Helen Richey

Helen Richey (1909 – January 7, 1947) was a pioneering female aviator and the first woman to be hired as a pilot by a commercial airline in the United States.

Helen Richey, 1929.

"Outdoor Girl" after the record flight

A Curtiss Robin flown by Dale Jackson and Forest O'Brine being refueled during another flight endurance record in 1929.

Richey was born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania. She graduated from McKeesport High School in 1927.[1] Her father, Joseph B. Richey, was superintendent of schools in McKeesport from 1902 to 1935. During her teens, Richey was one of the few girls in McKeesport who wore pants. She learned how to fly a plane at age 20. Her father bought her a Bird plane when she obtained her pilot's license.[2]

In December 1933 Richey partnered with another female pilot, Frances Marsalis, to set an endurance record by staying airborne for nearly 10 days over Miami, Florida, with midair refueling. Their aircraft was a Curtiss Thrush, named "Outdoor Girl" after its sponsor, a cosmetics brand.[3][lower-alpha 1] Marsalis had previously set an endurance record the previous year with Louise Thaden in another Thrush.[2][3] The refuelling was achieved by opening the central hatch, grabbing a dangling hose out of a Curtiss Robin and shoving it into the gas tank, which Richey likened to "wrestling with a cobra in a hurricane".[3]^:16 Marsalis was killed during the 1934 Women's Air Meet in Dayton.[2]

In 1934 Richey won the premier air race at the first National Air Meet for women in Dayton, Ohio. Also in 1934, Central Airlines, a Greensburg, Pennsylvania–based carrier that eventually became part of United Airlines, hired Richey as a pilot; she made her first regular civil flight with them on December 31, taking a Ford Trimotor on the Washington to Detroit route.[6] She eventually was forced to step down from the cockpit by the all-male pilots union.

In May 1936, Helen Richey, flying a light plane,[7] set an international altitude record for aircraft weighing under 200 kilograms (440 lb).[8] She reached 18,448 feet (5,623 m)[8] during a flight from Congressional Airport to Endless Caverns Airport in New Market, Virginia.[9] Richey flew the same plane that Benjamin King had flown to break the record previously.[9]

After leaving Central Airlines, Richey continued to perform at air shows. In 1936 she teamed with Amelia Earhart in a transcontinental air race, the Bendix Trophy Race. Richey and Earhart came in fifth, beating some all-male teams. Later, Richey flew with the British Air Transportation Auxiliary during World War II.

In addition to being the first female commercial airline pilot, Richey also was the first woman sworn in to pilot air mail and one of the first female flight instructors.

Richey died in her apartment in New York City on January 7, 1947, apparently from a pill overdose. Her death was ruled a suicide.