Category AVIATION &ТНЕ ROLE OF GOVERNMENT

Braniff’s conclusion that deregulation would be only temporary, and that re-regulation was inevitable, was probably the biggest mistake of all. That conclusion prompted Braniff to believe that new routes should be established as quickly as possible, before the window of opportunity slammed shut, and that the equipment to serve these new routes should be immediately acquired before the aircraft manufacturers became back­logged with orders from all of the other airlines that were sure to come.

In 1978 Braniff International Airways was a successful, established carrier with a reliable business clientele responsible for about 70 per­cent of its traffic. When Postmaster General Far­ley ordered the re-bidding in 1934 for airmail routes after the so-called “Spoils Conference” affair of 1930, Braniff Airways, Inc, as it was known then, had acquired the coveted Dallas – Chicago route. As it grew, its route system cen­tered on the Midwest, primarily on a north-south axis. Braniff was profitable and had been for much of its proud history as one of the 16 trunk carriers grandfathered under the Civil Aeronau­tics Act of 1938.

After World War II, Braniff became the first international competitor to Pan American certificated by the United States government when it began service to South America along its east coast. In 1950, Braniff was granted landing rights in Buenos Aires by the Peron government in Argentina.

By the late 1950s, Braniff had expanded to airports across the country using the DC-7, the last of the large piston engine airplanes, and would soon convert its entire fleet to turbine powered aircraft, including Lockheed turbo “Electras” and Boeing 707s. At this time Braniff was still a conservatively run organization with a solid balance sheet, excellent routes both domes­tically and internationally, and new aircraft. The future looked bright, indeed.

In 1965, Braniff was bought by GreatAmer – ica Corporation, an insurance holding company whose expansion into transportation included the purchase of National Car Rental. With its history as a solid Midwestern company serv­ing conservative business and corporate clients, its livery, as well as its management style, was considered rather staid. Under new management Braniff began to take on a different image, one that defines how it is usually viewed today.

Harding Lawrence, as Braniff s new CEO, inaugurated a “makeover” that became the talk of the airline industry. Madison Avenue advertising agencies, folk artists, Italian fashion designers, and architects were called in to recreate the “Braniff look.” The airplanes were painted in solid colors, a different color for each airplane, and the colors ranged across the pastel spectrum. During the 1960s, Braniff airplanes sported a total of 15 different colors, including ochre, tur­quoise, and lemon yellow.

Harding Lawrence loved the abstract, mul­ticolored paintings of the modern artist Alex­ander Calder and hung some 50 of his original creations around Braniff’s executive offices in 1972. Soon, Calder was engaged to design a paint scheme for an entire jet airplane, the first of several, in original, swirling, multicolor designs unique to each aircraft. Calder oversaw the paint­ing as an original work of art and insisted on personally painting one engine nacelle on each airplane with a special design. He was paid a fee of $100,000 for each aircraft design. This fee did not include the paint.

In December 1965, Braniff expanded its international reach by buying the 50 percent interest of W. R. Grace in “Panagra,” an airline operated as a joint venture with Pan American World Airways to serve the Andean countries of South America from the United States. Four months later, Braniff bought out Pan Am and continued to fly these South American routes as far south as Santiago, Chile. Pan American con­tinued to fly the east coast of South America.

Between 1975 and 1980, Braniff doubled in size. By this time 95 percent of the Braniff fleet consisted of jets.

Within a few days after the Airline Deregu­lation Act was passed in October 1978, Braniff had applied for 626 new routes. By early Novem­ber the CAB had granted Braniff 67 of these new routes, and by the middle of December, the airline had begun service to 16 new cities. Dur­ing the three months following the signing of the ADA, Braniff hired over 338 new pilots. It bracketed the American continent by establish­ing new hubs in Boston and Los Angeles. It expanded its fleet by buying and leasing all man­ner of new aircraft, including the expensive-to – operate 747, which served to compound the error as its cavernous interior flew practically empty on Braniff s new routes.

