Quick Facts
Aries
Biography
Sabiha Gökçen (Turkish: [sabiha ɟœctʃæn]; 22 March 1913 – 22 March 2001) was a Turkish aviator. She was the world's first female fighter pilot, aged 23. Others such as Marie Marvingt and Evgeniya Shakhovskaya preceded her as military pilots in other roles, but not as fighter pilots and without military academy enrollment. She was an orphan, and one of the eight adopted children of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.
She is recognized as the first female combat pilot by The Guinness Book of World Records and was selected as the only female pilot for the poster of "The 20 Greatest Aviators in History" published by the United States Air Force in 1996.
Early life
According to official Turkish sources and interviews with Sabiha Gökçen, she was the daughter of Mustafa Izzet Bey and Hayriye Hanım, both of whom were of Bosniak origin. During Atatürk's visit to Bursa in 1925, Sabiha, who was only twelve years old, asked for permission to talk with Atatürk and expressed her wish to study at a boarding school. After learning her story and about her miserable living conditions, Atatürk decided to adopt her and asked Sabiha's brother for permission to take her to the Çankaya Presidential Residence in Ankara, where Sabiha would live with Atatürk's other adoptive daughters, Zehra, Afet and Rukiye. Sabiha attended the Çankaya Primary School in Ankara and the Üsküdar American Academy in Istanbul.
In February 2004 an article in the newspaper Agos, headlined "The Secret of Sabiha Hatun", contained an interview with Hripsime Sebilciyan, a former resident of Gaziantep, who claimed to be Gökçen's niece and that Gökçen herself was of Armenian ancestry. Mustafa Kemal had also adopted Gökçen, who was in an orphanage shortly after the Armenian Genocide. According to Turkish-Armenian linguist Pars Tuğlacı, who deemed Sebilciyan's claim false, Gökçen herself found out about her Armenian roots while in Ankara, when members of her family contacted her from Beirut. It is claimed that Gökçen visited her Armenian relatives in Beirut and had four brothers, Sarkis, Boğos, Haçik and Hovhannes.
However, along with Turkish sources and interviews with Sabiha, her adopted sister Ülkü Adatepe, also in an interview, disputed these claims and reiterated that Sabiha and her both parents, Mustafa İzzet Bey and Hayriye Hanım, were of Bosniak ancestry.
After the introduction of the Surname Law, Atatürk gave her the family name Gökçen on 19 December 1934. 'Gök' means sky in Turkish and Gökçen means 'belonging or relating to the sky'. However, she was not an aviator at that time, and it was only six months later that Sabiha developed a passion for flying.
Career
Atatürk attached great importance to aviation and for that purpose oversaw the foundation of the Turkish Aeronautical Association in 1925. He took Sabiha along with him to the opening ceremony of Türkkuşu (Turkishbird) Flight School on 5 May 1935. During the airshow of gliders and parachutists invited from foreign countries, she got very excited. As Atatürk asked her whether she would also want to become a skydiver, she nodded "yes indeed, I am ready right now". Atatürk instructed Fuat Bulca, the head of the school, to enroll her as the first female trainee. She was meant to become a skydiver, but she was much more interested in flying, so she earned her pilot's licence. Gökçen was sent to Russia, together with seven male students, for an advanced course in glider and powered aircraft piloting. However, when she was in Moscow, she learned the news that her sister Zehra had died, and with collapsed morale, she immediately returned to Turkey, isolating herself from social activities for some time.
As girls were not being accepted by the Turkish War Academies in those years, Sabiha Gökçen was provided, on Atatürk's orders, with a personalized uniform, and attended a special education programme of eleven months at the Tayyare Mektebi (Aviation School) in Eskişehir in the academic year 1936-1937. After receiving her flight patents (diploma) she trained to become a war pilot at the 1st Airplane Regiment in Eskişehir for six months.
She improved her skills by flying bomber and fighter planes at the 1st Aircraft Regiment in Eskişehir Airbase and gained experience after participating in the Aegean and Thrace exercises in 1937. In that same year, she took part in military operations at the Dersim rebellion and became the first Turkish female air force combat pilot. A report of the General Staff mentioned the "serious damage" that had been caused by her 50 kg bomb to a group of fifty fleeing "bandits" and she was awarded with a takdirname (letter of appreciation). She was also awarded the Turkish Aeronautical Association's first "Murassa (Jeweled) Medal" for her superior performance in this operation.
In 1938, she carried out a five-day flight around the Balkan countries to great acclaim. In the same year, she was appointed "chief trainer" of the Türkkuşu Flight School of the Turkish Aeronautical Association, where she served until 1954 as a flight instructor and became a member of the association's executive board. She trained four female aviators, Edibe Subaşı, Yıldız Uçman, Sahavet Karapas and Nezihe Viranyalı. Sabiha Gökçen flew around the world for a period of 28 years until 1964. Her book entitled "A Life Along the Path of Atatürk" was published in 1981 by the Turkish Aeronautical Association to commemorate Atatürk's 100th birthday.
Throughout her career in the Turkish Air Force, Gökçen flew 22 different types of aircraft for more than 8,000 hours, 32 hours of which were active combat and bombardment missions.
Controversies
Gökçen made headlines and sparked controversy, in 2004, when Hrant Dink, a journalist of Turkish-Armenian descent, published an interview with a person claiming to be Sabiha's niece that claimed that she was of Armenian origin. Many contested the matter, including her adopted sister and the last living daughter of Atatürk, Ülkü Adatepe, disputing this during an interview and stating that Sabiha was of Bosniak ancestry. According to Adatepe, Sabiha's mother Hayriye and father Mustafa İzzet were ethnic Bosniaks. The notion that Gökçen could have been Armenian caused controversy in the country; the Turkish General Staff said the debate "mocked national values" and was "not conducive to social peace". Hrant Dink, the journalist who wrote the article, came under criticism, most notably from newspaper columnists and Turkish nationalist groups. A US consul dispatch leaked by WikiLeaks and penned by an official from the consulate in Istanbul observed that the entire affair "exposed an ugly streak of racism in Turkish society." It is also believed that the affair was one of the reasons that led to Hrant Dink's assassination in Istanbul in January 2007.
Legacy and recognition
Sabiha Gökçen International Airport in Istanbul is named after her.
She is recognized as the first female combat pilot by The Guinness Book of World Records.
She was selected as the only female pilot for the poster of "The 20 Greatest Aviators in History" published by the United States Air Force in 1996.
That year, she was also honored at the Air Command and Staff College's Gathering of Eagles at Maxwell Air Force Base. The program encourages the study of aviation history by emphasizing the contributions of aviation pioneers.
She was the subject of a Google Doodle honouring her birthday which was displayed in Turkey on 22 March 2009.