Fred Noonan

Do you know who Fred Noonan was? No, he wasn’t Ricky and Lucy’s neighbor, that was Fred Mertz. Most people don’t know who Fred Noonan was, and a lot of people don’t even realize that there was such a person.
Almost every American knows who Amelia Earhart was, and even knows of her final fate. She departed Miami, Florida on June 1st, 1937 with the intention of flying around the world. She flew to South America, then to Africa, then to India, Southeast Asia, and then New Guinea. She took off from Lae, New Guinea on the 2nd of July, having traveled most of the way around the world, with her next scheduled stop at Howland Island in the Pacific, just north of the equator. She never made it. The US Coast Guard Cutter Itasca was on station near Howland, to try to guide her in. They were able to establish radio contact, but not visual contact. Radar hadn’t been invented yet, and the Itasca was unable to guide her in without knowing where she was. At least at one point of their communications, her radio signal was very strong, so she was close, but evidently not close enough.
What does this have to do with Fred Noonan? Allow me to make a comparison between Amelia Earhart and Charles Lindbergh (not that I would be the first to do so). Lucky Lindy is noted for the first solo non-stop transatlantic flight. Notice the use of the word, ‘solo.’ Lindbergh was alone on the flight that he is famous for. Earhart did quite a bit of solo flying (including a non-stop transatlantic flight, 5 years after Lindy), but you never hear the word solo applied to her attempt to circumnavigate the globe. That’s because she didn’t fly alone; she had Fred Noonan with her as navigator.
The point is, usually when you hear about Amelia Earhart, you hear about her, or your hear about her and her plane. Fred Noonan wasn’t piloting the plane; he was just giving her directions. Is he important to the story? That depends on who you talk to. To a lot of people, the story is about her, he’s just a supporting player, so it’s okay not to mention him. Some people think that he is important, because they are both dead, and his life was not any less important than hers, even though she is the one that acquired fame through her adventures in the air.
In John 20:1, we are told that Mary Magdalene went to the sepulcher, and finding the tomb empty, went back and told Peter and John, who then accompanied her back to the tomb. Now, Matthew 28:1 says that “the other Mary” was with Mary Magdalene, and they went to the sepulcher together. Mark 16:1 says that Mary the mother of James, and Salome were with Mary Magdalene. Luke 24 tells us that it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and “other women.” Some people get very uptight about the fact that John didn’t mention any of these other women, Matthew tells us of another Mary (presumably the mother of James), but not Salome or Joanna… Some would say that the four gospel accounts contradict each other, even though John never says that Mary Magdalene went to the tomb alone. Someone said that, following that “weak” logic, I could say that Elvis Presley went with Mary to the tomb. I suppose you could say that, but, by the same token, following your logic, I could say that Elvis was on the plane with Amelia Earhart, too. He would have been two years old, and his surviving that flight would have been nothing short of miraculous, but, you know, as long as you want to be silly, I can be silly, too.