Bessie Coleman

I took my dad to the Wright Brother's Museum in Kiity Hawk, North Carolina. I wouldn't have gone on my own. I'm not that interested. But Dad is, and I will be forever grateful to him for giving me the reason to go. Don't miss it if you are ever in the Outer Banks of North Carolina.

I was totally surprised by my reaction to the display of firsts and greats in aviation. The first parashooter. The first woman parashooter, the first this and that. I had such an emotional reaction. My eyes welled, my heart reacted. It was a simple display, but the pictures of amazing people who had had a passion and found a way to the passion was so moving.

And of course one of those was Bessie Coleman the first Black Woman Aviator, and one of the most famous of her day. Bessie Coleman was the 1o of a sharecroppers family of 13 children. Her father left them all when she was very young. Yet she managed to go to college for a semester before she ran out of money, get to Europe, learn to fly and support herself with her passion.

1. Bessie Coleman came from poverty, grew up in world of racism and sexism, yet insisted on 'following her bliss, her passion' and didn't take no for an answer.

2. Bessie Smith didn't forget others. After making a name as a pilot, or aviatirx as it was called then, she started a school to teach other black women to fly.

3. Bessie Smith was an entertainer and an astute business woman who loved life and lived it to the nth degree. In an age when both women and blacks were invisible she was known through out world. Her obituary made the front page headlines in major papers

Talk about leaving them begging for more, I really want to see more of this!

Many of them are for children and I can't think of a better role model for kids of any flavor.

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