Amelia Earhart’s Derry landing celebrated in giant new street art

A mural celebrating Londonderry’s place in aviation history has been unveiled during a four-day street art festival in the city.

The Amelia Earhart artwork – thought to be Northern Ireland’s tallest mural – can be seen on the side of the North West Regional College’s Foyle building.

It’s the work of North Carolina street artist Jeks, one of a number of artists in Derry for the Get Up Street Art Festival, which is featuring as part of the Foyle Maritime Festival programme.

Festival-goers have been watching the piece as it has been created over the weekend.

Almost a century ago Ms Earhart touched down in the city, becoming the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic.

Nicole McElhinney of the Amelia Earhart Legacy Association said the organisation is “absolutely delighted” with the mural.

“It’s something we have always wanted to see, we have been very excited watching it coming together,” she told BBC News NI.

Ms Earhart, she said, is more than befitting of the artistic honour, adding that the pioneering pilot had truly “broken the glass ceiling”.

She was flying planes at a time “when so very few women even drove a car,” Ms McElhinney said.

In May 1932, Amelia Earhart had taken off from Newfoundland in Canada, attempting to become the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic.

Hoping to land in Paris, bad weather and technical problems altered her course.

Her 14-hour journey ended abruptly when she was forced to bring her Lockheed Vega 5B plane down in the Gallagher family’s field on the outskirts of Derry.

There she stayed the night, later writing that having landed without any money, Mr Gallagher, “owner of the field in which I landed, assured me, however, that I had no occasion to worry about money ‘as we will see you through'”.

Artist Jeks started work on the mural – which the local council claim is the tallest in Northern Ireland – on Thursday, using a cherry picker to get to its near rooftop location.

Derry City and Strabane District Council’s head of culture Aeidin McCarter said it was one of a number of “striking pieces” created during the festival.

She added: “It’s only fitting that we celebrate this iconic female pioneer who has such strong associations with the city, and what a wonderful way to do it”.

Five years after her landing in Gallagher’s field, Ms Earhart vanished during her attempt to fly around the globe, leaving no trace.

The new mural is now among a number of homages to the aviator in Derry.

She is remembered by the street names Earhart Park and Amelia Court, while in 2019 the Amelia Earhart Legacy Association unveiled a plaque outside the former Northern Counties Hotel, where a post landing press conference was held back in 1932.

Ms Earhart’s links to Derry have been remembered before in an artistic sense in the city.

A mural by artist Joe Campbell was unveiled close to her landing site during a series of events to mark the 90th anniversary of her Derry landing.

The Amelia Earhart Legacy Association, who worked with street art collective Peaball in the planning stages of the mural, says there are plans to further honour the aviator in the city.

They hope to soon see an Amelia Earhart statue erected in Derry, funding permitting.

“She doesn’t have the prominence here that she does in the US, there doesn’t seem to be the same momentum here to honour her in the way that America has,” Nicole McElhinney said.

“What she did when she landed here was a huge achievement, there is so much potential in the association with her especially in terms of tourism,” she added.

Derry now boasts a growing gallery of street art.

The city’s factory girls, who worked in the city’s once thriving shirt-making industry, punk icons The Undertones, footballer James McClean and the characters of comedy Derry Girls have all been immortalised in murals in recent years.