9A16400: Jeannette Piccard inside gondola of "Century of Progress." 1934
Jeannette Piccard (1895 - 1981) was the first women to reach the stratosphere. Piccard earned her balloon license in the summer of 1934, and on October 23rd of that year she, along with her husband Jean Piccard, lifted off in their balloon, A Century of Progress. Jeannette Piccard piloted the balloon to a height of 57,979 feet, while Jean Piccard was the scientific observer. With this flight Jeannette Piccard became the holder of the women's altitude record; she held this record until Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova's space flight in 1963.
This collection consists of the following: a 1979 letter from Jeannette Piccard to National Air and Space Museum curator Claudia Oakes, about her flight; a four page description by Piccard about the October 23, 1934 flight; a copy of a page of the flight log; and copy negatives and prints of 13 images, presumably lent by Piccard to the Museum for copying.
No arrangement.
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Jeannette Piccard, Gift, 1979, NASM.2019.0045
Jeannette Piccard Documents and Copy Prints, NASM.2019.0045, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
Arranged, described, and encoded by Patti Williams, 2020.