Amelia was my mother-in-law.  She was inspired to pursue aviation when, back in the 1930's, she got her first airplane ride in a Cub with Evelyn Sharp, a local pilot who went on to become a WASP during WWII.  She got her master's degree in mathematics and was a programmer for NACA before it became NASA, then quit to start her own flight school.

Her airshow routine at Watsonville was always a crowd-pleaser, as she wrung out her little 150 Aerobat and did things in it that would make most pilots cringe.  Aerobatic pilot Sean Tucker and aviation speaker Rod Machado were among her students.

Amelia was inducted into the EAA Flight Instructor's Hall of Fame in 2001, having taught over 4,000 students to fly and logging over 55,000 hours.  Someone did the figures and estimated that she had two years' time in L-2's on downwind for Runway 31 at Reid-Hillvew Airport in San Jose, her home drome.  That's a lot of L-2 time!