Always on the lookout for something spectacular, Clara made one of her most memorable trips in 1939 when she set a world record for a round-the-world flight solely on scheduled passenger airlines—the first by a woman. She completed her journey around the globe in 16 days and 19 hours, returning to New York on July 15, 1939.

Dwelling at length on the lives of kings and queens, history books routinely ignore commoners. So also the story of aviation is dominated by flyers, designers and airline entrepreneurs. But what of the humble air traveller without whom commercial aviation would not exist? Clara Adams became famous as one of aviation’s pioneer passengers, featuring in so many maiden flights that she became known as a ‘First Flighter’. Dedicated in her thankless task of persuading a sceptical public that flying was safe—even for a little old lady—she always insisted on paying her fare.

Clara was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, on December 3, 1884. Her first experience of air travel was in March 1914, in a flying boat. She later recalled, “I was a mere youngster but it was an experience that marked the beginning of years of flying. I have never handled the controls and have no desire to become a pilot.” When her husband, 40 years older than herself, died in 1929, Clara suddenly found herself a wealthy widow with enough time and money to travel. In 1924, she flew on one of the test flights of a zeppelin.

In 1928, Clara bought the first transatlantic air ticket ever sold to a female passenger. In October 1928, she flew on the Graf Zeppelin (LZ-127) on its pioneer round trip from Germany to the US. The airship had 64 men on board, as well as Clara Adams. The flight was no pleasure cruise—it lasted 71 hours and encountered a couple of severe storms, making it the most hazardous trip ever experienced by the Graf Zeppelin officers and crew. In 1931, Clara was the only woman passenger on the first flight of Germany’s massive, 12-engine Dornier DO-X flying boat from Rio de Janeiro to New York.

Clara religiously kept track of first flights and made determined efforts to be part of them. She specially travelled to Germany to be on the maiden flight of the zeppelin Hindenburg from Germany to the US in May, 1936. A year later, the world was shaken by the tragic fire and explosion of the Hindenburg on May 7, 1937. But Clara was unfazed. The very next day she wrote a cheque for $100 to be held as deposit for the first ticket for the planned new dirigible. In the event, it never flew.

Always on the lookout for something spectacular, Clara made one of her most memorable trips in 1939 when she set a world record for a round-the-world flight solely on scheduled passenger airlines—the first by a woman. She left New York on June 28, 1939, aboard Pan American’s famous ‘Dixie Clipper’ on its first transatlantic passenger flight. She planned her itinerary meticulously, buying tickets on Pan American, Deutsche Lufthansa, KLM and United Airlines, with stops in Horta, Lisbon, Marseille, Leipzig, Athens, Basra, Jodphur, Rangoon, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Manila, Guam, Wake Island, Midway Island, Honolulu, and San Francisco. She completed her journey around the globe in 16 days and 19 hours, returning to New York on July 15, 1939. She covered 25,000 miles and spent $2,500 in fares. Today, such a feat would probably elicit yawns. But it illustrates the amazing pace at which commercial aviation had spread worldwide just 12 years after Charles Lindbergh’s epochal solo flight across the Atlantic in 1927.