Lady Mary Heath visited the Davis-Monthan Airfield on May 30th 1929. She was flying an Avian, registry 603E. She did not indicate an origin or a destination (see notation in right column), but she was westbound (page link). The Newark Star-Eagle of April 27, 1929 (“Lady Heath Starts Country Air Tour”) reports her dawn departure from the Pine Brook Airport for a tour of the U.S. piloting, “a new Whittlesworth Avian powered with a Cirrus four-in-line air cooled engine.” Her first stop was planned for Dayton, OH, with “several short hops” to the west coast. Image, left, from New York Sun, August 29, 1929.

Her airplane was being delivered to R.W. Simpson, Clover Field, Los Angeles, a west coast dealer. It carried the latest features, including the Handley-Paige slotted wing to prevent spins. She was flying under contract to sell American Cirrus engines, and to find out how the engine would behave through use of any grade of fuel or oil. Her contract would be over when she returned east.

Stepping back, Lady Heath had recently come to the U.S. An article in Popular Aviation, March, 1929, announced her arrival and provided a short biography. You may download the article at the link (PDF 1.2Mb). The article appeared in a special column of Popular Aviation magazine dedicated to "Women's Activities." The author was Louise Thaden. Heath would take over the authorship of this column, and her reportage would appear in the magazine for some months. See the example, below, from December, 1929.

Also appearing in the same issue of Popular Aviation (PA) magazine was the full-page advertisement, below, for the General Airplanes Corporation, Buffalo, NY. Because of her reputation, the Heath testimonial letter of endorsement placed value on this ad.

Advertisement, General Airplanes Corp., Popular Aviation, March, 1929 (Source: PA)

Fresno Bee, August 29, 1929

Along the way on her trip, on May 2, 1929, The Star-Eagle reported (“Lady Heath In Crash”) a minor accident upon making a forced landing at Effingham, IL. The plane was damaged and repairs were made at Terre Haute, IN. She then continued her flight westward.

A brief mention of her progress was made in the Lubbock Sunday Avalanche (TX) of May 26, 1929. In an article that was really about the then ongoing endurance flight of Reg Robbins and James Kelly, it stated that she paused briefly to watch the fliers and send her good wishes, but then moved on, "Lady Mary Heath of England famous cross country flier, also sent greetings but was forced to fly on to keep up with her schedule on a trip to the Pacific Coast."

Her cross-country voyage was reported in this article from the British journal Flight of July 4, 1929 (p. 551), just about a month after she visited Tucson. There is a photograph in this article of Lady Heath standing next to large saguaro cactuses near Tucson. The article also mentions her meeting with Marvel Crosson, female flyer (signed the Clover Field Register) killed in the 1929 Powder Puff Derby. Her brother, Joe Crosson, is a Register pilot.

Lady Heath enjoyed a meteoric career in aviation. Setting records, transport flying and accidents, as well as politics and three marriages, punctuated her life between 1928 and 1932. She first made headlines by flying solo from Capetown to London between February 12 and May 28, 1928. See the article, right, near the bottom ("Flew Across Africa").

On February 28, 1928 The New York Times reported an enroute incident during that record-setting flight (“Lady Heath Faints While Piloting Plane”). She made a forced landing while flying from Pretoria to Bulawayo on her way to Cairo. She realized she was suffering “sunstroke” and, “…altered her course toward the grasslands, shut off the engine and remembered no more until she awoke in a native hut with the occupants giving her a drink.” Her plane had flown to an uneventful landing in the grass while she was unconscious!

On July 11, 1928 the New York Tribune (“Lady Heath Sets Light Seaplane Altitude Mark”) reported her climb to 13,000 feet over the Rochester Airdrome, London in an all-metal Mussel light seaplane with a Cirrus engine. She was carrying fellow pilot Kathleen O’Brien. They ascended at 12:25 PM and descended at 2:14 PM. The flight was held under the auspices of the International Aeronautical Federation. On July 27, 1928 she applied her piloting skills in a commercial job with Royal Dutch Airlines (New York Evening News: “Lady Heath Takes Job As Dutch Air Pilot”).

Thirteen-months later she crashed her airplane through a roof at Cleveland, OH (Fresno Bee link, left sidebar). At right, the article from the Fresno Bee of August 29, 1929 that describes that crash. She survived the accident caused, in part, by the fact that she had shut her engine off while practicing for a dead-stick landing contest at the 1929 National Air Races in Cleveland. Most conservative, modern pilots would not turn off a perfectly good-running engine. And they probably would not expose passengers to risk while doing this kind of practice.

This crash is also documented in an undated news article found in a scrapbook commemorating the 1929 National Air Races. The scrapbook is part of the Emile Choureé Photograph and Document Collection.

Below, a brief news film of an interview with Lady Mary wherein she describes the aftermath of her accident. The film is ca. 1931.

Lady Heath's accident has a relationship with the information about Martin Factory Field in northeast Cleveland. Please direct your browser to the link and scroll to the aerial photograph of the old Martin Field that is marked with red labels. It was at Martin that she crashed and was injured.

A site visitor states about the photograph of Martin Field and relates it to her accident as follows, "The long factory along [the] street, opposite side of the rail spur from the airmail hanger [this hangar and the factory are visible in the annotated photograph at the link] is ... still there.  The smoke stack near that factory still stands and is, I am quite sure, the smokestack that the famous Irish aviatrix Lady Heath snagged on landing a company Great Lakes 2T1 just before the 1929 National Air Races.  She crashed through the roof of the factory and came very close to death in the following few weeks."

About this same time, Heath authored a column, below, that appeared in Aeronautics magazine for December, 1929. The article mentions the completion of the 1929 National Air Races (the first NAR in which women were allowed to compete). She also cites several sister Register pilots, Ruth Elder, Louise Thaden, Amelia Earhart, Elinor Smith and Laura Ingalls.

One interesting thing she lists in her column is the count of female pilots in the U.S., sixty, at the time of her writing. I believe there were more, because the Ninety-Nines were formed during the winter of 1929-30 and the "99" notion was derived from the number of certificated female pilots who formed the core of charter members.

She also cites seven women employed in the aviation industry at the time. She was enthusiastic about the roles women could play in aviation, besides being pilots. She pointed out roles in sales, administration and equipment testing. All these have come to pass, which is testimony to her prescience.

Heath Column, Aeronautics Magazine, Aeronautics Magazine, December, 1929 (Source: Web)

Please direct your browser to some of the links in the left sidebar to review additional information about Lady Mary Heath. She was a hoot in any era. Below, a portrait of Lady Mary Heath from Aeronautics magazine, July, 1929.

Lady Mary Heath, Aeronautics Magazine, July, 1929 (Source: Web)

Ironically, Lady Heath suffered a fall down the stairs of a double-decker bus in London. She passed away from her injuries in 1939. Her fortunes dwindling, contemporary newspapers reported that nobody knew her when she was taken to the hospital.

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Dossier 2.4.21

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