Amelia Earhart was prepared to fly across the Atlantic Ocean, but not to wed. The first time her fiancé, George Putnam, proposed to her, she said no. She declined Putnam’s offer the second, third, fourth and fifth try, as well.

But the sixth time Putnam popped the question, Earhart gave in. Well, partially. She suggested a one-year temporary marriage, a means of testing the feasibility of their relationship given the stresses and demands of their jobs, which remained central to their lives.



In a letter to Putnam, she wrote, "You must know again my reluctance to marry, my feeling that I shatter thereby chances in work which means most to me. I feel the move just now as foolish as anything I could do. I know there may be compensations but have no heart to look ahead.... Please let us not interfere with the others' work or play."

Yet Earhart does not stop there, lending her views on faithfulness in a marriage: "On our life together I shall not hold you to any medieval code of faithfulness to me nor shall I consider myself bound to you similarly."



Clearly, Earhart was ahead of her time.

“A lot of men are scared of Type A women,” says Rani Spivey, Pilot and Aeronautical Engineer, a modern day Amelia Earhart. "The best thing I can do is just keep pushing forward, and I'm glad I have a partner who backs that."