Amelie Beese

Amelie Hedwig Boutard-Beese (13 September 1886 – 21 December 1925), also known as Melli Beese, was the first female German pilot, qualifying in 1911, as well as the first such aircraft engineer. Together with Lilly Steinschneider and Marie Marvingt, she is considered one of the first female pioneers of aviation. To get there, however, she had to overcome many obstacles and fight the male-dominated bastion.

Early life Amelie Hedwig Beese was born in Dresden on 13 September 1886 to Alma Wilhemine Hedwig Beese and Friedrich Karl Richard Beese, an architect and master mason.

In 1906 Beese decided to pursue a career as a sculptor; however, she had to leave her native Germany to study, as German art schools did not admit female students. She studied instead at Stockholm's Royal Academy Her father encouraged her to attend Dresden's Politechnic School in preparation for becoming an aviator (hoping she would become bored by it) and she began studying mathematics, shipbuilding, and aeronautic engineering. Less than a year later, she had persuaded her father of her seriousness and he agreed to fund her studies and living expenses at a Berlin flying school. with financial assistance from her mother and a Dresden businessman, Karl A. Lingner, and in partnership with Frenchman Charles Boutard and Hermann Reichelt. They bought three planes and Adolph Ludwig joined them as the school's mechanic. Boutard gained a German flying license on 4 April 1912 and helped Melli with teaching her pupils.

In 1912, the German government developed a National Flying Donations scheme to raise money to develop aviation technology and training, having decided that aeroplanes had a military use and felt challenged by the fact that all the significant aviation records were held by the French. Beese hoped to benefit from this funding to develop her work, but as Boutard was French, their company could not legally be given work connected with the military.

After marrying Boutard, and despite their remaining in Germany, Beese became a French national as a woman took on her husband's citizenship and lost her own when marrying a foreigner under German law at the time.

In 1993, the flying club Aeroclub Mellie Beese was formed in Berlin.

In 2004 the Tempelhof district of Berlin decided to name a pedestrian passage between Hoeppnerstraße and Hessenring the Melli-Beese-Promenade.

Beese's life was the inspiration for Aris Fioretos's 2020 novel Nelly B.s Herz.

A school near the former Johannisthal airfield is named after her, and the Berlin Airport access road is named Melli-Beese Ring.

Literature Sehn, Dietmar: Dresdner Straßengeschichten. Wissenswertes, Unterhaltsames und Kurioses. Wartberg Verlag, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2006. Spitzer, Barbara: Melli Beese. Bildhauerin, Pilotin – eine ungewöhnliche Frau. (Begleitband zur Ausstellung „Melli Beese, Bildhauerin, Pilotin – eine ungewöhnliche Frau“. 2. Juni 1992 bis 20. September 1992 im Heimatmuseum Treptow und 2. Oktober 1992 bis 13. November 1992 im Verkehrsmuseum Dresden, Berlin). Bezirksamt Treptow, Dresden 1992.

Wittmann, Livia Käthe, Zibler, Barbara: Melli Beese und die „Flügel am Horizont“. Die Geschichte der ersten deutschen Pilotin. Trafo-Literaturverlag, Berlin 2009.

Film Die tollkühne Fliegerin Melli Beese – Das Schicksal der ersten deutschen Pilotin aus Dresden, TV-Dokumentation von Jörn E. Runge, MDR-Produktion (Lebensläufe, Folge 87), 2005. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0880194