Laura Ingalls

Laura Ingalls became one of the best pilots of her day.  She set a round-trip transcontinental record for women. In addition, she flew solo around the rim of South America, hopping the Andes in a Lockheed Air Express. She received a Harman Trophy for this feat. And then, according to C. R. Roseberry, her friends watched incredulously while she destroyed herself.

America First Movement

It began, as with Lindbergh, when Laura Ingalls involved herself in the America First movement. She addressed meetings until the public labeled her Isolationist Aviator Number 2.  Clearly, the next step sealed her fate.  Washington possessed restricted zones.  Flying over them was strictly forbidden. In 1939, Laura planned to drop America First anti-war leaflets from her aircraft.  She ignored the restricted zones and swooped low over the White House.  CAA officials, waiting at the airport, demanded she show cause why her license should not be revoked. Laura insisted that patriotic fervor stood as her motive.  Further, she confessed she knew nothing of the restricted zones. The CAA declared she possessed disturbing deficiencies in her knowledge and suspended her license.  To win it back, she needed to pass an exam on Civil Air Regulations.

A Spy?

Immediately after Pearl Harbor, the FBI arrested Laura Ingalls. They charged her with being a paid agent of Germany and failing to register as such. Agents who shadowed her testified that she used direct quotes from Mein Kampf in her speeches.  Witnesses depicted her as an intense Nazi sympathizer who wore a swastika pendant and referred to Hitler as a marvelous man. Letters introduced into evidence showed she signed with a Heil Hitler. Laura did not deny that she had been on the payroll of the German Embassy.  Once again, she used patriotic motives to obtain counterespionage information for the United States.  Further, Laura described herself melodramatically as an international Mata Hari.  In the end, the court convicted Laura in 1941.  She served a prison term from which she was released in 1943 to fade into the shadows.