Keeping Legends Alive: How Honoring Bessie Coleman Still Takes Flight

January 27, 2026,(Dallas, TX) – Some legacies are preserved in books or museum cases. Others are carried—quite literally—by the people who refuse to let them fade.

Bessie Coleman’s legacy lives in that second category.

Born in Atlanta, Texas, Bessie Coleman grew up far from the cockpits she would one day command. When flight schools in the United States denied her admission because she was both Black and a woman, she did something extraordinary: she learned French, crossed the Atlantic, and earned her pilot’s license in France in 1921. In doing so, she became the first Black woman and the first Native American woman pilot, leaving a legacy that continues to lift others toward the sky.

A century later, her story still resonates because it is not just about flight. It is about resolve, imagination, and the courage to claim space where none was offered.

That story is being kept alive by Gigi Coleman, Bessie’s great-niece, who has made it her life’s work to ensure her aunt is remembered not as a distant historical figure, but as a real person with a real dream. Through a deeply personal one-woman presentation, Gigi brings Bessie’s journey to audiences across the country.

This February, that living legacy will take flight in Dallas when Gigi Coleman appears at the Henry B. Tippie National Aviation Education Center as part of its Black History Month programming. It is a fitting moment: a Texas-born aviation pioneer, remembered in her home state through the voice of family.

There is something profoundly moving about that kind of remembrance.

At airshows nationwide, Living Historians often wear uniforms, or parts of uniforms, that once belonged to family members. A jacket passed down. A set of wings earned long ago. These garments are more than fabric; they are vessels of memory, responsibility, and pride.

Gigi Coleman’s work carries that same weight. She does not just tell Bessie Coleman’s story—she inhabits it, protects it, and passes it forward. In doing so, she transforms history from something we observe into something we feel.

The Henry B. Tippie National Aviation Education Center exists to spark that kind of connection. By pairing education with storytelling and lived experience, it reminds us that honoring legends is not about nostalgia—it’s about continuity. It’s about ensuring that courage, perseverance, and vision are not lost between generations.

Bessie Coleman once refused to accept “no” as an answer. Today, through the dedication of her family and educators committed to keeping history human, her voice still echoes—lifting new dreams skyward.