I should be in a small aircraft taking my first flying lesson in my grandmother’s honor, but thanks to the COVID-19 shut-downs, this dream is on pause.

Fifty-six years ago, my grandmother, Jerrie Mock, did something that the world still gets wrong – she was the first woman to fly around the world.

Jerrie answers the phone immediately after arrival in Hawaii, round-the-world flight 

In elementary school, teachers told us that Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly around the world. My little hand shot up. “You’re wrong.”

For proof, I brought my grandmother’s scrapbooks, the book she wrote, and dear ole’ Grandma Jerrie herself to school for show-and-tell. I doubt those teachers ever made that mistake again.

Rita with Jerrie at the “Wall of Fame” induction ceremony, Tallahassee, Florida, 2007 

Geraldine “Jerrie” Fredritz had always wanted to be a pilot. As a young girl she decided she would fly around the world. She pursued this dream through high school and college – becoming one of the first aeronautical engineering students at Ohio State University.

But then she met my Grandpa, Russell Mock. They got married when she was nineteen years old, she dropped out of college, and her dreams of soaring above the Taj Mahal fell beneath a heap of dirty diapers.

My grandfather also aspired to flight, so the two took private pilot lessons. During the seven years leading up to the world-record flight, Grandma Jerrie flew a mere 750 hours.

When Grandpa told her to go fly around the world instead of complaining of boredom, she replied, “All right, I will.”

Jerrie packs the cockpit 

My grandparents assumed another woman had already done it, but they couldn’t think of who, so they inquired. No one had. Grandpa Russ found sponsors to cover the costs and the Air Force connections Grandma needed to plan her route.

Jerrie before taking off from Wake Island, round-the-world flight

Several months later, Grandma Jerrie did it. Solo, in a single-engine Cessna 180, making twenty-one stops, over twenty-nine and a half days, from March 19 to April 17, 1964. I did a podcast about each day of her flight, telling the events of the day. 

Post-flight for two years, she had to make public appearances. She was on a few television shows, in hundreds of newspapers, grand marshaled parades, and other appearances. The second her obligations were over, she vanished from the limelight.

Jerrie being interviewed at the Bowling Center, Wake Island 

I can only assume that her humility and introverted nature are why almost no one knows who she is.

She had faced near-death situations several times and the inevitable mountains of red tape. But the worst of it, in her opinion, was that the U.S. government confiscated two rolls of film from her flight.

On route to Cairo, Egypt, she accidentally landed on a secret military base. The next day, she rode a camel to the pyramids. “The military men wouldn’t let me take photos [at Inshas], but I guess the government thought the sight of me on a camel was too dangerous for the public.”

The fact that the U.S. military bombed the base a few years later gave Grandma Jerrie some theories. “Perhaps they took my film because they thought I saw something they could use.” She assumed the government had used Amelia Earhart as a spy, so maybe they had tried to use her, too?

Jerrie with her life vest, round-the-world flight 

My Grandma Jerrie may have been an aviation pioneer, but to me, she was always Grandma Jerrie. Even after many chats with female pilots – such as filmmaker and pilot, Hannah Quinn, missionary pilot, Joy Carrera, and Shaesta Waiz, the first female civilian pilot from Afghanistan – I’d never thought of her differently.

Jerrie shortly after landing in Papua New Guinea 1969 

On October 10, 2019, I stood on the dais at the Ohio State House and received recognition from the Ohio Civil Rights Commission for my grandmother’s incredible achievements that helped to break down barriers for women in aviation.

Jerrie’s sporting aircraft license 

Post-ceremony, a visit to see Charlie – Grandma Jerrie’s plane – in D.C. was a must. I’d only seen it two times prior, once in storage near the National Mall, and once, years later, suspended from the ceiling of the Smithsonian’s National Air & Space Museum.

For others, the Smithsonian is a museum. For me, it’s the home of my childhood hero and lifelong friend. To some, that little red-and-white plane is just a hunk of metal, but he feels like my long-lost cousin.

Charlie hanging at the Smithsonian, October 2019 

Going to The Works Ohio Center for History, Arts, and Technology in Grandma’s hometown of Newark, Ohio, is like chatting with my grandmother on a quiet afternoon. The interactive museum has an airplane modeled like Jerrie’s. Sitting inside the cockpit suggests sitting in the aged golden plush chair she had in her Florida room.

Rita in the plane modeled after Jerrie’s Cessna at The Works, Newark, Ohio 

“I was so tired of that dress by the time I got back. And those heels!”

The outfit she wore, along with her presidential medal and Logue book, rest behind plexiglass just outside the model plane. She’d only worn them for the photographers – it was the 60s, after all. She hated dresses.

“I did pretty good, I guess, for being ‘just a woman,’” Grandma Jerrie told me with a laugh. You can read more about Jerrie's adventures in her book, Three Eight Charlie, republished by Phoenix Graphix.

Jerrie ready for her flight in the Air Force Voodoo Jet (post-round-the-world trip) – Courtesy Phoenix Graphix Publishing Services

Grandma Jerrie, you were more than just a woman. You were a legend in the unassuming guise of a “flying housewife.” Someday, hopefully, sooner rather than later if the world is still around, I hope to get in a plane and learn to fly, too. And even though I like dresses, I’ll do it in pants, for you.

Rita Pike as herself with Suzy Brack as Jerrie Mock, publicity shot for “The Flying Housewife, A True Story” by Rita Mock-Pike, world premiere, Chicago 2016 – Courtesy Rita Mock-Pike, photographer Tyler Core

Rita Mock-Pike is the granddaughter of aviatrix, Jerrie Mock, first woman to pilot an airplane solo around the world. Rita has found inspiration from her grandmother's life and flight and pursued many of her own dreams in theatre, podcasting, novel writing, and cooking up delicious food from around the world. She is a freelance journalist and the author of The Unofficial Hogwarts for the Holidays cookbook, the Editor-in-Chief of the MockingOwl Roost, a literary magazine, and director/producer of the branch of the performing arts of the MockingOwl Creatives. She's happily married to Matt, and faithfully serves the very fluffy kitten queen, Lady Stardust.

Find her online at https://ritajpike.com

All photos courtesy of Rita Mock-Pike, except where noted