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Other documents randomly have
different content
At the Lewistown fair we obtained a field adjoining the fairgrounds
and did a rushing business for three days. We had arranged for the
fence to be opened to the grounds and for a gateman to give return
tickets to anyone who wished to ride in the plane. All this in return
for a free parachute drop.
At Billings, however, our field was some distance from the fair and
we decided to devise some scheme to bring the crowd out to us. We
stuffed a dummy with straw and enough mud to give it sufficient
falling speed to look like a human being.
When the grandstands were packed that afternoon we took-off from
our field with the dummy in the front cockpit with me. I went out on
the wing and we did a few stunts over the fairgrounds to get
everyone’s attention, then Lynch turned the plane so that no one
could see me on the wing and we threw out the dummy. It fell
waving its arms and legs around wildly and landed near the
Yellowstone River.
We returned to our field and waited expectantly for the curious ones
to come rushing out for information, but two hours later, when a few
Montanans did arrive, they told us about one of the other attractions
—a fellow who dived from an airplane into the Yellowstone River
which was about three feet deep at that point. That was the last
time we attempted to thrill a Montana crowd.
The barnstorming season in Montana was about over in October and
soon after returning from Lewistown I purchased a small boat for
two dollars. After patching it up a bit and stopping the larger leaks, I
started alone down the Yellowstone River on the way to Lincoln.
The river was not deep and ran over numerous rapids which were so
shallow that even the flat bottom of my small boat would bump over
the rocks from time to time. I had been unable to purchase a
thoroughly seagoing vessel for two dollars, and very little rough
going was required to knock out the resin from the cracks and open
the old leaks again.
I had my camping equipment lashed on top of one of the seats to
keep it dry, and as I progressed downstream through the ever-
present rapids, more and more of my time was required for bailing
out the boat with an old tin can, until at the end of the first day,
when I had travelled about twenty miles, I was spending fully half of
my time bailing out water.
I made camp that night in a small clearing beside the river. There
had been numerous showers during the day, which thoroughly
soaked the ground, and towards evening a steady drizzling rain set
in.
I pitched my army pup tent on the driest ground I could find and,
after a cold supper, crawled in between the three blankets which I
had sewn together to form a bag.
The next morning the sky was still overcast but the rain had
stopped, and after a quick breakfast I packed my equipment in the
boat and again started down the river.
The rain set in anew, and this together with the water from the ever-
increasing leaks in the sides and bottom of the boat required such
constant bailing that I found little use for the oars that day. By
evening the rocks had taken so much effect that the boat was
practically beyond repair.
After a careful inspection, which ended in the conclusion that further
progress was not feasible, I traded what was left of the boat to the
son of a nearby rancher in return for a wagon ride to the nearest
town, Huntley, Montana. I expressed my equipment and bought a
railroad ticket to Lincoln, where I had left my motorcycle.
A short time before I had left Lincoln, while I was racing with a car
along one of the Nebraska country roads, a piston had jammed and
I had not found time to replace it. Accordingly, after returning from
Montana, I spent several days overhauling the machine before
proceeding on to Detroit where I was to meet my mother.
I made the trip to Detroit in three days and after spending about
two weeks there I took a train for Little Falls to clear up some
business in connection with our farm.
During the winter months I spent part of my time on the farm and
part in Minneapolis with my father. Occasionally we would drive the
hundred miles from Minneapolis to Little Falls together.
In March, 1923, I left Minnesota and after a short visit in Detroit,
departed on a train bound for Florida. My next few weeks were
spent in Miami and the Everglades.
 II
MY FIRST PLANE

