Amanda Sargent was only 2 years old when she took her first flight in the back of the Piper Tri-Pacer her father had recently bought. The big smile that flying put on her face never faded until her father sold the plane. She knew then that she had to do whatever it took to fly again.

Nothing could stop her... Well, life has funny ways to test resolve. Her training was touch and go. She endured three successive flight school closures. But nothing could keep her away from her end goal. Today, she is a helicopter tour pilot and a helicopter flight instructor in Seattle.

The Museum of Flight located on the Boeing Field in Seattle opens a new exhibit: Chasing Horizons–an exhibit about the history of women in the aerospace industry–as part of the Museum’s continuing efforts to feature those who have made contributions to the field of aviation. The story begins with the pioneer French aeronaut Élisabeth Thible, who became the first woman to fly in a balloon in 1784, and it continues through aviation’s Golden Age, World War II and other international conflicts, to contemporary female fighter pilots, aerobats, engineers, and astronauts.