Onstage, Miss Earhart displayed an unpretentious grace and an effortless command, with a deceptively casual, off-the-cuff manner (though she gave one basic speech with little improvisation) that made the audience members feel she was speaking directly to each of them.
But I knew that right now, in the dressing room backstage, she was sitting quietly, head lowered, hand over her eyes, in a zombielike state, having already thrown up, once or twice. I’d found out the hard way that she, like Garbo, wanted to be alone. She needed at least fifteen minutes to gear herself up for the ordeal of facing a crowd.
The house lights went down as the movie projector began its whir, and black-and-white images came up on the screen, the sonorous voice of Lowell Thomas, made tinny by tiny speakers, elucidating newsreel footage that began with the lonely unattended Boston takeoff of the Fokker seaplane Friendship, followed by a mob in Southampton, England, where Amelia got her first taste of fame; then ticker-tape parades, Amelia with Lindbergh, cheering onlookers at airfields where she’d set various speed and altitude records, Amelia with President Hoover, Amelia flying the ungainly goose that was an autogiro, takeoffs, landings, swarming crowds, Amelia with President Roosevelt and Eleanor...
Then the footage ended and the lights came up and there she was, no longer an image flickering on a screen, but a sweetly pretty young woman seated primly on stage, in the armchair near the Iowa state flag. Hands folded in her lap, like a schoolgirl, only the faintest smile acknowledging the immediate, ringing applause that filled the hall, she did not rise. Perhaps because she was seated, and her willowy height was not yet apparent, the impression she gave was of an improbably slight figure, for a woman of such accomplishment; in a gray chiffon frock of her own design, coral beads at the curve of her long, lovely neck, she was perfection, with only the studiously tangled mop of dark blond hair to hint at the daredevil within.
In bow tie and tweeds, the bunny-nosed Coliseum director was at the lectern, smiling prissily, as if all that applause had been for him. He informed the crowd of Miss Earhart’s graciousness and friendly manner, how she put on none of the airs the famous frequently brought with them; and he spoke, rather eloquently, of her bravery, and her devotion to the cause of equality for women.
Through all this, Amelia gave no sign that she was being spoken of, or stared at; neither proud nor embarrassed, she gave no clue that experiences like these were far more frightening to her than flying across an ocean.
“Gertrude Stein has called us a lost generation,” the Coliseum director said.
I didn’t know how to break it to him, but I didn’t think Gertrude Stein had Des Moines in mind.
“But,” he continued, “no generation that could produce our speaker could ever be considered ‘lost.’ She displays better than any other young woman of her generation the pioneer spirit and courageous skill of our Midwestern forefathers... and need I remind you that she is a Des Moines girl, come home to share her story with us tonight... Ladies and gentlemen, the Queen of the Air, Lady Lindy — Miss Amelia Earhart!”
She winced, just barely, at that “Lady Lindy” sobriquet, which followed her everywhere, and annoyed her no end. And as the most resounding applause of the night followed her introduction, she rose with easy grace, moving fluidly to the microphone, where she thanked the director and patted the air with one hand, gently, till the applause abated.
“It’s true,” she said, in that low, rich, yet very feminine voice, “that I saw my first airplane here in Iowa, at the State Fair. It was six years after the Wright Brothers made their historic flight at Kitty Hawk, and it was their celebrated plane on display, behind a fence... My father told me it was a flying machine. To me, it was a funny-looking crate of rusty wire and wood. I was much more interested in the merry-go-round at the time.”
Laughter rippled through the hall.
“In his generous introduction, Mr. Cornelison mentioned our courageous pioneer forefathers,” she said solemnly, “and I realized suddenly what a terrible mistake I’d made...”
The grave timbre of her voice quelled the laughter.
“...being born a woman,” she said, her voice now mischievously lilting, “and not a man.”
Laughter almost exploded from the women in the hall, their menfolk smiling nervously.
“When heavier-than-air craft were first invented,” she said, “women followed just a few years behind in flying them. Today women hold various records, and I’m lucky enough to hold a few of those myself... though one recent article in the French press concluded, ‘But can she bake a cake?’”
Gentle laughter, now.
“More important in my view than record-setting is the everyday flying done by five hundred cake-baking women in this country, on missions of business and pleasure. How many of you have flown? Show of hands.”
Around the hall, perhaps twenty men raised a hand, and only four women.
“Please keep in mind that the flights I have made were simply for the fun of it...”
This reference to her book was contributed by Putnam, I would bet.
“...and have really added nothing to the progress of aviation. The time will soon come when what Colonel Lindbergh and I and a few others have done will seem quaint. Safe, regularly scheduled transoceanic flights will take place in our lifetime.”
This exciting news caused a mild wave of whispering to break out.
“Could I have the lights dimmed, please?” she asked, and they were.
Then, using a pointer but never turning her back to the crowd (a nice piece of public-speaking savvy), she guided them through a lively, personalized slide show of her Atlantic crossings and other record-setting adventures. Throughout she maintained an unaffected, friendly tone, rarely getting overly technical, and even then projecting so much enthusiasm about her subject, her audience never grew bored.
When the lights came up, she shifted subjects, with the startling statement, “Sex has been used too long as an excuse by incompetent women who like to make themselves and others believe that it is not their incompetence holding them back, but their womanhood.”
The crowd didn’t know what to make of that one, and I could spot a few frowns, though they seemed to be thought-induced. And the men were shifting in their seats, fidgeting; the word “sex” spoken in public, when a husband was seated next to his wife, was apparently unsettling. In Des Moines, anyway.
“Don’t take me wrong,” she said, and flashed that gap-toothed, just-one-of-the-girls, just-one-of-the-boys smile, “I’m no feminist. I merely indulge in modern thinking.”
And she spoke of science having cut back on household drudgery, that a woman could run a home and have a career, that husbands could and should share household and child-raising duties.
This all sounded pretty good, but when I plugged Amelia Earhart and her husband George Palmer Putnam into the equation, something didn’t add up — I couldn’t quite picture either one of them doing a dish or pushing a sweeper, and I figured both were too self-centered to ever have a kid.
But it made for a good, mildly controversial speech, which received a standing ovation, the Coliseum director returning to the microphone to let the crowd know that, shortly, Miss Earhart would be signing copies of her book in the lobby. Soon I was making change and dispensing full-price copies of a three-year-old volume that was available in a cheaper edition, but not here.
Amelia signed three hundred and some copies of her book, and spent time with every customer, shaking hands, laughing, listening, each treated as an individual, and if she felt any condescension for any of her public, her eyes did not betray it; she did the same with those who bought no book, merely came through the line with a program to sign.