Who knew the first woman to fly solo around the world lived alone just down the street?

How This Story Was Discovered
In 2001 I began serving as the chaplain of a retirement community. The first week on the job, residents began sharing their life stories with me. Some of their stories come from chapters of our nation’s history which have been forgotten. I started asking around, and I found out about yet even more untold stories in the wider community of Tallahassee and north Florida.
I read the Limelight (entertainment) section of the Tallahassee Democrat every Friday, and one day a small story ran about a series of photos on display at the airport, taken by and of Jerrie Mock, the first woman to fly a plane around the world. I asked around and found out that she lived in Quincy, just a few miles up the highway, and I was told that she might not mind sharing her story.
In those days, we were still using a phone book. I found a Jerrie Mock listed as living on King Street, and I gave her a call and simply asked if I might visit her and write a book about her story. She simply said “yes.”
About the same time, my wife Pam and I were called to serve as co-interim ministers at First Presbyterian-Quincy. So, we arranged to visit with Jerrie in her home after church one Sunday afternoon. I would call and set a day and time, and Jerrie would welcome me into her home. She spread out her charts, letters, telegrams and newspaper clippings all over her dining room table, and she answered everything I knew to ask. We visited once or twice a month from July 2007 until February 2009. I pitched this story to agents and publishers, and made it as far as a face-to-face interview with the editor with one major publishing house. However, I got my heart broken by a polite rejection, and I had to report back to Jerrie that we had been turned down.
I was at a loss as to how to go forward. Meanwhile, Pam suggested that I see what else I could find out about the other pilot, Joan Merriam Smith. I explored the internet, and one day in 2010 I found an interesting blog.
When you read the book, you will come to the part about how Joan Merriam Smith was killed in a plane crash in 1965. She had a passenger on board with her, her friend and biographer Trixie Ann Schubert.
The blog I had found was an introduction to the story of Trixie Ann Schubert, and it had been posted by her granddaughter, Tiffany Ann Brown. I began reaching out to Tiffany Ann by email. She responded right away, and she and I began to compare notes and ideas, long-distance. Through our correspondence, I discovered that Joan’s husband, Captain Marvin “Jack” Smith, was living in Prattville, Alabama, within a day’s drive of Tallahassee.
I gave Captain Smith a call, and he welcomed Pam and me into his home. We also got a great interview and we were allowed to make copies of photos.
Along the way I continued to research and collect all the documents I could find, and ask experts. I got to have very informative conversations with Bryan Swopes, who maintains the website On This Day in Aviation, and with Pat Macha, who has been investigating plane crashes in the California mountains for thirty years.
Meanwhile, it also took a couple of decades to find a publisher. When I first moved to Tallahassee in 1998, I joined a writer’s group led by Adrian Fogelin. Adrian introduced me to editor Gina Edwards, who worked with me through Jerrie’s story, and patiently taught me how to use Track Changes😊. Years later, Adrian and Gina led me to M.R. Street, who has been willing to take this project on as both editor and publisher, for which I am eternally grateful.
Recovering this forgotten story has been an incredible journey, and we suspect that with the publication of this book, yet more details and memories may emerge.