Park Kyung-won

Infobox Korean name

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caption=Park in 1926
hanja=朴敬元
hangul=박경원
rr=Bak Gyeongweon
mr=Pak Kyŏngwŏn

Park Kyung-won (born 24 June, 1901, Daegu, Gyeongsang-do, Korea; died 7 August, 1933, Hakone, Kanagawa) was, along with Kwon Ki-ok of the Republic of China Air Force, one of the earliest Korean female aviators. Though it is generally agreed that Kwon was the first female pilot, Park is still recognised as the first Korean female civilian pilot, as Kwon was trained by the Republic of China Air Force.cite news|url=http://www.chosunonline.com/article/20051016000045|date=2005-10-16|accessdate=2007-05-22|publisher=Chosun Online|title=映画『青燕』、韓国初の女性飛行士めぐり論争 (Movie 'Blue Swallow' and the debate about Korea's first female aviator)] She was the subject of the controversial 2005 South Korean film "Blue Swallow", in which she was portrayed by actress Jang Jin-young.cite news|publisher=Korea Times|last=Kim|first=Tae-jong|url=http://www.koreapop.com/webzine.pfm?mode=review&num=193&code=review|title='Blue Swallow' faces turbulence|date=2006-02-22|accessdate=2007-05-20]

From 1912 to 1916, Park attended Daegu's Myeongsin Women's School, a Presbyterian missionary school operated by Americans; a year after her graduation, on 13 September 1917, she departed her hometown for Japan. Upon her arrival in Japan, she initially settled in Yokohama's Minamiyoshida-machi, where she enrolled in the Kasahara Industrial Training School, spending two and a half years. From 1919, she began attending a Korean church in Yokohama, and later converted to Christianity. In February 1920, she returned to Daegu to enter a nursing school there; though her true aim was to become a pilot, she needed to earn money for the tuition fees first. In January 1925, she returned to Japan, where she finally enrolled in a aviation school in Kamata (present-day Ōta, Tokyo. She had initially hoped to attend the same flight school as An Chang-nam, the first Korean male pilot, but it had burned down in 1923. She graduated and took the test for her third-class pilot's licence on 25 January, 1927; she obtained the licence three days later. On 30 July of the following year, she obtained her second-class pilot's licence.cite news|url=http://www.arirang21.com/news/read.php?idxno=443|publisher=Arirang News|title=우리나라 최초의 여류 비행사 박경원 (Our country's first female pilot, Park Kyung-won)|date=1999-12-25|accessdate=2007-05-23]

On 4 May, 1933, Park was chosen to fly on a new route between Japan and Manchukuo, in a propaganda effort intended to encourage closer ties between the two countries. She flew to Seoul on 19 May to meet with government officials there. At 10:35 AM on of 7 August, 1933, she took off from Tokyo's Haneda Airport on one such flight to Manchuria; she crashed 42 minutes later near Hakone, Kanagawa and died.cite news|url=http://www.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?at_code=299511|title=제국주의의 치어걸, 누가 미화하는가 (Who will try to glorify the cheerleader for imperialism?)|publisher=OhmyNews|date=2005-05-19|last=Jeong|first=Hye-ju|accessdate=2007-05-24]

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