Julia Clark

Julia Clark (1880 – June 17, 1912) was the third woman to receive a pilot's license (on May 19, 1912) from the Aero Club of America, and though British, she was the first female pilot to die in an air crash in the United States.

Biography

Clark was born in London, and emigrated to the U.S., became a citizen, married a westerner, and settled in Denver. Clark enrolled at the Curtiss Flying School at North Island in San Diego, and, like Scott, soloed in a Curtiss plane and then joined an exhibition team. On June 17, 1912, she decided to make a test flight around dusk. Visibility was poor, and, on takeoff, one wing struck a tree limb, and the plane, a Curtiss pusher, tumbled to the ground, pinning her beneath the wreckage. She was the first American woman to die in an air accident, her death preceding Harriet Quimby's by two weeks.

She was the third woman to die in a plane crash but she was the first licensed pilot to die in a plane crash. Denise Moore (aka Jane Wright) age 35 was the first woman to die in a plane crash followed by 20 year old Suzanne Bernard in March 1912. Both of these deaths were in France.

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