Clara Adams
early Female plane passenger
Clara Adams (née Grabau; December 3, 1884 – February 10, 1971), known as the "first flighter" and the "maiden of maiden flights" was an American aircraft passenger and enthusiast who set a variety of flying records. She helped popularize air travel and was the first woman to fly across the Atlantic as a commercial passenger aboard the Graf Zeppelin.
Personal life
Clara Grabau was born in 1884 in Cincinnati, Ohio to German parents. Her father, Walter Grabau, was a professor of music at the Conservatory of Music in Leipzig, Germany, where she later studied music.
Grabau was married to George Lincoln Adams, who was affluent and served as president of the American Leather Tanning Company. George Adams died in 1929.
Clara Adams died on February 10, 1971.
Flying
In March 1914, Adams embarked on her first flight in Florida on a Thomas flying boat. The flight was piloted by Walter E. Johnson, who would become a captain in the U.S. Army, and reached an altitude of 700 feet, "a daring height in those pioneer days". The flight would spark her interest in aviation.
The public source identifies “Clara Adams” as early Female plane passenger. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Clara, Adams and early.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5125931. VIAF identifies the subject as 4544161634380710850000. The Library of Congress control number is no2021031222. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1884, 1971, 1929 and 1914.
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This entry incorporates text from “Clara Adams” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.