Edna Emma Bissner Christofferson was an American aviator, markswoman, and radiographer. She was the wife of pioneering aviator Silas Christofferson.
Early life
Edna Christofferson was the daughter of Martin and Mary Elizabeth Bissner, immigrants from Alsace-Lorraine. Upon arriving in the United States, they settled in Pipestone County, Minnesota, where Edna was born in 1886. She had three siblings who died in childhood: Bertha, Edward, and Jack. Two brothers, William and Harry, survived. When Edna was five years old, her family moved to Vancouver, Washington. She attended school at the House of Providence and was interested in becoming a nurse.
Marriage to Rudolph Becker
Edna married Rudolph Becker Jr. in September 1906. Becker was the heir to the Becker Auto Company, a car dealership in Portland, Oregon.
When the Beckers' home caught fire in 1907, Edna Becker ran back into the flaming building to rescue her pet dog. Since the building also housed their auto garage, the fire was estimated to cause 15,000 dollars' worth of damage (over 403,000 dollars today).
In 1909, Edna's friend Hazel Maddux was accused of vehicular manslaughter. Edna, who had seen the collision, was a reluctant witness. Though she freely admitted knowing the driver's identity, she refused to say who it was, claiming that "The woman has an old and kindly mother whose heart would be broken did she know of this." Maddux was found not guilty.
The Beckers' marriage had ended by November 1912, when Edna Becker married Silas Christofferson. Since Rudolph Becker Jr. was still alive, it can be assumed they had divorced.
Marriage to Silas Christofferson
Becker made her first flight in 1911, with Silas Christofferson as her pilot. She sat on the lower wing of his biplane, holding onto a wooden strut for support. They took off from Pearson Field in Vancouver, reaching heights of 500 feet and circling the field twice. The flight lasted eight minutes.
On September 1, 1912, Silas Christofferson made the first hydroplane flight in Oregon, taking off from Oaks Amusement Park. He chose two women, Edna Becker and Mrs. R.F. Cox, to take turns flying with him. By then, Becker was determined to become a pilot and had ordered her own biplane. As she explained, "I have an inordinate craving to fly at a tremendous height, and I intend to indulge myself."
Becker was the second of the women to ride with Silas Christofferson, taking off at 5 PM. With no safety harness, she clung to an aluminum bar with a half-inch diameter. Despite a strong wind, the two reached an altitude of 1,250 feet. Upon landing, they received a standing ovation from the tightly packed crowd.
Edna Becker and Silas Christofferson were married on November 19, 1912, at the King Hill apartments in Portland. The marriage took many of their friends by surprise. An hour after the ceremony, they made a honeymoon flight over the Willamette Valley that lasted thirty minutes.
The Christoffersons moved to San Francisco, where Silas opened a flying school. The school, which relocated to Redwood City in 1914, attracted students from around the world and trained several female pilots.
Though Edna made many flights with Silas as her co-pilot, she did not fly solo during their marriage. After she made a mistake while volplaning, Silas refused to give her further lessons "until she should prove capacity to do the right thing at the time of emergency."
A 1913 article mentioned Edna Christofferson helping her husband prepare planes for an air show, and claimed she "knows pretty near everything there is to know about aeroplanes." A Reno Gazette-Journal article, looking back on Silas's career in 1961, mentioned Edna approving a landing site for Silas, and said that "his wife's advice was sought and always adhered to by the famous airman." After the Christoffersons' friend Lincoln Beachey was killed in 1915, she organized a ceremony to commemorate the one-year anniversary of his death.
On October 31, 1916, Silas was testing a new biplane prototype when his engine died. He glided downward for several hundred feet, then fell the last one hundred feet to the ground. Edna had been watching his flight and was one of the first people to reach him. She directed the men who carried him to the ambulance and accompanied him to the hospital, where he died of internal injuries. Edna arranged for him to be buried alongside Lincoln Beachey in the Cypress Lawn Cemetery. After the funeral, she went to stay with relatives on an Oregon ranch for a year.