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A Born Aviator

Florence Lowe Barnes was born to a socially prominent family in San Marino, Calif., the wealthy town adjacent to Pasadena. Her grandfather, Thaddeus Lowe, had started the balloon corps for the Union Army during the Civil War and encouraged his granddaughter to dream of flying.

All images © Pancho Barnes Trust Estate Archive and reprinted with permission.

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Free Spirit

An outsize character from her earliest childhood, Barnes found her release in flying. “It’s my escape from everything conventional,” she said.

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From Florence to Pancho

Pancho got her nickname after she ran away to Mexico, disguising herself as a man and signing onto a banana boat that turned out to be running guns. After she jumped ship, she spent four months traveling throughout Mexico during its revolution. She learned to fly after she returned to California.

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Pilot's License

Pancho Barnes’ pilot’s license photo was taken by her friend George Hurrell, the famous Hollywood studio photographer. Having heard that Orville Wright, who had to sign the license, didn’t approve of female pilots, Pancho dressed as a man, complete with dirty fingernails.

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Officially a Pilot

Pancho exults following her first solo flight, which she took in 1928, after only six hours of training. She then barnstormed as the “Pancho Barnes Flying Mystery Circus of the Air.”

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The First Women's Air Race

Participants pose at the 1929 Women’s Air Derby, which Will Rogers nicknamed the “Powder Puff Derby.” The transcontinental race from Santa Monica to Cleveland garnered enormous press coverage. Marred by crashes, mechanical difficulties, accidental side trips to Mexico, and fatalities, the race was won by Louise Thaden.

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Charisma and Glamour

Pancho Barnes with Amelia Earhart at the first transcontinental Women’s Air Derby in 1929. The two aviators were friends, although Barnes did not like Earhart’s promoter husband, G.P. Putnam. She complained that he belittled his wife and pushed her to do stunts beyond her skills.

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Stunt Pilots

Early Hollywood stunt pilots, including Pancho Barnes (center). She did stunts in a half dozen films, and for Howard Hughes’s Hell’s Angels, she provided sound effects by repeatedly buzzing a balloon equipped with a microphone.

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Hollywood Connection

Pancho Barnes with her cousin Dean Banks, also a pilot, and her close friend Ramon Navarro, the silent film star and, thanks to Pancho, George Hurrell’s first Hollywood client.

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The Fastest Woman in the World

Pancho poses with her Travel Air “Mystery Ship.” In 1930, she set a speed record of 196.19 mph, displacing Amelia Earhart as the fastest woman pilot. After losing her money in the Depression, Pancho had to sell her plane in 1934 and give up flying. When the plane came up for auction in 1968, no one bid against Pancho so she could buy it back.

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The Happy Bottom Riding Club

Pancho tends bar at the Happy Bottom Riding Club. Her Mojave Desert guest ranch was a popular hangout for test pilots from Edwards Air Force Base.

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Happy Hostesses

Pancho surrounded by “her girls,” the Happy Bottom Riding Club hostesses, who were a major attraction for local aviators.

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Good Times

Pancho and guests at the Happy Bottom Riding Club sing along with the Happy Bottom Riding Club’s battered piano. Chuck Yeager is to her left, with his hand draped over the piano.

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The Marrying Kind

Pancho married four times. Her first marriage, to a socially prominent Episcopal minister, was essentially an arranged marriage. The next three were to significantly younger men, including former military pilot Mac McKendry.

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Friends in High Places

Pancho’s aviation connections included high-ranking brass. Here, she is with Jimmy Doolittle (left) and Hap Arnold. She and her fourth husband, Mac McKendry, often socialized with Doolittle and his wife.

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A Fighter

When the federal government sought to seize her ranch to expand Edwards Air Force Base, Pancho fought a long, bitter court battle, charging that the price she was offered under eminent domain was about a tenth of the ranch’s value. During the fight, the ranch burned down under suspicious circumstances.

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Pancho in Profile

Though never a glamorous figure, the young Pancho Barnes was one of the most memorable characters in early aviation. Her charisma and first-hand understanding of the excitement and perils of experimental flight later made her beloved among jet-age test pilots. Despite many reversals over her long life, she managed to reinvent herself.