Steve Fossett and the Legacy of Amelia Earhart in the Collective Memory of America

By Tracy Dove, Ph.D
Editor, The Russia News Service

February 16, 2008

After roughly 5 months of a fruitless search and rescue mission, the missing millionaire and record-holding adventurer Steve Fossett has finally been declared dead, although the wreckage of his sport aircraft was never found. His estate is worth tens of millions of dollars, and he will certainly be mourned by the likes of Richard Branson, Mick Jagger and other over 60 alpha males who have cheated death themselves countless times but keep on performing. Maybe because he was loved and admired so much that the search was never called off in that part of northern Nevada, although there was little hope of surviving the extreme conditions of this uninhabited part of America. Or maybe it was because he was rich. Either way, his mysterious disappearance has stirred the embers of interest in someone else who is nested in aviation's collective memory of missing peoples- Amelia Earhart, whose legacy- unlike Fossett's- will always remain larger than her life was.

Despite the 70+ years since her disappearance the conspiracy theorists are still all over Earhart's story. Discounting the usual UFO explanations, colorful yarns have been spun about Earhart being on a spying against the Japanese for FDR, or having been executed by the Japanese for spying, or that she was used by the Japanese for propaganda purposes, and even that she became Japanese and stayed there. The most believable and established explanation of her disappearance is that her mission was poorly planned and worse executed; for whatever reason, she probably crash-landed around the Phoenix Islands in the Pacific and perished either immediately or later. In 1937, neither flight nor rescue efforts were very sophisticated, so once her plan touched water, all radio communications would be forever lost.

It's a sad story of how Earhart and her co-pilot, Fred Noonan went missing that day just before 9 a.m. on July 2, 1937. The US Coast Guard ship Itasca had been in radio contact with Earhart, and since dawn she had been firing up her engines to produce visible smoke for Earhart to see. The last voice signal was strong enough, suggesting- as she thought- they were right on top of Howland Island, where they were expected. But then nothing. The flight was being followed by Americans at home, and when she went missing, numerous amateur radio operators throughout the Pacific joined in to help with the rescue operations. For four days, the Coast Guard and some navy ships took part in the search, and even the Japanese Navy helped out for a few days- marking it the last time that the Americans and Japanese would interact in a peaceful way in the Pacific before the outbreak of World War II in 1941. But no wreckage was found. It wasn't until two and one half years later in 1939 that Earhart and Noonan were declared dead.

Which is over two years longer than Fossett's estate was willing to wait. After Fossett went missing on September 2, 2007, the Nevada desert, too, was combed for wreckage but they found nothing- despite the 21st century's sophisticated technology and Fossett's big and brightly colored plane. So far, there hasn't been much conspiracy spin on this disappearance. Perhaps this is because Fosset was such an over-achiever that people simply believed the man's number had come up and that was that. During his lifetime, Fossett had set multiple speed and endurance records that earned him the adoration of his colleagues- and most of those were achieved on Wall Street. After that he went on to fly around the world in bizarre aircraft, climb a dozen mountains and even swim the English Channel. How could it be that such a talented and apparently careful adventurer met his end in the banality of the Nevada desert? Discarding the first theory which obviously comes to mind- that vengeful UFOs had returned after 50 years to wreak havoc in retaliation for all of those Area 51 atrocities- it seems that he and his aircraft simply vanished- or evaporated in the desert heat.

Not wanting to miss an opportunity to take an official stand in the controversy, the National Air and Space Museum in Washington has an entire exhibit dedicated to Earhart; but it is doubtful that Fossett will have such a legacy- unless Richard Branson pays for it. Ameila Earhart was and still is a feminist icon and symbol for early Girl Power, and she was an active supporter of any women aviators who dared to want to get behind the stick instead of being in front of it all the time. She is called "America's favorite missing person" and rightly so. The world will miss Steve Fossett as well, but as long as we still have images of Lou Dobbs parachuting from aircraft with a "can do" smile on his face it is likely that Mr. Fossett will enjoy at least an honorable and quiet rest for the next few years to come.

Tracy Dove, editor of The Russia News Service, is a Professor of History and Dean of Summer Programs for the Lessing Institute. He also teaches history at the Anglo-American College in Prague.

See all previous articles by Tracy Dove here.