Clevelander Blanche Noyes stands in front of her plane, "The Miss Cleveland," which she used in the 1929 Women's "Powder Puff" Air Derby. The all-woman derby began in Santa Monica, California and ended in Cleveland in front of the crowd at the National Air Races. The Halle Brothers department store sponsored Noyes. Earlier in 1929, Noyes became the first woman to receive a pilot's license in Ohio.
Noyes's most memorable race was the 1936 Bendix Trophy Race from New York to Los Angeles. Noyes and co-pilot Louise Thaden (the winner of the 1929 Women's Air Derby) won the race in the first year that women pilots were allowed to compete with men.
