Meet the extraordinary female British aviation pioneer Pauline Gower. A writer as well as a pilot, Gower first flew with another British aviation pioneer Alan Cobham and was fascinated by flying. In 1931 she met Dorothy Spicer, with whom she established an air taxi service in Kent. She was one of only three liscened pilots allowed to carry passenger for ‘hire and reward’ (aka money, I suppose). Work, though, was scare and she wound up lying in air circuses and pageants. On the outbreak of the World War 2, Gower made use of her high-level connections to propose the establishment of a women’s section in the new Air Transport Auxiliary —the ATA would be responsible for ferrying military aircraft from factory or repair facility to storage unit or operational unit—to the authorities.

As an author, she was responsible for, among other works, a book called ‘Piffling Poems For Pilots’, which I currently am on the hunt for. She died young (thirty-six) giving birth and as far as I can tell is a forgotten figure today. Enjoy the view above of her and Spicer in the years of their business. The big question: why is the film named after somebody named ‘Eve’? Perhaps an arcane British reference? We’d have to ask a 100 year old Brit…and they’re notoriously tight-lipped…