Aloha Wanderwell

Aloha Wanderwell (Idris Galcia Hall née Welsh, October 13, 1906 – June 4, 1996) was a Canadian explorer, author, filmmaker, and aviator. Beginning when she was 16 years old, she became the first woman to drive around the globe, driving a Ford 1918 Model T over a five year period (1922–1927). Ultimately she traveled 500,000 miles across 80 countries.

Early life Idris Galcia Welsh was born on October 13, 1906, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Margaret Jane Hedley and Robert Welsh. When her mother married Herbert Hall in 1909, her name was changed to Idris Hall. Her step-father was a developer and rancher on Vancouver Island and the family lived in Parksville and Duncan.

Wanderwell was stranded in Brazil for six weeks and during this time she lived among the Bororo people and made the earliest film documentation of them. In 1932, her husband was shot and killed on their yacht Carma in Long Beach, California. One year later, Wanderwell married Walter Baker and continued her travels, ultimately visiting over 80 countries and six continents, and driving over 500,000 miles in Ford vehicles.

The Wanderwell Expedition In 1921, Walter Wanderwell (born Valerian Johannes Pieczynski in Poland) was capturing headlines with the Million Dollar Wager, a round-the-world endurance race between two teams racing Ford Model Ts to see which team could visit the most countries. A controversial figure, Wanderwell had been jailed in the United States during World War I on suspicion of being a German spy, but was released in 1918. Wanderwell was inspired by his meeting with the League of Nations and around 1930 he formed his own organization Work Around the World Educational Club or (WAWEC). In a Model T Ford, Wanderwell made the journey as driver, translator and filmmaker for Wanderwell Expeditions, a round-the-world motoring tour led by Walter "Cap" Wanderwell (Poland). The first woman to circumnavigate the world in an automobile was Harriet White Fisher in 1909–1910, but she used a chauffeur and did not drive herself.

Partially sponsored by the Ford Motor Company, the round-the-world tour also sustained itself through filming and travel lectures, from Africa through the Middle East and on to Asia. In Calcutta in 1924, their tour crossed paths with planes from the first aerial circumnavigation, and Idris filmed their meeting.

Encounter with Bororo people, Brazil In 1930 and 1931, Aloha Wanderwell learned to fly a German seaplane, "Junker", that she would later land on an uncharted part of the Amazon River when the Wanderwells traveled to the state of Mato Grosso in Brazil. They set up camp at the Descalvados Ranch in Cuiabá and were ostensibly searching for the lost explorer Colonel Percival Harrison Fawcett, who was looking for the legendary Lost City of Z. They made several flights with a seaplane, once running out of fuel on the Paraguay River and receiving help from the Bororo people. The crew's cameraman filmed a ceremonial dance, a first contact scenario with Boboré villagers, and Bororo men experiencing sympathetic labor pains. The 32-minute silent film called Last of the Bororos is preserved in the Smithsonian Institution's Human Studies Film Archives and includes Aloha Wanderwell's meeting with Brazilian explorer Cândido Rondon.

Marriage to Walter Wanderwell Arriving in the United States in 1925, Aloha married Walter Wanderwell on April 7 in Riverside, California. Their marriage prevented the FBI from arresting Wanderwell under the Mann Act, a law that prohibits transporting women across state lines for "immoral purposes."

Aloha gave birth to a daughter, Valri, in December 1925 and a son, Nile, in April 1927. The Wanderwells continued their travels, sailing to Cuba and South Africa. Aside from dealing with poor roads, the Wanderwells also had difficulty finding gasoline for their vehicles. During their travels through Africa from 1926 to 1928, they used crushed bananas for grease and elephant fat for engine oil. The global tour included 43 countries. Author Stookie Allen contends that during this time, Aloha cut her hair and fought as a member of the French Foreign Legion. In 1942, Henry Ford decided that Little Lizzie and 50 other autos would be scrapped for the war effort.

Murder of Walter Wanderwell In late 1932, the couple purchased a yacht, the 110-foot Carma, intending to document their voyage to the South Seas on film. On December 5, 1932, the day before they were to embark, Walter Wanderwell was murdered on the yacht in the harbor near Long Beach, California. William James Guy, a member of their 1931 expedition to South America who had attempted to mutiny on a previous voyage, was tried for the crime. Guy had an alibi and was acquitted by the jury and Judge Kenny. Another man, Edward Eugene Fernando Montague, was briefly considered a suspect, but was never charged. Her final films include To See the World by Car (1935–37), India Now, and Explorers of the Purple Sage, in Technicolor, which contains the only known footage of Desert Dust, the famous palomino wild horse.

Aloha continued to give lectures, and during this period, she wrote an autobiographical account of her travels, Call to Adventure!, which was published in 1939, and republished in 2012. The couple settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, where Aloha worked in radio broadcasting (WLW Radio) and print journalism. In 1947, she and Baker moved to Lido Isle community in Newport Beach, California. Aloha gave her final performance for 150 family members and guests, with Dr. Pete Lee, curator at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles in 1982. She died on June 4, 1996. The Academy Film Archive has preserved many of these films, from both 35mm nitrate and 16mm sources, including rare 1920s and 1930s footage.

In 2020, With Car and Camera Around the World was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Works

Filmography Australia Now Cape to Cairo Car and Camera Around the World Explorers of the Purple Sage Flight to the Stone Age India Now Last of the Bororos Magic of Mexico My Hawaii River of Death To See the World by Car Victory in the Pacific

Books Call to Adventure!