SINCE I had first started flying at Lincoln, the year before, I had held
an ambition to own an airplane of my own. So when I took my last
flight with Lynch in Montana, and started down the Yellowstone, I
had decided that the next spring I would be flying my own ship.
Consequently when April arrived, I left Miami and went to Americus,
Georgia, where the Government had auctioned off a large number of
“Jennies,” as we called certain wartime training planes. I bought one
of these ships with a new Curtis OX-5 motor and full equipment for
five hundred dollars. They had cost the Government nearly twice as
many thousands, but at the close of the war the surplus planes were
sold for what they would bring and the training fields were
abandoned. Americus, Georgia, was a typical example of this. The
planes had been auctioned for as little as fifty dollars apiece the year
before. A few days after I arrived, the last officer left the post and it
took its place among the phantom airports of the war.
I lived alone on the post during the two weeks my plane was being
assembled, sometimes sleeping in one of the twelve remaining
hangars and sometimes in one of the barracks buildings. One
afternoon a visiting plane arrived and Reese stepped out of the
cockpit. I had not heard from him since we had traded planes in
Montana, and he stayed with me on the post that night while we
exchanged experiences of the previous year.
One of the interesting facts bearing on the life of aviators is that
they rarely lose track of one another permanently. Distance means
little to the pilot, and there is always someone dropping in from
somewhere who knows all the various flyers in his section of the
country, and who is willing to sit down and do a little “ground flying”
with the local pilots. In this way intimate contact is continually
established throughout the clan. (“Ground flying” is the term used to
designate the exchange of flying experiences among airmen.)
I had not soloed up to the time I bought my Jenny at Americus,
although at that time the fact was strictly confidential.
After my training at Lincoln I had not been able to furnish the
required bond and, although I had done a little flying on cross
country trips with Bahl and Lynch, I had never been up in a plane
alone. Therefore when my Jenny was completely assembled and
ready to fly I was undecided as to the best method of procedure. No
one on the field knew that I had never soloed. I had not been in a
plane for six months; but I did not have sufficient money to pay for
more instruction, so one day I taxied to one end of the field, opened
the throttle and started to take-off. When the plane was about four
feet off the ground, the right wing began to drop, so I decided that
it was time to make a landing. I accomplished this on one wheel and
one wing skid but without doing any damage to the ship. I noticed
that the wind was blowing hard and suddenly decided that I would
wait for calmer weather before making any more flights and taxied
back to the hangar.
A pilot who was waiting for delivery on one of the Jennies offered to
give me a little dual instruction, and I flew around with him for thirty
minutes and made several landings. At the end of this time he taxied
up to the line and told me that I would have no trouble and was only
a little rusty from not flying recently. He advised me to wait until
evening when the air was smooth and then to make a few solo
flights.
When evening came I taxied out from the line, took one last look at
the instruments and took-off on my first solo.
The first solo flight is one of the events in a pilot’s life which forever
remains impressed on his memory. It is the culmination of difficult
hours of instruction, hard weeks of training and often years of
anticipation. To be absolutely alone for the first time in the cockpit of
a plane hundreds of feet above the ground is an experience never to
be forgotten.
After a week of practice flights around Southern Field I rolled my
equipment and a few spare parts up in a blanket, lashed them in the
front cockpit and took-off for Minnesota.
This was my first cross country flight alone, less than a week after
my solo hop. Altogether I had less than five hours of solo time to my
credit. I had, however, obtained invaluable experience the year
before while flying around in the western states with Biffle, Bahl,
and Lynch.
While learning to fly in Nebraska the previous spring, I discovered
that nearly every pilot in existence had flown in Texas at one time or
another during his flying career. Accordingly I decided that, at the
first opportunity I would fly to Texas myself and although I travelled
a rather roundabout way from Georgia to Minnesota, my course
passed through Texarkana en route.
The first hop was from Americus to Montgomery, Alabama, and
passed over some fairly rough territory of which both Georgia and
Alabama have their share.
I had been warned before leaving the field, that the airline course to
Texas was over some of the “worst flying country in the south” and
had been advised to take either a northern course directly to
Minnesota or to follow the Gulf of Mexico. This advice served to
create a desire to find out what the “worst flying country in the
south” looked like. I had a great deal of confidence in my Jenny with
its powerful OX-5 engine, and it seemed absurd to me at that time
to detour by airplane. Consequently I laid my route in the most
direct line possible to conform with my limited cruising range with
forty gallons of fuel.
The flight to Montgomery was uneventful. I landed at the army field
there before noon, filled the fuel tanks and took-off again for
Meridian, Mississippi.
I arrived over Meridian in late afternoon and for the first time was
faced with the problem of finding a suitable field and landing in it.
