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[[newspaper clipping]] [[image - photograph of woman in flying attire]] she practices medicine and devotes her life to the education of her daughters, a high school miss. Few of her neighbors know her romantic background. Her city knows her well as a physician and clubwoman. But as a flier, no. Yet out at the airport she is an honorary member of the clan and often takes joy rides with the pilots. There was no mystery to her disappearance in the eyes of Doctor Raiche. Broken in health, she came West. Health regained, she attended a university, secured her doctor's degree and began her practice. She had achieved flight and sought new fields to conquer. Valuable relics of early flying days are preserved by Doctor Raiche. But most valuable are her memories of those who strove to emulate the eagle. Mineola was the hotbed of activity. Almost daily, radical new types of planes were introduced, wrecked and rebuilt. Doctor Raiche tells of one inventor who built his crate in a barn. He had to take it apart to get it out. She recalls others who spent months and their every dollar on absurdities that would only spin in circles on the ground. In the epitome of the Aeronautic Society for the year of 1909 is shown a triplane, "winner of first prize money for design and workmanship, independent of performance." Many of the ships of the period were pretty, but impractical. [[image - photograph of woman with biplane]] The success of the first plane built by the Raiches inspired the building of a second and a third. The latter two were sold. Mr. Raiche organized the French-American Aeroplane Company and went into the business. Mrs. Raiche designed, made patterns for the castings and superintended the building of her own private plane. It was a full sized, Curtiss biplane type equipped with a forty-horsepower, four-cylinder reconditioned marine motor. Its speed was thirty-five miles per hour. The mishap that caused Mrs. Raiche to adopt breeches for a flying costume inspired a New York Globe writer to declare, "Unterrified by her accident several days ago and unhampered by skirts, Mrs. Bessica Raiche, the first woman who ever attempted to go up in an aeroplane within the United States, made a successful flight today. Some of those who saw her fall several days ago feared that the experience might unnerve her. But it was proved this morning that she was made of different stuff. She took her aeroplane out and made several flights. The longest was about 500 yards during which she rose from fifteen to twenty feet above the ground." Ever keen to keep up with the latest achievement of women in aviation, Doctor Raiche looks back upon early flights with an appreciation of the spirit of the pioneers that is almost reverence. "Our ambition was to construct a plane that was extremely light," she says. "We believed that the lighter the craft the better it would fly. Of course, we did not dream that greater power was the secret of swift flight. We spent hours drilling out crankshafts to save a few ounces of weight. My husband was the first to use piano wire instead of iron stove wire then in vogue for bracing struts. Bamboo, because of its lightness, was our favorite construction material. "We imported China silk for wing coverings and sized it with ordinary shellac. Carrying passengers was undreamed of. I made an ideal prospective pilot because I weighted only one hundred pounds. "The motor for my own plane was constructed from an engine taken from a motorboat. Every possible idea for cutting down its weight was utilized. "We had no throttles to control engine speeds. Once the motor was started, it ran at top speed until the gasoline and ignition were cut off. Four or five men held the plane until the engine revolved at top speed and let let go. In one crash I suffered, the newspapers played up the fact that the motor still continued to spin amid the wreckage and I picked myself up from the ground, walked over and cooly turned it off. I had to. I needed that motor badly for my next plane. "In starting aglide down you shut off the motor in the air. There was no starting it again. You came down, and if the glide was too steep, there was no climbing out of it. "Ailerons for lateral balancing while in flight were unheard of. However, we devised 'flaps' [[/newspaper clipping]] [[newspaper clipping]] DR. BESSICA RAICHE, EARLY FLIER, DEAD Received Gold Medal From Hudson Maxim as 'First Woman Aviator of America.' BUILT HER OWN AIRPLANE Made Flights in it in 1910–Was Painter, Musician and Linquist and Practicing Physician. SANTA ANA, Cal., April 11 (AP).–Dr. Bessica Raiche, 58 years old, reputed to be the first woman who ever flew an aeroplane, died yesterday at her home in Balboa, a beach resort near here. She was found in her bed by her daughter Catherine. Death apparently was caused by heart disease. In 1910 at the flying field at Mineola, L. I., where many of the first flights were made in this country, she flew an old pusher-type ship. In later years she engaged in no flying, and in an interview recently said that she had been out of a plane so long that she believed she would be afraid to go up. Dr. Raiche came to California about nineteen years ago and devoted most of her time to her medical practice, which was extensive. A funeral service will be held here tomorrow afternoon. Mrs. Raiche was a native of Wisconsin, having been born near the town of Beloit. Her father was an inventor, and on her mother's side her ancestry was said to date from the early Puritan settlers of New England. Early in life she became an accomplished musician and also took great interest in painting in oils and water-colors. She was also a noted linguist and as a young woman had mastered several modern languages. In her early twenties Mrs. Raiche went to Paris to complete her studies in ivory miniature painting. There she met François Raiche, to whom she was later married. She had a lasting interest in out-of-door sports, such as horseback riding, swimming and trap shooting, and upon her return to the United States she became attracted to aviation, which at that time was in its early stages of development. She made a study of the science, designed and constructed a plane of her own. In 1910 she made twenty-five flights in one week in the machine and was generally accredited with being America's first aviatrix. Hudson Maxim, the famous inventor of explosives, who was then the president of the Aeronautical Society, presented a gold medal to her on behalf of the society which was inscribed to "the first woman aviator of America." [[/newspaper clipping]] [[newspaper clipping]] Madame Tible, a French woman, was a passenger in a Montgolfier balloon at Lyons in 1784; this is the first recorded ascent in plane or balloon by a woman. [[/newspaper clipping]]
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