MARILYN AND THE AEROPLANES
How much do we really know about Marilyn Monroe? Who was Norma Jeane Mortenson Baker? How many of us know that her modelling and acting career related to aeroplanes? Platinum blonde hair. Angelic features. A profile able to turn the heads of sportsmen, intellectuals...
GABRIELLA “GABY” ANGELINI
As was the case for many young women born into middle-class families at the beginning of 1900s, Gabriella ‘Gaby’ Angelini had a piano teacher and attended a ballet school in Milan.
But she would dream of aeroplanes twirling in the clouds rather than a ballerina...
HÉLÈNE DUTRIEU
Pioneering women. Skilled women. Fearless women. Strong women. Or, more simply, women. Hélène Dutrieu was all this and much more.
In this column dedicated to some of the most fascinating stories from the past, we often write about the lives of women who, although they...
RAYMONDE DE LAROCHE, OUR 8th OF MARCH
The 8th of March is a chance to do what we should do every day. It’s a chance to remember the social conquests, the political and economic struggles, and the process of empowerment of which women have been and still are protagonists.
To answer what...
JACQUELINE “JACKIE” COCHRAN
Many women throughout history have broken down barriers. Barriers made of bias and obstacles to freedom, barriers between dreams and possibilities.
The American aviatrix Jacqueline ‘Jackie’ Cochran is a woman who broke down all these barriers, plus another one besides: the sound barrier.
She got married...
THE HISTORY OF FLIGHT ATTENDANTS’ UNIFORMS
There are many reasons why flight attendants wear uniforms.
The first reason is a psychological one: there’s evidence that people have more confidence in uniformed professionals. Passengers rely on flight attendants and pilots on an aeroplane no less than they do doctors and nurses in...
THE MONTGOLFIER BROTHERS
Joseph Michele and Jacques Étienne Montgolfier were two French inventors who lived on the cusp of the 1700s and 1800s. Fathers of the hot air balloon (known as mongolfiera in Italian).
The hot air balloon, as rudimentary as it may seem to us now, was...
JAMES STEWART
“The whole world believed James Stewart. They have never caught him acting”. These words come from Peter Bogdanovich, director, screenwriter and film critic.
James Maitland Stewart was a big, great actor from the United States. Already an Oscar winner in 1941 as an actor in...
HARRIET QUIMBY
It is with great pleasure that we dedicate today’s article to Harriet Quimby, an aviation pioneer who did not receive anywhere near as much attention as she should have.
It is a shame that aviation history has not dedicated a place of honour to this...
ROSINA FERRARIO
We’d like to dedicate today’s article to all those women who’ve ever been told:
‘Forget about it, that’s boy stuff’
Rosina Ferrario was born in 1888 into a wealthy family in Milan.
Those were the years of the Industrial Revolution and the Italian National Exhibition, where...