An experienced pilot can see at a glance nearly everything necessary
to know about a landing field. He can tell its size, the condition of
the ground, height of grass or weeds, whether there are any rocks,
holes, posts or ditches in the way, if the land is rough and rolling or
flat and smooth; in short whether the field is suitable to land in or if
it would be advisable to look for another and better one. In fact, the
success of a barnstorming pilot of the old days was measured to a
large extent by his artfulness in the choice of fields from which to
operate. Often, in case of motor failure, the safety of his passengers,
himself, and his ship depended upon his alertness in choosing the
best available landing place and his ability in maneuvering the plane
into it. If his motor failure was only partial or at high altitude, time
was not so essential, as a plane can glide a great distance, either
with a motor which only “revs” down a couple of hundred R.P.M. or
without any assistance from the engine at all. The average wartime
machine could glide at least five times its height, which meant that if
it was five thousand feet above the ground the pilot could pick a
field to land in five miles away with safety; but if the failure was
soon after the take-off, then instant decision and immediate action
were necessary.
An amateur, on the other hand, has not overcome the strangeness
of altitude, and the ground below looks entirely different than it does
from the air, although there is not the sensation, in an airplane, of
looking down as from a high building. Hills appear as flat country,
boulders and ditches are invisible, sizes are deceptive and marshes
appear as solid grassland. The student has not the background of
experience so essential to the successful pilot, yet his only method
of learning lies in his own initiative in meeting and overcoming
service conditions.
There was no regular airport in Meridian in 1923, and a few fields
available for a reasonably safe landing. After a half hour’s search I
decided on the largest pasture I could see, made the best kind of a
short field landing I knew how by coming down just over the
treetops, with the engine wide open, to the edge of the field, then
cutting the gun and allowing the ship to slow down to its landing
speed. This method brings the plane in with tremendous velocity
and requires a much larger landing field than is necessary, but until
the pilot has flown long enough to have the “feel” of his ship it is far
safer to come in fast than too slow.
It had been raining at Meridian and the field was a little soft, so that
when my “Jenny” finally did settle to the ground it had a very short
roll and there was still some clear ground in front.
I taxied up to a fence corner alongside of a small house and
proceeded to tie down for the night. I had gained considerable
respect for the wind in Kansas and Nebraska, so after turning off the
gasoline and letting the motor stop by running the carburetor dry, (a
safety expedient to keep the ever-present person who stands
directly under the propeller while he wiggles it up and down, from
becoming an aeronautical fatality) I pushed the nose of the plane up
to a fence and after blocking the wheels securely, tied each wing tip
to a fence post and covered the motor and cockpit with a canvas in
case of rain.
By this time the usual barnstorming crowd had gathered and I spent
the remaining daylight explaining that the hole in the radiator was
for the propeller shaft to go through; that the wings were not made
of catgut, tin, or cast iron, but of wood framework covered with
cotton or linen shrunk to drum tightness by acetate and nitrate
dope; that the only way to find out how it feels to fly was to try it for
five dollars; that it was not as serious for the engine to stop as for a
wing to fall off; and the thousand other questions which can only be
conceived in such a gathering.
As night came on and the visibility decreased the crowd departed,
leaving me alone with a handful of small boys who always remain to
the last and can only be induced to depart by being allowed to
follow the aviator from the field.
I accepted an invitation to spend the night in the small house beside
the field.
The next morning I telephoned for a gas truck to come out to the
field and spent the time before the truck arrived in the task of
cleaning the distributor head, draining the carburetor jet wells and
oiling the rocker arms on the engine.
While I was working, one of the local inhabitants came up and
volunteered the information that he had been a pilot during the war
but had not flown since and “wouldn’t mind takin’ a ride again.” I
assured him that much as I would enjoy taking him up, flying was
very expensive and that I did not have a large fund available to buy
gasoline. I added that if he would pay operating costs, which would
be five dollars for a short ride, I would be glad to accommodate him.
He produced a five dollar bill and after warming up the motor I put
him in the cockpit and taxied through the mud to the farthest corner
of the field. This was to be my first passenger.
The field was soft and the man was heavy; we stalled over the fence
by three feet and the nearest tree by five. I found myself heading up
a thickly wooded slope, which was sloping upward at least as fast as
I was climbing in that direction and for three minutes my Jenny and
the slope fought it out over the fifteen feet of air between them.
Eventually, however, in the true Jenny style we skimmed over the
hilltop and obtained a little reserve altitude. I had passed through
one of those almost-but-not-quite accidents for which Jennies are so
famous and which so greatly retarded the growth of commercial
flying during the post-war period.
 © Wide World Photos

