The disappearance of famed woman aviator Ameila Earhart has long been on of America’s great mysteries. Like Jimmy Hoffa, Earhart seemed to vanish into thin air.  Well, we do know she was in the air, attempting to fly her Lockheed Electra around the world in 1937 when she suddenly vanished.  All radio communication ceased and it has long been assumed that she and her navigator, Fred Noonan, crashed somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.  On 1 June 1 1937, Earhart and Noonan took off from Miami, Florida. The last time they were heard from was when they made a stop in Lae, New Guinea on June 29, 1937, with only 7,000 miles of the trip left. While a great deal of mystery surrounds her, her contributions to aviation and women’s issues have inspired people for over 80 years.

Earhart began flying in 1920, and broke the women’s altitude record in 1922. In 1928 she was invited to be the first woman to fly across the Atlantic and became an international celebrity. In May 1932 she became the first woman to fly solo across in the Atlantic. Earhart promoted aviation and helped found the Ninety-Nines, an organization dedicated to female aviators.

A Chamorro man with ties to Saipan shared a theory about Amelia Earhart being a Japanese prisoner in Saipan that was told to him by an uncle who worked at the prison where she may have been held at. William “Bill” Sablan, who lives on Chamorro, said his uncle Tun Akin Tuho worked at the prison where Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan were taken prisoner in Saipan.   Tuho told Sablan that their arrival caused quite a commotion. Saipan was a hub for the Japanese, but it was rare to see white people on the island. “They had no reason to be there,” Sablan said.

The theory that Earhart and Noonan were captured by the Japanese after their plane crashed into the Pacific Ocean in one of several that have been around for awhile. But Sablan’s  story fits with the theory brought to light by the History Channel’s documentary titled Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence. In the TV special, historians purport that the U.S. government knew that Earhart was captured and killed by the Japanese, and that the government even found and exhumed her body before lying about her fate for decades.  Sablan that Earhart’s plane dropped into the ocean before she and Noonan were captured and arrested. His story is one of dozens of alleged witnesses, who have told of their possible run-ins with Earhart in several different places, under multiple circumstances.  Representatives from the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, told the New York Times that Earhart possibly landed on the island of Nikumaroro, transmitting distress signals in hopes of a rescue, but ultimately ending up stranded.  A famous photo fits with the theory that Earhart was captured in the South Pacific, showing the profile of a white woman with cropped hair sitting on a dock in the Marshall Islands. Some believe that her plane can be seen in the background of the photo, but not all agree that it’s strong evidence. A Japanese blogger said that Earhart couldn’t possibly be the one in the photo, since he says it was published two years before her disappearance.

Saban’s uncle, Tun Akin Tuho. claimed that Amelia Earhart and her navigator were executed by the Japanese government to avoid an international incident, and the US played along. The story is Earhart and Noonan were killed on the island of Saipan, now a US commonwealth, after their disappearance in 1937.  Saban claims that Earhart’s body was retrieved by the US military – which may have hidden her killing to keep the peace.

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