But possibly the most astonishing devel­opment after deregulation was in 1979 when Braniff began service with the new supersonic Concorde between Dallas/Fort Worth and

Washington, D. C. as the first leg of international routes to London and Paris with British Airways and Air France. The Concorde was the product of a joint enterprise of the British and French gov­ernments to develop the first supersonic transport (SST), and it had been introduced to the avia­tion world at the Paris Air Show in 1973. The advantage of the Concorde was its ability to fly at Mach 2; its disadvantage was that it could fly at Mach 2 only over the open ocean due to the shock wave produced by supersonic flight. Where Braniff flew the Concorde, which was over the continental United States, there was no advantage—it was limited to an airspeed of.95 Mach, barely over the normal operating speed of a Boeing 727. Worse, even with a nominal surcharge of only $100 added to the DFW-Dulles fare, the cramped 100 seat-configured Concorde usually flew at 15 percent capacity. Some wag observed that all of Braniff’s airplanes should have been painted yellow since the airline had gone completely “bananas.”

Beginning in 1980 and extending into the early years of the decade, fuel prices spiraled upward due to the OPEC oil crisis, interest rates shot up to 20 percent, and the attendant recession had a stifling effect on passenger traffic. When deregulation did not end, and upstart airlines con­tinued to enter the field and pose significant com­petitive pressures on Braniff’s expanded routes, Braniff began suffering catastrophic losses. In order to maintain cash flow, Braniff began to sell off its newly acquired fleet of aircraft at dis­tressed prices to its competitors, further weaken­ing its position. It then turned to selling off its biggest prizes, its European routes and then its Asian routes, as well as some of its domestic ser­vice. This was a pattern that had never been seen before in American aviation, but it was only the beginning.

By 1982, Braniff could no longer keep its doors open against the clamor of creditors, and it filed for Chapter 11 protection under the Bank­ruptcy Act. It was the first United States airline to do so since airline regulation was begun in 1938. Due to the crushing debt that had accumu­lated under Braniff’s bizarre management style since deregulation, the company could not secure an agreement from its creditors to continue operations under Chapter 11. On May 12, 1982, Braniff grounded all of its beautifully designed and painted aircraft and shut down its opera­tions. It had been 52 years since Paul Braniff first coined the slogan, “The World’s Fastest Airline.”

■ The United States Bankruptcy Act4

The Constitution of the United States (Article 1, Section 8) specifically provides that Con­gress be empowered to establish “uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States.” Congress has done so on repeated occasions since 1801. Bankruptcy in the United States, therefore, is mainly a federal exercise, administered in the federal bankruptcy courts, which are an adjunct of the United States District Courts located in each state across the land.

The concept of bankruptcy first implies that one’s debts exceed one’s assets. This is called “insolvency.” Under U. S. law, a petition in bank­ruptcy can be initiated either by creditors of the insolvent debtor, called “involuntary bank­ruptcy,” or by the debtor himself, called “vol­untary bankruptcy.” As we saw in Part I of this book, the industrial revolution, and particularly the advent of the railroads, caused the rise of the corporate form of business entity. Under U. S. law, corporations are entitled to the same basic privileges as individuals, including the protection of the bankruptcy laws.

The bankruptcy code is sub-divided into “Chapters,” each one dealing with a separate kind of bankruptcy. The most common form of bankruptcy, known as “straight bankruptcy” is found in Chapter 7 of the Code and results in the shutting down of the business. This procedure provides for the appointment of a trustee to liq­uidate all of the debtor’s assets and to distribute the proceeds to the creditors. Chapter 11 is a more complex procedure that allows the debtor to remain in business under the supervision of the bankruptcy court while it goes through a “reor­ganization” of its debt structure and contractual obligations.

The intent of Chapter 11, in allowing a com­pany to remain in business under reorganization, is to provide a way to pay most if not all of the creditors, to save jobs, to preserve the engine of profitability (which is the corporation’s opera­tions in place, good will, experience, and hope of the future), and to allow the business to earn a “fresh start.” One trade-off to accomplish this result is the cancellation or renegotiation of pre­viously incurred debts and contracts, including labor contracts. This is accomplished either by compromise between the debtor and the credi­tors, or by rulings of the bankruptcy judge.

