Suzanne Asbury-Oliver began flying gliders at age 14 while attending junior high school near Portland, Oregon. At 15, she soled and by 18, she was certified as a flight
instructor. She also holds an Airline Transport Pilot rating. She has logged over 5,500 flying hours and her most enjoyable flying hours were spent in the 1929 open cockpit Travel Air Pepsi Skywriter biplane.
“I fell in love with the open cockpit flying,” says Asbury-Oliver. “Most pilots stare out at the sky through two layers of dirty Plexiglas. But in the open cockpit, there is just the sky, the wind, the cold, the ground, and me.”
The 1929 Travel Air D4D open cockpit biplane, flown by Suzanne for most of her skywriting career, has a spectacular history but after some 80 active years on the job, it was retired in 2000 and now hangs from the ceiling at the Smithsonian’s new National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center at Dulles Airport.
Today, Suzanne partners with SkyMagic for most of her skywriting sorties. She is the nation’s only female professional skywriter, and her aerial artistry – painted on a canvas some 10,000 feet high – dazzles many. Millions have met Suzanne through national media attention such as the Today Show, US Magazine, People Magazine, and front page coverage in the Wall Street Journal. It’s all in a day’s work to Suzanne Asbury-Oliver.
“Skywriting is very much like a dance routine,” says Asbury-Oliver. “I count off seconds just like a dancer would count off steps. Everything is choreographed. Timing is essential. Lose count, no matter what the distraction, and you count on failing at skywriting.”
