Amelia Earhart

Aviation legend Amelia Earhart is most famous for the mysterious circumstances of her death: she disappeared in 1937 somewhere in the South Pacific, near the end of an attempted round-the-world flight. Despite extensive searches, no clear evidence has ever been found of Earhart, her navigator Fred Noonan, or their plane. Before her disappearance Earhart was one of the most famous women in America. She had set many flight records, including becoming the first woman to fly solo across both the Atlantic Ocean (in 1932) and the Pacific Ocean (in 1935). She also was the first woman to fly across the Atlantic in a multi-person plane, making the crossing in 1928 with pilot Wilmer Stultz and Lou Gordon. She authored the books 20 Hours, 40 Minutes (1928, about her first trans-Atlantic flight) and The Fun of It (1932).

Extra credit: Earhart was married to publisher George Putnam... She was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross by Congress in 1932 (the DFC was later restricted to military recipients only)... She was sometimes called "Lady Lindy," a reference to famous flier Charles Lindbergh, the first man to fly solo across the Atlantic.