January 16, 1929 Aviatrix Bobbi Trout sent a letter to Orville Wright, chair of the National Aeronautic Association Contest Committee, demanding that a separate class of records for women be reinstated. Wright and others contended that special women’s records should not be recognized even though women were not permitted to compete in powerful planes “inappropriate to the fair sex”. For example, Opal Kunz was not allowed to fly her Travel Air in the first Powderpuff Derby because it was “too fast for a woman to fly.”