ST. LOUIS, MO.—FINANCIAL BACKERS OF THE NON-STOP

NEW YORK TO PARIS FLIGHT
UPPER ROW, LEFT TO RIGHT: HAROLD M. BIXBY, HARRY
HALL KNIGHT, HARRY F. KNIGHT, MAJOR A. B. LAMBERT
LOWER ROW, LEFT TO RIGHT: J. D. WOOSTER LAMBERT,
MAJOR WILLIAM B. ROBERTSON, E. LANSING RAY, EARL C.
THOMPSON
 © Wide World Photos

FUSELAGE FRAME OF THE PLANE

I decided that my passenger was entitled to a good ride after that

take-off and kept him up chasing a buzzard for twenty minutes.
After we landed he commented on the wonderful take-off and how
much he enjoyed flying low over the treetops; again assured me that
he had flown a great deal in the war; and rushed off to tell his
friends all about his first airplane ride.
The gasoline truck had arrived and after servicing the ship I took-off
again and headed west. I had no place in mind for the next stop and
intended to be governed by my fuel supply in picking the next field.
The sky was overcast with numerous local storms. I had brought
along a compass, but had failed to install it on the instrument board,
and it was of little use in a suitcase out of reach. The boundary lines
in the south do not run north and south, east and west as they do in
the Northern states but curve and bend in every conceivable
direction, being located by natural landmarks rather than meridians
and parallels. I was flying by a map of the entire United States, with
each state relatively small.
I left Meridian and started in the direction of Texas, cutting across
country with no regard for roads or railways. For a time during the
first hour I was not sure of my location on the map, but soon passed
over a railway intersection which appeared to be in the proper place
and satisfied me about my position. Then the territory became
wilder and again I saw no checkpoints. The storm areas were more
numerous and the possible landing fields farther apart, until near the
end of the second hour I decided to land in the first available field to
locate my position and take on more fuel. It required nearly thirty
more minutes to find a place in which a plane could land and take-
off with any degree of safety, and after circling the field several
times to make sure it was hard and contained no obstacles, I landed
in one corner, rolled down a hillside, taxied over a short level stretch,
and came to rest half-way up the slope on the far side of the field.
A storm was approaching rapidly and I taxied back towards the
fence corner at rather high speed. Suddenly I saw a ditch directly in
front of me and an instant later heard the crash of splintering wood
as the landing gear dropped down and the propeller came in contact
with the ground. The tail of the plane rose up in the air, turned
almost completely over, then settled back to about a forty-five
degree angle. My first “crack-up”!
I climbed out of the cockpit and surveyed the machine. Actually the
only damage done was to the propeller, and although the wings and
fuselage were covered with mud, no other part of the plane showed
any marked signs of strain. I had taxied back about thirty feet east
of the landing tracks and had struck the end of a grass-covered
ditch. Had I been ten feet farther over, the accident would never
have happened. The usual crowd was assembling, as the impact of
the “prop” with the ground had been heard in all of the neighboring
fields and an airplane was a rare sight in those parts.
They informed me that I was half-way between Maben and
Mathiston, Mississippi, and that I had flown one hundred and
twenty-five miles north instead of west.
When enough men had assembled we lifted the plane out of the
ditch, pushed it over to a group of pine trees and tied it down to two
of the trees. After removing all loose equipment I rode into Maben
with one of the storekeepers who had locked up his business when
he heard about the landing of the plane.
I wired Wyche at Americus to ship me one of the two propellers I
had purchased before leaving, then engaged a room at the old
Southern Hotel.
While waiting for the propeller I had extracted promises from half a
dozen citizens to ride at five dollars each. This would about cover
the cost of the “prop,” as well as my expenses while waiting for it to
arrive. When it did come I put it on the shaft between showers, with
the assistance of most of Maben and Mathiston. I gave the plane a
test flight and announced that I was ready to carry passengers when
it was not raining too hard.
The Mississippians who were so anxious to fly when the propeller
was broken immediately started a contest in etiquette. Each and
every one was quite willing to let someone else be first and it
required psychology, diplomacy, and ridicule before the first
passenger climbed into the cockpit. I taxied over to the far corner of
the field, instructed my passenger how to hold the throttle back to
keep the ship from taking off, and lifted the tail around in order to
gain every available foot of space for the take-off.
The first man was so audibly pleased with his ride that the others
forgot their manners of a few minutes before and began arguing
about who was to be next.
That afternoon a group of whites chipped in fifty cents apiece to give
one of the negroes a hop, provided, as they put it, I would do a few
“flip flops” with him. The negro decided upon was perfectly willing
and confident up to the time when he was instructed to get in; even
then he gamely climbed into the cockpit, assuring all of his clan that
he would wave his red bandanna handkerchief over the side of the
cockpit during the entire flight in order to show them that he was
still unafraid.
After reaching the corner of the field I instructed him, as I had the
previous passengers, to hold the throttle back while I was lifting the
