Dates

• Existence: 1897 August 15 - 1939 April 19

Biographical Note: Ruth Wightman

Ruth Wightman was an aviator, autocar racer, and scenario writer for Samuel Goldwyn Studio in Los Angeles, California during the early part of the 20th century.

Ruth Wightman was born on August 15, 1897, in Falconer, New York to John and Lulu Wightman. The family traveled around the United States where her mother gave talks on equal rights. As a young girl, she would attend her mother’s free speech demonstrations and actively took part in the rallies. She and her family eventually settled down in Los Angeles, California in 1912.

In the early part of 1917 Wightman began taking flying lessons from Clarence Oliver Prest at the Riverside Aircraft Company in Riverside, California. She was a highly skilled flyer and was active in the early aviation scene. Despite the limited employment opportunities for women in the field, in October of 1917, Wightman took on a position with the Aviation Section, United States Signal Corps at the Wright Martin factory to inspect the materials used in the interior of the Wright-Martin Model V. In the following years she competed in the first legal women’s auto racing event in 1918, worked as a scenario writer for the 1921 films, The Beautiful Liar and The Ace of Hearts, and in 1925, traveled to Madrid, Spain to train as a bull fighter.

Wightman married pulp author Gouverneur Morris the IV in 1928. They lived in Los Angeles, as well as their home in Papeete, Tahiti. Wightman passed away on April 19, 1939, in New Mexico.

Biographical note derived from collection information, records on Ancestry.com, and Greenwald, John A. Wild Bird, the True Jazz Age Tale of Ruth Wightman Morris. California: Hawk Tower Press, 2016.

Places

• New York (State) (Place of Birth)
• Los Angeles (Calif.) (Residence)
• California (Residence)

Found in 2 Collections and/or Records: