Commemorating a Milestone with an Opportunity

Our inaugural GALA fundraising event held in March 2022 commemorated the 75th anniversary of the first All Woman Air Show hosted at Peter O. Knight Airport in 1949. The special celebration raised scholarship money for young women in the Tampa Bay area to pursue an education in aviation. Generous donations made by significant sponsors of the event were used to fund the scholarship.

This annual event celebrates women in aviation past, present and future by continuing to raise funds each year for this important cause. The GALA Scholarship Fund is named after a local aviation trailblazer, Betty Skelton. Known as “The First Lady of Firsts”, she began her aviation career at Peter O. Knight Airport (TPF) in the 1940s. She flew aerobatics and raced at the first All Woman Air Show in 1949 to help raise awareness of women in aviation after WWII. She was an international aerobatics champion and later became a professional racecar driver for Chevrolet. Betty broke more aviation and automotive records than anyone else in history. Her biplane, “Little Stinker”, hangs in the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, DC.