title. In Fly Girls, O’Brien tells the widely unknown story of American female aviators in the 1920’s and 30′. Amelia Earhart’s amazing accomplishments and the mystery of her disappearance appears prominently in history books but how many know Ruth Nichols, Louise Thaden, Ruth Elder, and Florence Klingensmith? These young female aviators were held back by deep gender inequities during golden age of flying, and as O’Brien explains of their forgotten histories, “each of the women went missing in her own way.” 

The stories of these five “fly girls” show how they came from very different backgrounds and experiences. Nichols was a New York debutante, Thaden sold coal in Wichita, Elder was hiding her divorce, Klingensmith was working on airplane engines, and Earhart was in Boston making life changing decisions.

Airplane racing was a very hot sport between WWI and WWII but was completely dominated by men. The five “fly girls” struggled to find opportunities to fly, begged sponsors, borrowed planes, took risks such as daredevil stunts on the wings of planes. O’Brien tells all of these stories, including numerous fiery crashes and the tragedies that occured in the cockpit and also on the ground.

Fly Girls is in the vein of Hidden Figures and The Girls of Atomic City, telling the story of how a group of women banded together to break the glass ceilings, struggling against entrenched prejudice, to fight for the right to do the job which had been seen as exclusively for men.

This Young Reader edition includes a glossary, source notes by chapter, an index, and primary source black and white photos.