During the reorganization process, which may take months to years depending on the complexities of the reorganization, the debtor is considered “under the protection” of the bankruptcy court. This means that the debtor is shielded from lawsuits that could otherwise be brought by creditors, and from general harass­ment associated with its unpaid debts. At the same time, the operations of the debtor are sub­ject to the scrutiny of the bankruptcy court and the creditors.

In the following chapters of this book, we will see how Chapter 11 bankruptcy has become an integral part of the air transportation business in the deregulated world. Other sophisticated free market techniques, previously unheard of in commercial aviation, would be brought to bear as airlines attempted to cope with the new world of competition. Hostile corporate take­overs, leveraged buyouts, downsizing, outsourc­ing, and employee pay givebacks and salary cuts were only some of the new developments that loomed over the horizon. Chief practitioner of these ideas was a Harvard MBA by the name of Frank Lorenzo.

4. The bankruptcy law is codified at Title 11 of the United States Code. The U. S. Code is a series of books contain­ing all of the laws of the United States arranged sequen­tially from Title 1 through Title 50A. Each Title is devoted to a particular subject matter. Title 49, for example, con­tains the federal statutes in the field of transportation.

■ n the fall of 1903, aerodynamic research і had proved the practicality of gliding flight, capable of carrying a man on wings of various designs. Rudimentary control had been shown in gliding flight, but with inconsistent results, and lack of control had caused the recent deaths of at least two gliding aeronauts. Sustained powered flight had been shown using models with steam engines. Reaching the goal of sustained, manned, and controlled flight was tantalizingly close, and was seemingly within the grasp of several dif­ferent experimenters, yet it remained completely out of reach—as far away as the moon. The combined knowledge and experience of all of the preceding pioneers of flight hung in suspension just above their heads, awaiting some catalyst— some insight or development—that would crys­tallize all of it into successful, sustained flight. Of all such contenders, the most promising in the fall of 1903 seemed to be Samuel P. Langley (see Figure 6-1), an astronomer, mathematician, physicist, and third Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D. C.

Langley’s formal education ended on his graduation from the Boston Latin School, but he was self-taught in mathematics, physics, and astronomy. When he was nine years old, he was heavily into reading books on astronomy, and

he built telescopes of various types, using them to observe the moon and the planets. He secured placement as an assistant astronomer at Harvard College Observatory during the middle 1860s, and then took a position at the U. S. Naval Acad­emy as a professor of mathematics. His work in

Annapolis mostly related to the restoration of the observatory at the Academy.

After a year, Langley went to the Alle­gheny Observatory of the Western University of Pennsylvania (now the University of Pittsburgh), where he began to engage in pioneering work in solar observation and discovery, and where he developed astronomical instruments and con­ducted research that brought him a degree of recognition and fame. His work naturally led to publications in scientific journals and periodi­cals, and in turn he met and became familiar with inventors and scientists in many cognate fields of exploration, including the pursuit of heavier than air flight.

From his university life he moved to Washington, D. C., in order to take the appoint­ment to the Smithsonian Institution as its third Secretary in 1887. The Smithsonian Institution was founded in 1846 by Congressional act to establish a charitable trust to create a museum, a library, and a program of research, publication, and collection in the sciences, arts, and history. The Secretary of the Smithsonian is the chief executive officer of the Institution.

After arriving in Washington, D. C. in 1887, Langley continued the research that he had ear­lier begun in studying aerodynamic lift. He con­structed a whirling table (in order to generate wind) on which he affixed various bird wings, by which means he was able to observe the lifting characteristics of the particular designs. Lang­ley worked briefly with gliders, consulting the work of Sir George Cayley of some 75 years earlier, who had also studied bird wings in shap­ing wings he constructed. The Smithsonian was a refuge and bulwark of naturalists, and it was easy for Langley to conduct research in that environ­ment. He mused at the time, “I watched a hawk soaring far up in the blue, and sailing for a long time without any motion of its wings . . . How wonderfully easy, too, was its flight! I was brought to think of these things again, and to ask myself whether the problem of artificial flight was really as hopeless and as absurd as it was then thought to be.”

