The untold story of five women who fought to compete against men in the high-stakes national air races of the 1920s and 1930s—and won

Between the world wars, no sport was more popular, or more dangerous, than airplane racing. While male pilots were hailed as dashing heroes, the few women who dared to fly were more often ridiculed for what the press portrayed as silly efforts to horn in on a manly, and deadly, pursuit. Fly Girls recounts how a cadre of women banded together to break the entrenched prejudice that conspired to keep them out of the sky.
Keith O’Brien weaves together the stories of five remarkable women: Florence Klingensmith, a high school dropout from Fargo, North Dakota; Ruth Elder, an Alabama divorcee; Amelia Earhart, the most famous, but not necessarily the most skilled; Ruth Nichols, who chafed at her blue-blood family’s expectations; and Louise Thaden, the young mother of two who got her start selling coal in Wichita. Together, they fought for the chance to race against the men--and in 1936 one of them would triumph in the toughest race of all.