Amelia Earhart's Shoes: Is the Mystery Solved?

by Thomas F. King, Randall S. Jacobson, Karen Ramey Burns

In this spellbinding book, these scholars offer tantalizing evidence that the First Lady of the Air and her copilot Fred Noonan landed on a deserted tropical island but perished before they could be rescued.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

448 pages, Hardcover

First published October 25, 2001

Reviews

[Kathrina · Rating 4 out of 5]

I stumbled across this book after my 6th grade son's passing interest in a blurb he read about Earhart in school. My vague view of her, as an icon of women's history and aviation lore, wasn't enough to answer some of his questions, so I decided to educate myself. Wow, I had no idea there was so much current action surrounding the mystery of her historic flight!
This book, published in 2004, concerns the archaeological research of a group called TIGHAR, dedicated to finding evidence proving that Earhart met her end as a castaway on a small, uninhabited island in the South Pacific. They posit that Earhart missed her original landing mark, and made an emergency landing on a reef-shelf of an island further down her trajectory, and that she continued to make radio distress calls for several days after her loss date, until her plane was (possibly) destroyed by the tide. TIGHAR makes quite a convincing argument, including archaeological and forensic evidence, as well as anecdotal evidence of colonial inhabitants who entered the area only months after Earhart was declared lost. What's even more exciting is that TIGHAR's research continues now. Their last mission to the island happened just this last summer, and a Discovery Channel exclusive will air November 29th, the Monday after Thanksgiving, disclosing their latest findings. Oh blessed serendipity, I will be tuning in!
The book is a great, fully accessible read, but I found the picture-printing quality pretty bad. Luckily, TIGHAR maintains a great website with clear and useful photographs, and a nice 20 minute video overview of their project. How exciting to seek out some historical information and find yourself inside a current forensic investigation!

[Steve Van Slyke · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my third Earhart book. I previously read Amelia Earhart by Elgen Long and Finding Amelia: The True Story of the Earhart Disappearance With DVD by Ric Gillespie. Although I didn't plan it this way, in retrospect, it was a good sequence.

Long's book provides the case for what I call "The Null Hypothesis" and what others call the "Crashed and Sank" hypothesis. It is essentially the default hypothesis that must be proven wrong by other theories.

Gillespie's book provides the background for the strongest case against the null hypothesis and it is called the "Nikumaroro Hypothesis" although I don't think Gillespie himself ever refers to it as such. In fact, Gillespie never really argues for it but rather lays out all the facts and data that might lead one to the conclusion that Earhart and Noonan managed to land safely on the reef flat of Nikumaroro Island 350 miles south of Howland Island, the original destination.

In this book by Tom King, an associate of Gillespie, the specific, detailed case in favor of the Niku hypothesis is laid out with summaries of all the research that has been done for the last twenty years, including all of the physical and anecdotal evidence that has been collected, which is considerable.

Although King clearly believes that the hypothesis is correct, he does a highly commendable job of raising all of the tough questions that the hypothesis fails to fully answer. And as I said in my reviews of the other two books, King ends by admitting that "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." And thus, King, Gillespie and their research organization, TIGHAR, are planning yet another expedition in 2015 to Niku to search for the "smoking gun," which could be an unmistakable part of Earhart's Lockheed Electra, or bones with DNA that matched either hers or Noonan's. My wife and I will have the pleasure of being at Niku for a few days during their expedition.

I would highly recommend reading Gillespie's book and Long's as well before reading this one in order to give the reader the overall context of Earhart's World Flight. King's book assumes a degree of prior knowledge of the subject.

[Devinne · Rating 3 out of 5]

As an anthropology student who had to read this for a class, I found this book rather compelling. The storytelling was easy to read and not over complex like other ethnographies can be. But, I do have to say at the end of the book, they become extremely repetitive and repeat details we already know. If this is geared toward a general audience, they can't assume that the audience is that forgetful. Or if they are, it's not a good idea.
The team presents an interesting assessment of where Amelia and Noonan were killed. But they seem to put the general populous on a low pedistal and raise themselves up as all knowing archaeologists.
Overall an interesting read for those who are casually interested in the process of archaeology but perhaps not so much for those seriously considering working in the field.

[Suze · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was impressed with the formidable team of authors who represent archeological research, geophysical oceanography, forensic anthropology of human remains, and remote sensing engineering. They are reporting on behalf of a much larger team who has, over the past twenty-plus years, investigated the intriguing hypothesis that Amelia Earhart and her navigator landed on Nikumaroro Island and survived for awhile. The “shoe” of the title refers to one similar to those Amelia wore, found on the island, along with other possible evidence and uncovered stories told by the inhabitants of the late 1930s & 40s. Although written accessibly and often with a light touch, it was a bit too excruciatingly detailed for me, and I found myself frequently skimming.

[Carolb · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm fascinated by Amelia Earhart so I thoroughly enjoyed this read. This book is fascinating not only in respects to the subject matter (Amelia, of course!), but also in detailing how an investigation of this magnitude progresses and how all the loose ends, questions, suppositions, etc, need to be followed up and accounted for.

I highly recommend this book for anyone even remotely interested in Amelia Earhart.

[Shayla · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was very interesting and I learned a lot about Amelia Earhart. This book is about a shoe found on an island that could very well have been Amelia Earhart's. The book goes through Earhart's entire flight up until she was lost. It talks about her and what people thought of her. On the island with the shoe, they also found evidence of a plane crash and bones that could have been Earhart's. Of course, we don't know for sure. This book has very interesting theories though.

[Kate Lawrence · Rating 5 out of 5]

This definitely kept me engrossed--a bit like going on a South Seas adventure myself! I was impressed with the scientific discipline of the search team; they were thorough and very careful not to jump to conclusions without hard data. I'm convinced that the landed-on-a-nearby-island-and-later-died is the most likely scenario of what happened to Earhart.

[Veronica Pacheco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Where in the world is Amelia Earhart? It just seems like the world has no idea. This book written by Thomas F. King is a very well-written novel on the possible theories and research that was put into the Earhart Project and the explanation that can very well say what happened to this heroic icon.

[Whitaker · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really great book shows us how everything is great and worth to die for

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Couldn't put this down. I am very interested in Amelia Earhart lore. But it seems like TIGHAR is really stretching to make their hypothesis work. Let me know if they ever find a plane...

[M · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was interesting. But honestly I only read it because of a class I am teaching. I most likely would not have picked it up otherwise.

[Susan · Rating 2 out of 5]

a little dry. I perused the last half of the book and called it done.