Quotes by Amelia Earhart
“After midnight, the moon set, and I was alone with the stars. I have often said that the lure of flying is the lure of beauty, and I need no other flight to convince me that the reason flyers fly, whether they know it or not, is the esthetic appeal of flying.”
“Anticipation, I suppose, sometimes exceeds realization.”
“Flying may not be all plain sailing, but the fun of it is worth the price.”
“Not much more than a month ago, I was on the other shore of the Pacific, looking westward. This evening, I looked eastward over the Pacific. In those fast-moving days, which have intervened, the whole width of the world has passed behind us, except this broad ocean. I shall be glad when we have the hazards of its navigation behind us.”
— Amelia Earhart, several days before she left for Howland Island and disappeared
“…decide…whether or not the goal is worth the risks involved. If it is, stop worrying….”
“I lay no claim to advancing scientific data other than advancing flying knowledge. I can only say that I do it because I want to.”
“Worry retards reaction and makes clear-cut decisions impossible.”
“The field was wet, the lane was wet, and the spirits of my mechanic and helper were damp.”
“The stars seemed near enough to touch and never before have I seen so many. I always believed the lure of flying is the lure of beauty, but I was sure of it that night.”
“Better do a good deed near at home than go far away to burn incense.”
“The most difficult thing is the decision to act. The rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life and the procedure. The process is its own reward.”
“My ambition is to have this wonderful gift produce practical results for the future of commercial flying and for the women who may want to fly tomorrow’s planes.”
“One of my favorite phobias is that girls, especially those whose tastes aren’t routine, often don’t get a fair break… It has come down through the generations, an inheritance of age-old customs, which produced the corollary that women are bred to timidity.”
“Preparation, I have often said, is rightly two-thirds of any venture.”
“The woman who can create her own job is the woman who will win fame and fortune.” “It is far easier to start something than it is to finish it.”
“Anticipation, I suppose, sometimes exceeds realization.”
“Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace, the soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things.”
“The more one does and sees and feels, the more one is able to do, and the more genuine may be one’s appreciation of fundamental things like home, and love, and understanding companionship.”
“The soul’s dominion? Each time we make a choice, we pay with courage to behold restless day and count it fair.”
“Women must try to do things as men have tried. When they fail, their failure must be but a challenge to others.”
“[Women] must pay for everything…. They do get more glory than men for comparable feats. But, also, women get more notoriety when they crash.”
“…now, and then, women should do for themselves what men have already done—occasionally what men have not done—thereby establishing themselves as persons, and perhaps encouraging other women toward greater independence of thought and action. Some such consideration was a contributing reason for my wanting to do what I so much wanted to do.”
“In my life, I had come to realize that, when things were going very well, indeed, it was just the time to anticipate trouble. And, conversely, I learned from pleasant experience that at the most despairing crisis, when all looked sour beyond words, some delightful “break” was apt to lurk just around the corner.”
“Never interrupt someone doing something you said couldn’t be done.”
“No kind action ever stops with itself. One kind action leads to another. Good example is followed. A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees. The greatest work that kindness does to others is that it makes them kind themselves.”
“Adventure is worthwhile in itself.”
“Never do things others can do and will do, if there are things others cannot do or will not do.”
“The more one does and sees and feels, the more one is able to do, and the more genuine may be one’s appreciation of fundamental things like home, and love, and understanding companionship.”
“The most effective way to do it is to do it.”
Quotes about Amelia Earhart
“Being men and being engaged in a highly essential phase of the serious business of air transportation, they [airline mechanics] all naturally had preconceived notions about a woman pilot bent on a ‘stunt’ flight—not very favorable notions, either. It was, undoubtedly, something of a shock to discover that the ‘gal,’ with whom they had to deal, not only was an exceptionally pleasant human being who ‘knew her stuff,’ but that she knew exactly what she wanted done and had sense enough to let them alone while they did it. There was an almost audible clatter of chips falling off skeptical masculine shoulders.”
—C.B. Allen, New York Herald Tribune
“Amelia is a grand person for such a trip. She is the only woman flyer I would care to make such an expedition with because, in addition to being a fine companion and pilot, she can take hardship, as well as a man, and work like one.”
—Fred Noonan, Amelia’s navigator for the around-the-world flight
“Amelia Earhart came perhaps before her time…the smiling, confident, capable, yet compassionate human being, is one of which we can all be proud.”
—Walter J. Boyne