tail around. When I climbed back in my cockpit I told him to let go
and opened the throttle to take-off. We had gone about fifty yards
when it suddenly occurred to him that the ship was moving and that
the handle he was to hold on to was not where it should be. He had
apparently forgotten everything but that throttle, and with a death
grip he hauled it back to the closed position. We had not gone far
enough to prevent stopping before reaching the other end of the
field and the only loss was the time required to taxi back over the
rough ground to our starting point. Before taking off the next time,
however, I gave very implicit instructions regarding that throttle.
I had promised to give this negro a stunt ride yet I had never had
any instruction in aerobatics. I had, however, been in a plane with
Bahl during two loops and one tailspin. I had also been carefully
instructed in the art of looping by Reese who, forgetting that I was
not flying a Hisso standard with twice the power of my Jenny,
advised me that it was not necessary to dive excessively before a
loop but rather to fly along with the motor full on until the plane
gathered speed, then to start the loop from a level flying position.
I climbed up to three thousand feet and started in to fulfill my
agreement by doing a few airsplashes, steep spirals and dives. With
the first deviation from straight flight my passenger had his head
down on the floor of the cockpit but continued to wave the red
handkerchief with one hand while he was holding on to everything
available with the other, although he was held in securely with the
safety belt.
Finally, remembering my ground instructions, I leveled the plane off
and with wide open motor waited a few moments to pick up
maximum speed, then, slowly pulling back on the stick I began to
loop. When I had gotten one-fourth of the way around, the ship was
trembling in a nearly stalled position; still, the Curtiss motor was
doing its best and it was not until the nose was pointing directly
skyward at a ninety degree angle that the final inertia was lost and
for an instant we hung motionless in the perfect position for a
whipstall. I kicked full right rudder immediately to throw the plane
over on its side but it was too late, the controls had no effect.
The Negro meanwhile decided that the “flip flops” were over and
poked his head over the side of the cockpit looking for mother earth.
At that instant we whipped. The ship gathered speed as it slid
backwards towards the ground, the air caught the tail surfaces,
jerked them around past the heavier nose and we were in a vertical
dive; again in full control, but with no red handkerchief waving over
the cockpit. I tried another loop in the same manner but just before
reaching the stalling point in the next one I kicked the ship over on
one wing and evaded a whipstall. After the second failure I decided
that there must be something wrong with my method of looping and
gave up any further attempt for that afternoon. But it was not until
we were almost touching the ground that the bandanna again
appeared above the cowling.
I remained in Maben for two weeks carrying over sixty passengers in
all or about three hundred dollars worth. People flocked in from all
over the surrounding country, some travelling for fifteen miles in
oxcarts just to see the plane fly.
One old negro woman came up and asked,—
“Boss! How much you all charge foah take me up to Heaben and
leave me dah?”
I could have carried many more passengers but it rained nearly
every day and each flight rutted the field badly. When I landed it
was necessary to pass over a soft spot between two hillsides, and
before taking off I had to taxi back over this soft place on the way to
the far corner of the field. During the last few days several men
were required on each wing to push the plane through the mud to
the hillside beyond. Another difficulty was that the old black wartime
rubber shock absorber card had deteriorated to such an extent that I
replaced it with hemp rope and taxi-ing over the harder parts of the
field was a very rough procedure, especially since the ground had
been plowed in years gone by and allowed to grow sod without
being harrowed.
I made several attempts to find another suitable field nearby but
there was none from which I could safely operate.
Landing fields are of primary importance to safety in aviation. It is
not a question of how small a field a plane can operate from, but
rather of how large a field is necessary to make that operation safe.
Large and well equipped airports situated close to cities will go far
towards developing commercial airlines and keeping the United
States at the top in aeronautical activity.
The cities who foresee the future of air transportation and provide
suitable airports will find themselves the center of airlines radiating
in every direction.
When an airline is organized, one of the primary considerations is
the condition and location of the various landing fields where
terminals are contemplated. If the airport is small and in poor
condition, or if a passenger must of necessity spend nearly as much
time in traveling from the business district out to the field as it will
require for him to fly from the field to his destination, then it is very
probable that some other city will be selected for the stopping point.
The condition of the field together with the fact that after a heavy
rain it was often necessary to carry gasoline in five gallon cans a
mile and a half over the railroad tracks by hand forced me to leave
Maben and a large number of would-be passengers behind, and
early one morning I took-off for the last time and again headed for
Texas.
 III
BARNSTORMING EXPERIENCES

