Aline Rhonie was a woman of many talents. An aviator who was the first woman to fly from New York to Mexico City, who also worked for the war relief effort during WWII, drove an ambulance in France during the war and advocated for the United States to train women fliers.

 

Rhonie wanted the U.S. to follow Britain's lead at the time, which was training women to fly liaison missions. She felt that women would be “very valuable in liaison missions,” according to a quote in one news report.

 

If that wasn’t enough, Rhonie was also an accomplished artist who learned mural painting from Diego Rivera and painted the large aviation themed fresco mural in Hangar F at Roosevelt Field.

 

The painting was called "The Pre-Lindbergh Era of Flying on Long Island." According to Air & Space magazine, the painting included more than 600 aviators and 268 types of aircraft covering the years 1909 through 1927.

 

“At some point the mural was stored in an old barn on the Sands Point Preserve in Long Island, where it made its way to the Long Island Early Flyers Club,” the magazine reported. “In 2006, the club donated the mural to Vaughn College of Aeronautics & Technology in Queens, near LaGuardia Airport.”

 

A brochure is available for download online (PDF) that identifies all the flyers int he painting.