Bessie Coleman, Queen Bess, and the Ticket to France She Bought Because No School in America Would Teach a Black Woman to Fly

Bessie Coleman became the first Black woman in the world to earn a pilot’s license on June 15, 1921 - but she had to cross an ocean to do it. No flying school in the United States would teach a Black woman, so Coleman learned French, sailed to France, and earned an internationally recognized license from the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI). She returned home as a celebrated barnstormer and a tireless advocate for opening aviation to Black Americans.

Who Was Bessie Coleman?

Bessie Coleman was born in 1892 in Atlanta, Texas, a small town in the northeast corner of the state near the Louisiana line. She was one of thirteen children. Her father was of mixed Cherokee and African American descent, and her mother - who could not read - picked cotton and took in laundry. Bessie picked cotton alongside her family from a young age.

Despite limited opportunity, Coleman was determined to learn. She finished the schooling available in her one-room schoolhouse, sometimes walking four miles to reach it, and saved enough for a single term at a college in Oklahoma before her money ran out.

Around 1915, during the Great Migration, she took a train north to Chicago to live with her brothers. There she became a manicurist, won a contest as the best and fastest in the city, and set up at the White Sox Barber Shop in the heart of Black Chicago.

Why Did Bessie Coleman Have to Go to France to Fly?

In the barbershop, Coleman listened to veterans returning from World War I in France telling stories about combat aircraft. One of her brothers, John, who had served overseas, teased her that French women had careers and could even fly airplanes - something he said she would never do.

That challenge set her course. Coleman decided to become an aviator, but every flying school in the United States turned her away. In 1920, flying schools were scarce, and none were willing to teach a woman - let alone a Black woman.

She turned to Robert Abbott, founder and publisher of The Chicago Defender, one of the most influential Black newspapers in the country. Abbott advised her to go to France, where, he said, she would be judged on whether she could fly, not on the color of her skin.

Coleman committed fully. She enrolled in night school to learn French, took a second job to save the fare, and in November 1920 boarded a ship for Europe.

How Did Bessie Coleman Learn to Fly?

Coleman traveled to Le Crotoy, a town on the coast of northern France, and enrolled at the flying school run by the Caudron brothers, well-known aircraft builders and instructors.

She trained on a Nieuport, a French biplane of wood, doped fabric, wire, and wind - no enclosed cockpit, no radio, and almost no instruments. Pilots flew exposed to the weather, and the castor oil thrown back by the rotary engines coated goggles and skin.

The training was dangerous. Much of it was done solo, with an instructor shouting from the ground. During her ten months at the school, Coleman witnessed another student die in a crash. She later wrote that it was a terrible shock, but added: “I could not turn back. Now I knew that flying was a thing I would love to the end of my life.”

On June 15, 1921, Coleman was awarded her license by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale - an international credential valid worldwide. She was the first Black woman anywhere on earth to hold one, and she earned it before some of the famous white American women aviators earned theirs.

Becoming Queen Bess: The Barnstorming Years

Coleman returned to New York in September 1921, greeted by the Black press as a hero. But she wanted more: to become a stunt pilot and barnstormer, the era’s biggest draw. In the 1920s, surplus military training aircraft flooded the market, and flying circuses toured the country with wing walkers, loops, and daring low passes.

To perform aerobatics, Coleman needed advanced training - and again, no U.S. school would provide it. So she returned to Europe, training in France, in the Netherlands with Anthony Fokker’s company, and in Germany. She came home in 1922 a polished stunt flier.

On September 3, 1922, at Curtiss Field on Long Island, Coleman flew her first American air show, billed as “the world’s greatest woman flier.” The event honored the Black veterans of the 369th “Fighting Fifteenth” New York infantry, and drew a large crowd. Audiences called her Queen Bess and Brave Bessie.

Standing on Principle: Coleman’s Fight for Equal Access

Coleman flew across Chicago, Texas, and the South, performing figure eights, loops, and low passes. But she used aviation for more than spectacle.

She lectured widely and showed films of her flights in theaters, churches, and schools to inspire Black audiences - especially young Black women - to believe the sky belonged to them. She dreamed of opening a flying school for Black aviators so future pilots wouldn’t have to cross an ocean.

She also drew a hard line on segregation. More than once, when promoters planned to segregate the gates or bar Black spectators, Coleman refused to fly unless everyone entered through the same gate. She turned down bookings and paychecks over it - remarkable courage for a barnstormer who lived from one show’s gate receipts to the next.

How Did Bessie Coleman Die?

Flying surplus aircraft in that era was deadly. In 1923, in California, Coleman’s own Curtiss Jenny stalled and spun in from about 300 feet. She broke a leg, cracked ribs, and was badly injured - yet wired her fans from the hospital: “As soon as I can walk I’m going to fly.” She recovered and returned to the air.

By early 1926, Coleman had saved enough to make a down payment on another Jenny and had a major exhibition scheduled in Jacksonville, Florida, for May 1.

On April 30, 1926, the day before the show, Coleman went up on a survey flight over the fairgrounds to scout for a planned parachute jump. A young mechanic and publicity agent named William Wills flew the aircraft while Coleman rode in the other seat - not wearing her seatbelt, so she could lean out and study the field below.

About twelve minutes into the flight, at roughly 1,500 to 2,000 feet, the airplane nosed over into a dive and then a violent spin. A loose wrench had slid into the engine compartment and jammed the controls. Because she was unbelted, Coleman was thrown from the aircraft and fell to her death. She was 34 years old. Wills could not recover the aircraft and died in the crash as well.

Bessie Coleman’s Legacy

Coleman’s dream did not die with her. Thousands attended her memorials in Florida and Chicago. In 1929, William Powell founded the Bessie Coleman Aero Club in Los Angeles to open aviation to Black pilots - exactly the vision she had championed. For years, Black aviators flew over her grave at Lincoln Cemetery in Chicago and dropped flowers from the air.

The trail she opened runs straight through aviation history - to the Tuskegee Airmen, to Willa Brown (the first Black woman to earn a commercial pilot’s license in the United States), and to Mae Jemison, the first Black woman in space, who carried a photograph of Coleman aboard the space shuttle.

The U.S. Postal Service honored Coleman with a stamp, and in 2022, on the 100th anniversary of her career, American aviators flew a formation in her honor - including a flight crewed entirely by Black women.

Key Takeaways

Bessie Coleman was the first Black woman in the world to earn a pilot’s license, awarded by the FAI on June 15, 1921.
No U.S. flying school would teach her, so she learned French and trained in France at the Caudron brothers’ school in Le Crotoy.
She became a celebrated barnstormer known as Queen Bess and refused to perform at segregated events.
She died on April 30, 1926, at age 34, when a loose wrench jammed the controls of her aircraft and she was thrown from her unbelted seat.
Her vision inspired the Bessie Coleman Aero Club (1929) and a legacy stretching to the Tuskegee Airmen, Willa Brown, and Mae Jemison.