I HAD strayed over a hundred miles off my course and experienced

a minor crack-up, but I departed with two hundred and fifty more
dollars in my pocket than I had arrived with, besides confidence in
my ability to make at least a little more than expenses by
barnstorming.
The constant rains had filled the rivers to overflowing, and after
leaving Maben I flew over flooded territory nearly all the way to Lake
Village, Arkansas. Often the water was up to the second story
windows of the farmhouses, and a forced landing at any time would
have at least meant nosing over.
I had installed the compass while waiting for the new propeller at
Maben, and experienced no further difficulty in holding my course.
After circling Lake Village I landed in a field several miles north of
town. The nearest building was a clubhouse and soon the keeper
and his family had arrived beside the plane. They invited me to stay
with them as long as I wished, but the keeper persistently refused to
accept a flight in return for his hospitality. I carried only a handful of
passengers that afternoon. The flying territory around that part of
the country was fairly good and there were a number of fields
available for planes to land in. Consequently an airplane was no
longer the drawing attraction that it was farther in the interior.
I staked the plane down much earlier than usual and went over to
the clubhouse.
Evening came on with the clearness of a full moon and open sky.
The landscape was illuminated with a soft yellow light; an ideal night
for flying. I decided to see what the country looked like from the air
at night and jokingly asked my host to accompany me. To my
surprise he willingly agreed. For some reason he had no fear of a
night flight although I had been unable to persuade him to go up
with me in the daytime. What his reaction would have been, had he
known that I had never flown after dark before, is a matter of
speculation.
We untied the plane, removed the canvases from engine and
cockpit, and after a few minutes spent in warming up the motor,
taxied down the field and took-off for a moonlight flight down the
Mississippi and over Lake Village.
Later in the evening after the ship was again securely staked to the
ground and we were sitting quietly in the clubhouse, my host stated
that he had never spent a more enjoyable quarter of an hour in his
life.
The next morning I was again heading towards Texas against a
strong westerly wind which retarded the speed of the Jenny so
greatly that even with my double fuel capacity it was necessary to
land at Farmerville, Louisiana, to replenish my supply. From there I
flew to Texarkana and landed between the stumps of the 1923
airport.
On the following morning I left Texarkana with a strong tail wind and
after crossing the western end of the Ozark mountains, landed near
a small town in north eastern Oklahoma where I took on a fresh
supply of fuel and again headed north towards Lincoln, Nebraska.
My tanks began to run low about half-way through Kansas and I
picked out a hillside near Alma. After flying low and dragging the
field several times I came in for a landing, but just as the wheels
were about to touch the ground I discovered that it was covered
with fairly large rocks half hidden in the tall grass. I opened the
throttle to take-off but the plane had lost too much speed for the
motor to take effect and as it struck the ground the left wing hooked
in the rocks and groundlooped the ship to the left but without doing
serious damage. The landing gear wires were strained and about
two feet of the rear spar on the lower left wing tip was snapped off.
Nothing was broken however which would require immediate
repairing.
 © Erickson

