Mary Riddle, also known as Kus-de-cha or Kingfisher, (April 22, 1902 – October 25, 1981) was the second Native American woman to earn a

pilot's license Pilot licensing or certification refers to permits for operating aircraft. Flight crew licences are regulated by ICAO Annex 1 and issued by the civil aviation authority of each country. CAA’s have to establish that the holder has met a specifi ...

, with Bessie Coleman being the first. Soon after earning her pilot's license she also earned her commercial license.

Early life

Riddle was a member of the Clatsop Tribe in Oregon and the

Quinault Indian Nation The Quinault Indian Nation ( or ; QIN), formerly known as the Quinault Tribe of the Quinault Reservation, is a federally recognized tribe of Quinault, Queets, Quileute, Hoh, Chehalis, Chinook, and Cowlitz peoples.

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered on ...

. She was the daughter of Albert "Doc" Riddell, and had two brothers, John and Valentine. Her grandmother gave her the name Kus-de-cha after noting that her cries sounded like a kingfisher's call. On the way home from school, an eleven-year-old Riddle saw her first plane and was mesmerized. From that day forward, she went to every airshow she could. When Riddle was seventeen, she saw a woman fatally crash an airplane. The incident made her determined to prove women could fly well.

Aviation career

Pilot

Riddle saved money for two years to attend the Rankin Flying School in

Portland Portland most commonly refers to: * Portland, Oregon, the largest city in the state of Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States * Portland, Maine, the largest city in the state of Maine, in the New England region of the northeas ...

, run by noted aviator

Tex Rankin John Gilbert "Tex" Rankin (January 20, 1894 – February 23, 1947) was an aerobatic pilot, barnstormer, air racer, and flight instructor from the 1920s to the 1940s. He created the Rankin Flying Service which trained thousands of pilots at Ran ...

. Rankin, who also taught Chinese-American pilot

Leah Hing Leah Hing (1907–2001) was the first Chinese American woman to earn her pilot's license. Trained by Tex Rankin, an early aviation pioneer at Pearson Field in Vancouver, Washington, she received her pilot's license in 1934. Later she became ...

, was interested in creating "a 'rainbow', all-female stunt team," but Riddle declined to participate, and the idea fizzled out. She flew solo for the first time on May 10, 1930. "I wasn't scared," said Riddle one month later. "On that first trip alone I just missed the weight of the instructor in the plane." She featured in an airshow at the 1930

Portland Rose Festival The Portland Rose Festival is an annual civic festival held during the month of June in Portland, Oregon. It is organized by the volunteer non-profit Portland Rose Festival Association with the purpose of promoting the Portland region. It inclu ...

, riding up to her plane on horseback and in "full tribal costume". Riddle was one of three female pilots in the show: the others were Dorothy Hester and

Edith Foltz Edith Magalis Foltz Stearns Grissom was the first female transport pilot in Oregon, the fifth female transport pilot in the United States, and the first female state governor of the National Aeronautic Association. For her work as a transport pi ...

. In August of that year, she made plans to fly to

Washington D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, Na ...

with "beaded gifts from Indian tribes of the Northwest", to be delivered to for "President Hoover and others". Riddle earned a limited commercial pilot's license in 1933. In June 1934, she was featured on the 99's magazine, ''The 99er''. An all-around athlete, she enjoyed swimming, riding, "golf, tennis, and ice skating."

Parachutist

Riddle later went to the Spartan School in

Tulsa Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the U.S. state, state of Oklahoma and List of United States cities by population, 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. ...

to learn

parachute A parachute is a device used to slow the motion of an object through an atmosphere by creating drag or, in a ram-air parachute, aerodynamic lift. A major application is to support people, for recreation or as a safety device for aviators, who ...

jumping. Though the school was all-male at the time, Riddle convinced them to admit her and graduated with honors. By 1937 she was performing as a parachutist while touring the United States on The Voice of Washington, advertised as the largest tri-motored plane in the world, on which she also served as chief stewardess. Press described her as quiet and charming. Riddle did forty parachute jumps. In 1937, she almost died when her parachute, which had not opened correctly, became tangled with her legs. The next year, a back injury caused her to quit parachuting.

Aircraft Inspector

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

restrictions on civilian aircraft forced Riddle to give up flying. She began working with aluminum sheet metal as part of the

U.S. Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

's Civil Service, reasoning, "I just had to be near airplanes- even if I could not fly them." She was recruited by the government to inspect civilian aircraft and work as an aircraft maintenance advisor. Riddle recalled, "I was a sort of guinea pig, really, on account of being the only woman, but I got along fine."

Later life

After the war, Riddle became a receptionist at the Gibbs and Hill firm in New York City, but continued to fly on occasion and to visit the Northwest.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Riddle, Mary 1902 births 1981 deaths 20th-century Native Americans Aviation pioneers American women aviators Aviators from Washington (state) Quinault people People from Pacific County, Washington Native American women aviators 20th-century American women 20th-century Native American women