Pancho Barnes Legend is Committed to Film With Pancho Barnes and The Happy Bottom Riding Club
By S. Mark Rhodes
The great Pancho at the peak of her profane glory. (Courtesy of the Pancho Barnes Trust Estate)If there was ever a figure worthy of cult status in the aviation world, that individual must be Florence “Pancho” Barnes. Barnes is probably best known as a character in Tom Wolfe’s The Right Stuff as well as the film version (played by Kim Stanley). The time frame of the book and especially the film pick up at a point in Barnes’ life where she is the owner and operator of the “Happy Bottom Riding Club.” The HBRC was basically a saloon out in the middle of the Mohave Dessert, which catered to the flyers at Muroc Field (later Edwards Air Force Base) who happened to be some of the finest and most legendary test pilots of the time like Chuck Yeager, Scott Crosffield and Buzz Aldrin. Barnes held court at this raucous bar and “dude ranch” for many years helping provide emotional and libational support to this elite group of aviators.
The recently released Pancho Barnes and the Happy Bottom Riding Club (Nick Spark Productions) helps give a full picture of Barnes that has only been hinted at in The Right Stuff. Barnes grew up in a kind of blue blood family in Pasadena, California where she was expected to become a society lady like her mother. This was not to be as the young Florence showed an adventuresome streak that was at considerable odds with her mom’s idea of how a young woman should conduct herself in public.
The film also points out an interesting and key connection between Florence and her grandfather, Prof. Thad S.C. Lowe who was a pioneer of American Aviation by helping establish the Union Army Balloon Corps during the American Civil War. The film points out that her grandfather helped influence not only her interest in pursuing adventure, but aviation which was a new sensation during Barnes’ adolescence.
Barnes was pressured into a doomed marriage with a clergyman who was predictably not thrilled by Barnes’ un-ladylike persona and interests. The marriage was quickly on the rocks and Florence even went AWOL to Mexico as a stowaway for a number of months (getting her famous nickname in the process). Later, Barnes influenced by a cousin who was a pilot, famously soloed after 6 (!) hours of instruction.
Naturally, Barnes was not simply content to be a pilot; she longed to compete and quickly became a minor celebrity as a prize-winning and record-setting aviatrix as well as a stunt pilot who worked in such high profile projects as Howard Hughes’ Hell’s Angels.
The film does a good job of showing all sides of Barnes such as her profane and even vulgar side (greeting people half-naked, turning cursing into an art form), her protective side (giving out free drinks to underpaid pilots) and her influential side (a good word from her to a General could advance a young pilot’s career overnight). It also documents the sad run of bad luck that Pancho had when the U.S. brass brought allegations against her that (among other things) hinted that she ran a ring of prostitution out of her saloon.
Pancho with some of her disciples including the great Chuck Yeager. (Photo courtesy of Pancho Barnes Trust Estate)Film Producer and journalist Nick Spark (along with Director Amanda Pope) puts together an impressive roster of interviewees including Mr. Right Stuff himself, Chuck Yeager as well as NASA legend Buzz Aldrin to reminisce about their time in the Mojave and their relationship with Pancho (Oscar Winner Kathy Bates provides a pitch perfect vocal performance as Pancho in the film’s narrations). Equally impressive is the amazing footage that Sparks has used which helps give real energy to the film and lifts it above more pedestrian bio-docs on cable.
The DVD has some extras like a commentary track by Spark and Pope as well as about 20 extra minutes of footage. There are two versions of the film here; a slightly longer, “extended” version, which goes into some of the racy material in Pancho’s life in greater detail. There are far too few narratives celebrating women in aviation so this one is well worth checking out.
(For more on the film see www.panchobarnesfilm.com)
