Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
May 14, 1928 A total of 22 planes took to the skies on a Monday morning in Oklahoma City for the launch of a five-day air tour. This tour, which was sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce of Oklahoma, reflected the ever-growing popularity of aviation in the United States. The idea behind what the Associated... Continue Reading →
Henry Hope Wong was born to William Hope Wong (originally known as Wong Fook On), a Chinese immigrant, and Cheruo “Mabel” Hope Wong (also identified as Chun Yow) in 1900 in Portland, Oregon. Henry became one of the first people of Chinese descent in that region of the United States to pursue taking to the... Continue Reading →
April 14, 1960 Aviation pioneer Dr. William Whitney Christmas died at Bellevue Hospital in New York City at the age of 94. He was born on September 1, 1865, in the town of Warrenton, North Carolina. After earning his M.D. from George Washington University in 1905, Christmas practiced medicine for just a few years before devoting... Continue Reading →
March 28, 2001 Regular operations began for Athens International Airport (AIA) Eleftherios Venizelos in Greece. This airport serves the Greek administrative region of Attica, including the country’s capital city of Athens. AIA is specifically located in Spata, a municipal unit that is 12 miles (20 kilometers) east of downtown Athens. The airport was named in... Continue Reading →
March 20, 2004 In Indonesia, an airport in the city of Sorong in the province of West Papua was officially opened. This city was part of the region split off from West Papua in 2022 to form the province of Southwest Papua. Both of these provinces are located on the Bird’s Head Peninsula, which makes... Continue Reading →
Jeanine Menze made U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) history as that uniformed service’s first black female aviator. She was born in Kingston, Jamaica. She and her family eventually moved to Canada and then relocated to Florida. In 1997, Menze graduated from Miami Killian High School in the Sunshine State’s community of Kendall. Menze subsequently studied at... Continue Reading →
Aviation pioneer Phoebe Jane Fairgrave Omlie was born on November 21, 1902, in Des Moines, Iowa. When Omlie was 12 years old, she and her family moved to Saint Paul, Minnesota. Her lifelong interest in aviation started the day before she graduated from Mechanic Arts High School in Minnesota’s capital city in 1920. This was when... Continue Reading →
A trailblazing pilot, Mildred Hemmons Carter started out life in the community of Isabella (also known as Benson) in central Alabama. She was born there on September 14, 1921, to Mamie and Luther Hemmons. Mildred and her family eventually moved to the city of Tuskegee in the eastern part of the state. After living there... Continue Reading →
In 1976, Edwina Justus became the first black woman to work as a locomotive engineer for the Union Pacific Railroad (UP). Her life's journey began on July 11, 1943, when she was born in Omaha, Nebraska, to Lee and Caldonia Isaiah Chaney. In one of her earliest trailblazing roles, she was the first black student... Continue Reading →
November 26, 1931 Thanksgiving Day in 1931 proved to be memorable in New York City. The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade started at 1:30 that afternoon in Manhattan at 110th and Broadway. The large helium balloons being carried in that year’s parade included a turkey, a dragon, a two-headed Martian, the popular cartoon star Felix the... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 