WORKING ON NAVIGATION CHARTS FOR FLIGHT

 © Erickson

INSTRUMENT BOARD OF THE PLANE

The field was quite a distance from Alma and in order to get an early
start in the morning I stayed with the ship that night. During the
heavy rains at Maben, Mississippi, I had constructed a hammock of
heavy canvas which could be suspended under the top wing.
I tied the corners of this hammock to the upper strut fittings and
crawled into the three blankets inside which were sewn up to form a
bag. Thus I spent a comfortable night.
When I arrived over Lincoln the next day I circled over the Lincoln
Standard factory, and after landing on the old flying field south of
town, waited for the car which was sent out to bring in visiting
airmen.
The remainder of the day was spent in “ground flying” with my
friends in the factory. We had not been together for seven months
and the usual exchange of experiences was necessary.
I soon learned that Bud Gurney had made a parachute for himself
and was intending to test it by the simple method of going up to an
altitude of fifteen hundred or two thousand feet and cutting loose
from the plane. If the chute opened it was successful.
After a great deal of persuasion I prevailed upon him to let me take
him up in my ship while we made the first test with a sand bag.
The tanks had just been filled with fuel but I had unlimited
confidence in my Jenny and we lashed the parachute and a sandbag
on the right wing. Bud, who weighed one hundred and sixty-five
pounds himself, climbed into the front cockpit and we started to
take-off with a total load of about six hundred pounds, to say
nothing of the resistance of the parachute and sandbag which were
directly in the slipstream from the propeller.
Even with this load we cleared the nearest obstacle by a safe margin
and finally attained an altitude of about two hundred feet. Then we
were caught by a descending current of air which carried the plane
down to within ten feet of the ground, and try as I would I could not
get any higher. A wooded hill was directly in front, and to avoid
striking the trees I turned down wind. A railroad tressle was then in
front of us and we stalled over it by inches. For five minutes we
dodged hills, trees, and houses. I signaled Bud to cut the sandbag,
but when he started to climb out of the cockpit to reach it, the
added resistance brought the plane down still lower. Then in front of
us appeared a row of trees, much higher than the rest, which I knew
it would not be possible to get over. We were then passing over a
grain field and I cut the gun and landed down wind. The grain was
high enough to keep the ship from rolling far and we unloaded the
handbag before taking off again. With the weight of the bag and its
resistance gone, we had no trouble in getting out of the grain and
back to the flying field.
A week later Bud carried out his original intention of testing the
chute. It was successful.
Before continuing the flight to Minnesota, Bud and I made a short
barnstorming trip through eastern Nebraska. That territory had been
fairly well covered by other barnstormers, however, and we did very
little business.
At one place where we landed we were overtaken by a violent
thunderstorm combined with a strong wind. It came up so suddenly
that we had only time enough to tail the ship into the wind and lash
the stick to keep the ailerons from whipping before the wind struck
us. We were both holding on to the tail trying to keep the plane from
blowing away. Following the wind was a heavy rain which covered
the ground with water and at each flash of lightning the electricity
on the wires of the ship would pass to the ground through our
bodies with the intensity of a booster magnet.
In an electric storm a plane acts as part of a condenser, since it is
insulated from the ground by the rubber tires and wooden tailskid. It
is possible to receive a violent shock by standing on wet ground and
holding on to one of the wires.
We were unable to let go of the ship in the high wind and could only
remain and take these discharges as they came. Fortunately the
storm did not last long.
The night after our return to Lincoln we slept on the field so that I
could get a good start in the morning. Bud was in the back of a Ford
truck, and I was in the hammock.
The next morning was overcast with local showers which were
visible in every direction. I took off soon after daybreak and after
flying through several storms landed in a hayfield at Forest City,
Iowa, where I serviced the ship between showers and took off on
the final flight to Shakopee, Minnesota, where I expected to meet
my father and carry him around on his campaign.
I found Shakopee covered by a cloudburst and in flying around
waiting for the storm to pass so that I could land I got into a heavy
shower near Savage. One of the cylinders cut out, and I was circling
preparatory to landing in a clover field when two more stopped
firing. I was flying at less than a two hundred foot altitude and
loosing that rapidly. It was necessary to land immediately but the
only choice of landing places lay between a swamp and high trees. I
took the swamp and cut the throttle. When the wheels touched
earth they rolled about twenty feet, sank into the spreader bar and
we nosed over.
The rudder did not quite touch the swamp grass and the plane
stopped after passing through three-quarters of a semi-circle, with
the radiator cap and top wing resting on the ground. I was hanging
on the safety belt but when I tried to open the clasp with one hand,
holding on with the other to keep from falling out on my head, I
found it to be jammed. After several futile attempts to open it I
reverted to the two strap buckles at the end of the belt to release
myself from the cockpit.
All this required not more than two or three minutes.
After getting out of the cockpit I inspected the plane carefully. Again
there was little actual damage. The propeller was badly cracked and
would have to be replaced; there was a crack in the spreader board
which required winding with strong cord. Otherwise the plane was in
perfect condition although splashed with mud.
For once there was no one in sight and I made my way through the
swamp to the nearest farmhouse. On the way I found that there was
solid ground along the edge of the swamp less than 100 yards from
the plane from which I could take-off.
The farmer had seen the plane pass over in the rain and was on his
way down towards the swamp when I met him. He informed me that
it was not possible to get horses through the mire out to the ship
and that he had no idea of how I was to get it back to hard sod
again.
I borrowed a rope from him to use in pulling the tail back to a
normal position and we started back to the swamp.
Meanwhile it seems that two boys had seen me land, and when I did
not emerge from the cockpit immediately, had run to Savage with
the news that “an aviator had landed upside down in the swamp”
and that they had “gone up and felt of his neck and that it was stiff
and he was stone dead.”
I had flown over the town in the rain only a few minutes before, and
as in those days it was not difficult for anyone to believe anything
about an airplane, the town promptly locked its doors and came
crawling and wading through the swamp. The older inhabitants
followed the railroad track around its edge and by the time I
returned with the farmer and a rope there were enough townspeople
to solve my problem by carrying the ship back onto solid ground.
They were undoubtedly much disappointed at having come so far on
