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WEDNESDAY, APRIL 10, 1957  THE ELMIRA ADVERTISER
Pioneer Woman Flyer Tells of Fun at Work

By SONIA McCONNELL
"I'm tired of speaking about myself from the 'firsts' angle," Blanche Stuart Scott of Canisteo said yesterday afternoon in an interview.

"I'd rather speak about my job in terms of: Don't we have fun?"

Looking at the life of this woman, one cannot omit the firsts completely. For she was the first woman ever to drive a car across the U. S. and above all she ranks as a foremost woman aviatrix--the first woman to fly long distance, the first to fly on the East and West Coasts, the first woman to fly a jet plane --a long list.

That record in itself indicates a full and dynamic life. But since she is above average in energy, her record does not halt there.

She also has been active in radio, as a motion picture producer, as a comedy dialogue script writer in Hollywood and in many other fields.
*  *  *
HOWEVER, SHE said she would rather discuss the "fun angle" of her more recent position as a public relations worker and consultant with the Air Force. 

She took this position in 1954 and held it until about a year ago.

"My past job brought me in close contact with people all over the nation through the medium of the press, radio and TV. We wanted to acquaint the public with the fact that the United States Air Force Central Museum at the Air Force Base at Dayton, Ohio, was open to the public.

"Originally it was not. But its material, the largest collection of aviation material in the world, was at one time only available to Air Force and government personnel."

This job kept her travelling constantly for 15 months with no break.
*  *  *
"IT MEANT carrying around with me at all times a typewriter, a polaroid camera, an extra coat and a lot of paper--for an endless filling out of records important in my job. I couldn't check any of these things," she said.

"But via the newspaper, TV, radio, club talks and the like, I had a lot of fun. One of the joys connected with this job was meeting people more interesting than you."

"I worked with people like Gary Moore, John Daly, Steve Allen, Art Linkletter and Jimmy Steward. Such people have helped to spread the information that the museum is open to the public.

"I've addressed many clubs across the country of the type of Zonta, Rotary and Kiwanis and have made contacts with hundreds of vital, interesting people.

"In other words, by job is fun and I like it. My work takes me to all the special big air events over the United States.

ADDRESSING approximately 35 members of Zonta Club at a luncheon at the Mark Twain Hotel yesterday, she said: 

"One of the biggest kicks I get out of being one of the aviation pioneers is seeing in reality exactly what we used to predict back in the 1911s and 12s when we'd sit around on rainy days when we couldn't fly and predict the future of aviation. We hit about everything in commercial aviation -- except for some reason we missed one thing. The stewardesses. Everything else materialized."

Since she sold her Martin two-seater to the government at the start of WWI as a trainer, she has stopped flying. 

"My present love, however, is a helicopter. I like coming down 10 to 15 feet from the ground  and just looking things over. The only trouble is helicopters are so slow. They only go about 90 to 100 miles an hour. Sometimes I want to get out and shove them along."

She has a few more predictions about aviation for the future. 
"I do think that inter planetary flight will go through in a few years," she said.
* * *
"FOR A LONG time I thought that the U. S. was developing some sort of secret weapon where the flying saucer was concerned. That perhaps the government was keeping the thing under wraps until war or perfection of such missiles.

"But I just read a book on flying saucers which has further convinced me that there is something more to the whole story.

"Not that I mean to tell you I believe in little green men from outer space. It's more serious than that. 

"I believe it plausible that such objects as have been reported in various parts of the nation in the past are inter-planetary planes.

"Have you ever asked yourself, 'Why fear them?'

"After all, they have done no damage, crashed into any planes in flight. Perhaps they've just looked around. They might be very friendly, you know-- with no inclination to be hostile. They've had the opportunity to be that way, but haven't. So I'd say there's not much to worry about.

"They might even help us in another war. At any rate, the government has issued word under no circumstances to fire on them since they haven't been hostile -- whoever or whatever they are."

Her address to Zonta "skimmed the top" of the aviation story from 1910 until the present and mentioned some of her fellow pioneers, the Wright Brothers and Glen Curtiss, who taught her to fly when she was 19.

In mentioning the Wright brothers, she said:
"They were God-fearing men. They had no idea that we'd put air power to work in death and destruction. If they had, I think they would have destroyed their own work. But of course someone else probably would have come along and invented the same things eventually."

Concluding she said:
"It certainly has been fun to be in on the beginning of the air age. I'm only sorry I can't see the end of it. But we all grow old, after all, and what are we going to do about it?"

[[image]]
MOVIE FUN--First American woman aviator, Blanche Stuart Scott, talks over early flying days with James Stewart on the "Spirit of St. Louis" location at Santa Maria, Calif., where Stewart is playing Charles A. Lindbergh in the Leland Hayward Production for Warner Bros. Mrs. Scott, now 63, first flew a plane in 1910.

[[image]]
TV FRIENDS--Gary Moore and Blanche Stuart Scott on "I've Got a Secret"--an example of one of the numerous friendships she made as public relations worker and consultant for the Air Force Central Museum.

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