Tiny Broadwick

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Tiny Broadwick (April 1893, Oxford, North Carolina – 1978), or Georgia Broadwick, was a pioneering parachutist.

Born Georgia Ann Thompson, at the age of 15 she saw Charles Broadwick's World Famous Aeronauts parachute from a hot air balloon and decided to join the travelling troupe.

Among her many achievements, she was the first woman to parachute from an airplane on June 21, 1913 (jumping from a plane piloted by Glenn L. Martin, 2,000 feet over Griffith Park in Los Angeles) and the first woman to parachute into water.

In 1914, she demonstrated parachutes to the U.S. Army. On one of her demonstration jumps, she got tangled in her static line and had to cut herself free, becoming the first person to free fall.

By the time of her retirement from jumping in 1922, she was said to have made over 1,100 jumps.

She is buried in Sunset Gardens in Henderson, North Carolina.

In February 2006, Vance County commissioners decided to name a portion of the Henderson Outer Loop highway after her.