The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. THURSDAY, MAY 29, 1930. A NATIONAL HEROINE.

Hokitika Guardian, 29 May 1930, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. THURSDAY, MAY 29, 1930. A NATIONAL HEROINE.

With her safe arrival in Australia, alter an adventurous flight of ten thousand odd miles Miss Amy .John, son has found fame, and it may be prophesied that fortune will come to her without much further effort on her part. Thus she has justified the high hopes will) which ,she set out from Croydon on May sth, on a venture which many e. ports, remarks the Otago r l lines, did not hesitate to describe as foolhardy in the extreme, Miss .loliaison’s. flight would indeed have seemed foolhardy had she failed, hut its success makes criticism superfluous. Fortune favours the brave— Quite frequently; and Miss Amy Johnson, the perils and risks of her high enterprise happily surmounted, stands

now revealed to the admiring world as a fortunate and wdlial a most dauntless and intrepid young woman. She has come safely through a senes of udreniures, all experienced in the compass of a few days, which shouid have' provided her with thrills to suffice for the rest of her life, and she lias certainly proved what she set out to do, that a v.oman can ily equally as wail as a man. She is credited with observing, “Alien a woman wants to make her mark she must do something rather better than any man- lias ever done it.’’ Mass Johnson fell short of that pinnacle of achievement, but certainly made her mark in both a literal and figurative sense. The congratulations that have been showered upon her, many from the most distinguished .sources, have surely been almost enough to affect the mental equilibrium of any but the most level headed young person. To be hailed as an Empire heroine, and the admiration of the world, is not the lot of one young oman in a generation, though may he times are changing. In view of the tributes that are being laid at her feet,' Miss Johnson should have but to choose in what manner she may, so to speak, capitalise her investment in aviation. Her youth and her comparative inexperience $n splo flying make her adventure, of course, the more noteworthy. He llight was a wonderful achievement which must compare with that of Air Hinkler, which set the standard for solo flights from England to Australia, and that of the New Zealander;* Captain Chichester, who made a lone llight early this year. The element of chance is never absent from such undertakings, and Alisa Johnson undoubtedly was fortunate in reaching her destination with no more serious mishaps en route than those which befell her machine. It cannot, however, be suggested that luck alone will guide an aviator through monsoon ami rainstorm over wastes of jungle and ocean, and Miss Johnson had qualifications which fitted her to embark on a difficult enterprise. She proved herself to lie remarkably well equipped, mentally and physically, for a venture in which unusual resources of mind and energy were necessary. Miss Johnson knew that she was, in her own. words, “risking her neck,” and she showed that she was fully aware of the hazardous nature of the flight, and willing to make the necessary gamble in order to do what she wanted. She is disappointed, no doubt, at not having broken Mr Hinkler’s record for the flight, but she has the consolation of knowing that in every way her adventure has succeeded. Some p-eoplp might feel that, with 47 speeches—more or less—to make in the first four days after her arrival in Sydney, and with thousands of worshipping men and women to be encountered. the worst part of the undertaking has still to be endured, but it is hardly to be expected that a young woman who has tarried alone in the desert during a sand storm, and has battled gamely with all the elements, will be dismayed at the prospect of facing her wildly enthusiastic Australian admirers. The cable messages describing the vociferous welcome accorded her at Darwin would suggest that Aliss Johnson’s nerves stood well the strnin of her trying experiences. The Daily Chronicle is within the mark in saying that the women of Esgland are making a notable name In the air,