Homepage Biographical Information Photo Gallery Record Flights Sound Clips Video Clips Souvenirs Exclusive Bobbi Trout Products Event Archives Celebration of Life Bobbi Trout Scholarship Fund Contact Us Bobbi's Special Links: Artist Nixon Galloway AVweb AWAM GladysOdonnell.com Julie Clark's American Aerobatics Ninety-Nines OneSixRight.com Pioneers of Aviation History Plane Mercantile San Diego Aerospace Museum Women in Aviation Women in Aviation Resource Center Women Fly WASPS www.BobbiTrout.com sponsored by: Aviatrix Enterprises PO Box 160063 Nashville, TN 37216 Phone: (615) 227-6177 email us ©2002-2010 Bobbi Trout/Aviatrix Enterprises All Rights Reserved		HER STORY Evelyn "Bobbi" Trout Pioneering and Record-Setting Aviatrix Extraordinaire By Warren K. Deem One afternoon in 1918, a sixth-grader walking home from school heard an unfamiliar sound. Growing louder to a roar, the noise came from overhead. She looked up and exclaimed, "An Aeroplane!" She rushed home to describe what she had seen, to her sweet Aunt declaring, "Someday I'm going to fly an aeroplane." At age 12, Evelyn Trout had made up her mind to become a flyer. Born on January 7, 1906 in Greenup, Illinois, Evelyn had her first flight at age 16. Between then and the last time she piloted an airplane in 1984, she became one of the nation's most illustrious female aviators--breaking numerous records and becoming very much a part of aviation history. In 1920, Evelyn and her mother joined her father in California. Evelyn, working in the Trout family service station in Los Angeles, told a customer of her dream of becoming an aviator. By coincidence, the customer, W.E. "Tommy" Thomas, owned a Curtiss Jenny. He asked if she would like to go up for a ride. An exuberant "Would I?" answered his question. Evelyn enjoyed every minute of her first airplane ride, taking off from Rogers Airport in west L.A. on December 27, 1922. From that moment, everything was directed at becoming an aviator. About 1928, screen star Irene Castle had her hair "bobbed"-cut short. It became the rage, and Evelyn decided that was the right hairdo for her. When friends teased her about the new look, she said, "Just call me Bobbi." She has been Bobbi ever since. (It was about this time Marlena Dietrich, Pancho Barnes, and Bobbi Trout were setting the style for slacks.) (Click arrow for next page)