a false alarm but turned to willingly to help me get the ship out of
the swamp.
The next edition of one of the Minneapolis papers carried the
following item which typically exemplifies what has been the average
man’s knowledge of aeronautics.
AIRPLANE CRASHES NEAR SAVAGE
Charles A. Lindbergh, son of ex-Congressman Lindbergh,
crashed near Savage, Minnesota, this morning. He was
flying in his plane three hundred feet above the ground
when it suddenly went into a nose dive and landed on its
propeller in a swamp. Lindbergh says he will be flying
again in three days.
After reading this and similar accounts of equally minor accidents of
flight, it is little wonder that the average man would far rather watch
someone else fly and read of the narrow escapes from death when
some pilot has had a forced landing or a blowout, than to ride
himself. Even in the post-war days of now obsolete equipment,
nearly all of the serious accidents were caused by inexperienced
pilots who were then allowed to fly or to attempt to fly—without
license or restriction about anything they could coax into the air—
and to carry anyone who might be beguiled into riding with them.
My next move was to wire to Little Falls for a propeller which Wyche
had expressed from Americus and two days later joined my father in
his campaign at Marshall.
My father had been opposed to my flying from the first and had
never flown himself. However, he had agreed to go up with me at
the first opportunity, and one afternoon he climbed into the cockpit
and we flew over Redwood Falls together. From that day on I never
heard a word against my flying and he never missed a chance to
ride in the plane.
After the campaign was over I spent the remainder of the summer
barnstorming through Minnesota, northern Iowa and western
Wisconsin. Most of the time I was alone, but I took one student
around with me for a few weeks while I was teaching him to fly, and
then I barnstormed southern Minnesota with my mother for ten
days. My mother had never objected to my flying, and after her first
flight at Janesville, Minnesota, she became an enthusiast herself.
We had been together constantly up to the start of my flying career
and had both looked forward to flying around together. Consequently
when the opportunity presented itself I wired her to meet me at
Janesville.
My mother enjoyed flying from the first and has made a number of
flights with me; including a round trip between Chicago and St. Louis
in the mail compartment of my plane.
Some weeks I barely made expenses, and on others I carried
passengers all week long at five dollars each. On the whole I was
able to make a fair profit in addition to meeting expenses and
depreciation.
One evening while I was waiting for chance passengers at a field in
southern Minnesota, a car drove up with several young fellows in it,
one of whom was a graduate of the Army Air Service Training
Schools. He asked me why I did not apply for enlistment as a cadet
at Brooks Field and explained that by writing to the Chief of Air
Service at the War Department in Washington I could get enrollment
blanks and full information on the course and its requirements.
I had always wanted to fly modern and powerful planes. Ever since I
had watched a group of fourteen De Havilands with their four
hundred horsepower Liberty motors come into the field at Lincoln in
my flying school days, I had longed to fly one of them. The Army
offered the only opportunity, for there were no Liberty engines flying
around barnstorming. Consequently at the hotel that night I wrote
my letter to the Chief of Air Service, and a few days later when I
received my next mail forwarded from Minneapolis, a letter from
Washington with the enrollment blanks was included. The letter
informed me that a candidate must be between twenty and twenty-
seven years of age inclusive, unmarried, of good physical condition,
and must have a high school education or its equivalent.
I completed and returned the forms, and a short time later received
another message authorizing me to appear before an examining
board at Chanute Field, Rantoul, Illinois, in January, 1924.
Toward the end of September I began to work south. Cold weather
was coming on in Minnesota and most people did not enjoy flying in
an open cockpit in winter.
I barnstormed over into Wisconsin but found that someone had
been carrying passengers for half price there. I had always
conformed to the rule in use among most pilots at that time, of
giving a good ride for five dollars but not carrying anyone for less.
So I left southern Wisconsin and turned towards Illinois. After taking
off I decided to take in the International Air Races at St. Louis,
which were then in progress; so instead of sizing up each town I
passed over for its passenger possibilities, I flew towards St. Louis
until the gasoline ran low, then landed, took on a fresh supply from
a passing gas truck, and pressed on to Carlinville, Illinois. There I
picked up more fuel, and a twenty-five dollar passenger for St. Louis.
As we neared Lambert Field where the races were being held we
passed over the race course while the bombers’ contest was in
progress. I landed on a hill east of Lambert in order to keep out of
the way of the races, and waited until evening before hopping over
and staking my ship down at the end of one of the long rows of
civilian planes.
A large number of my old friends were attending the races and soon
after landing I met Bud Gurney who, together with one of the flying
students at Lincoln, had managed to get to the races without buying
a Pullman ticket. He had brought his chute with him and was
entered in the parachute spot landing contest, in which he was to be
the last attraction of the meet by staging a double drop.
In the evening, after the races were over for the day, I carried a few
passengers and looked over the different types of planes. I would
have given the summer’s barnstorming profits gladly in return for
authority to fly some of the newer types, and I determined to let
nothing interfere with my chance of being appointed a Flying Cadet
in the Army. This appeared to be my only opportunity to fly planes
which would roar up into the sky when they were pointed in that
direction, instead of having to be wished up over low trees at the
end of a landing field.
When I went to St. Louis it was with the expectation of pressing on
still farther south when the races were over, but with Bud’s
assistance I sold my Jenny to his friend, flying instruction included.
Marvin Northrop who had flown a Standard down from Minneapolis
had sold his ship in St. Louis also; together with a course in flying.
Since it was necessary for him to return home immediately, I agreed
to instruct his student while mine was learning on the Jenny.
I had promised to carry Bud for his last jump, and towards evening
on the final day of the races he packed his two chutes and tied them
together with the only rope he could find. It was rather old but we
decided that it would hold and if it did not the only consequence
would be a little longer fall before the second chute opened.
I coaxed the old Jenny up to seventeen hundred feet and as we
passed to the windward of the field Bud cut loose. The first chute
opened at once, but in opening, the strain on the old rope was too
great and it snapped releasing the second chute which fell another
two hundred feet before opening.

© Erickson

“WE” MAKE A TEST FLIGHT

 © Wide World Photos

CURTIS FIELD, L. I.—PATSY, THE MASCOT FOR “THE