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Some basic facts for you. She was born in September 1886. In 1911, aged 25, she passed her flying test in spite of considerable efforts by male comrades to sabotage her with lighthearted practical jokes like draining fuel from her tank, loosening control wires, or replacing fresh sparking plugs with clogged ones. Injured in several crashes - not unusual in those days - she went on to construct her own aircraft based on the Rumpler Taube, and build several under license. She started her own flying school, the only one of the day to boast not one single serious accident or fatality! Her courage became a legend. She later married the French aviator and aircraft constructor, Charles Boutard. Stunningly beautiful, determined and enormously talented, she attracted many enemies, many of whom could be found amongst the ranks of her own jealous and envious fellow flyers and comrades.
The marriage disintegrated. Deeply depressed, disillusioned and in complete and utter despair, her courage finally failed her. A few days before Christmas in 1925, on the evening of 22 December, she placed the muzzle of a revolver against her temple and pulled the trigger. As I began to delve deeper into researching Melli, she slowly developed from an historical figure, a name in a book with a few faded photographs, to a real, three dimensional, and very special person. She was one of the bravest women of all time, and her story deserves to be told in full. As a tribute to her, I've been working on a novel based on her life. If you have any knowledge of her, or if you know of other, unpublished photographs of Melli or people she would have known, I could use any help I can get! It's very difficult to research a lady dead for three quarters of a century. Nobody who knew her personally is still alive today. I'm specifically trying to discover the name of the photographer who must have followed all the happenings in those pre WW-I days at Johannesthal. History is also very vague about what later became of her husband, Charles Boutard, whose design for a single-seat high performance aircraft (MB-Boutard-Monoplace) appears to have been stolen by Fokker and used as a basis for the famous Eindecker fighters. Melli's personal and patented design for an entirely feasible single engined flying boat, along with the finished prototype, also mysteriously disappeared from her workshop after she was arrested. The similarities between the Melli-Beese Flugyacht and the first Dornier flying boat stretch coincidence too far...
Left: A model of Charles Boutard's MB-Monoplace. Right: Fokker E-I. Curious resemblance , don't you agree?
The fearful injustices heaped upon Melli Beese and her husband by the authorities, eventually causing her to take her own life, can never be put right again. But she has a tale to tell, and she can't do it by herself... If you stumbled on this page by accident, thank you for taking a few seconds to read this far. If you were looking for her deliberately, well, perhaps you'll enjoy my efforts to bring her back for you, if and when my book makes it as far as publication. I hope so. Please get in touch with me if you think you could help!
Michael Graham, July 2001
Copyright © 2001 by Mike Graham. All rights reserved.
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You may never have heard of her. 
When
war was declared in 1914, Melli Beese, married to a French citizen, was declared an
enemy of the state. Her license was rescinded, and her husband was interned for
the duration of the war. Her business at Johannesthal was forcibly closed down,
and she was not even permitted to enter the aerodrome area. When hostilities ended in 1918, she was still
considered persona non grata, and never permitted to fly again.