This was also the time of other true believ­ers, like Lilienthal and Chanute, whose work concentrated on lift experiments with gliders. But Langley moved away from gliders, favoring the development of a complete, self-sustaining aerial machine that would, by its own power, show that manned flight was ultimately possible.

He did this by building a series of mod­els, which he called “Aerodromes” sequentially numbered, the first of which was completed in 1892, but not flown. By 1894, he had settled on a design that used two sets of equal-sized wings in tandem (one set of wings located behind a first set forward), on which he placed small contriv­ances of motive power, using compressed gas or steam. He converted a 38-foot houseboat, with a workshop, into a launch platform and towed it down the Potomac River to a point near Quan – tico, Virginia.

From here he tested Aerodrome 4 (all attempts were failures, resulting in each of the models falling into the water), and Aerodrome 5, which sustained a flight in October, 1894, for 35 feet and three seconds. A year and a half later, on May 6, 1896, Aerodrome No. 6 was launched from the houseboat’s catapult but its left wing collapsed and the model landed in the water. At 3:05 p. m. that same day, Aerodrome No. 5, 13 feet long and weighing about 24 pounds, is launched and flies for a minute and a half, covering about one-half mile and reaching 100 feet altitude. This is the first successful sus­tained flight of a heavier-than-air machine ever recorded. At 5:10 p. m., Langley does it again as the machine climbs to 60 feet and flies in circles for 1 minute and 31 seconds. Dr. Alexander Graham Bell, the only witness to the flight who was not a staff member, photographed the accomplishment. Joy abounded.

The see-saw battle against gravity proceeded in fits and starts. In June, Chanute conducts his acclaimed glider experiments at the Lake

Michigan dunes using his box glider design, which will be later borrowed by the Wright brothers to good effect. In August, after over

2,0 gliding flights, the intrepid Lilienthal dies when his glider stalls and crashes from an alti­tude of about 50 feet. On November 28, Langley repeats his success as Aerodrome No. 6 flies 4,800 feet in 1 minute and 45 seconds.

On February 15, 1898, the USS Maine sank in Havana harbor, with the death of 266 sailors, due to a massive explosion. The Maine was in Cuba to protect American citizens during revolu­tionary unrest caused by Cuban freedom-fighters against Spanish colonial rule. A Navy Board of Inquiry concluded that the Maine had been sunk by a mine placed on her hull. Although the government did not affix blame for the mine’s placement, an outraged public blamed Spain. This was one of the precipitating factors to the American entry into war with Spain (the Spanish – American War), which began on April 21, 1898.

Between the sinking of the Maine and the declaration of war, on March 25, 1898, the Assis­tant Secretary of the Navy, Theodore Roosevelt, suggested the development of Langley’s Aero­drome as a possible weapon of war to Navy Secretary John D. Long. This shortly resulted in a grant from the War Department of $50,000 to Langley for the construction of a full-sized ver­sion of the Aerodrome model capable of carrying a man in controlled flight.

The Smithsonian is intricately connected to the federal government, and has always been largely funded by federal dollars and adminis­tered by officials from the three branches of the federal government. It was natural, then, that the federal government would fund advanced research that had already been started under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution. It is not clear that this was a welcome development to Langley, as many have supposed that he intended to complete his aeronautical experiments and contributions with the successful flights of the models he had already produced.

Still, Langley accepted the assignment and was immediately confronted with several sig­nificant challenges. First, his plan was simply to scale up the models that he had successfully flown into a full-sized flying machine capable of carrying a person. Based on later analysis by the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum,1 this was an error of failure-producing propor­tion since the aerodynamics, structural design, and control system of the smaller craft were not adaptable to the full-sized version. However, Langley’s primary focus was not on the integrity of the craft’s structure, but on its propulsion.

In 1898 there existed no available engine that could produce sufficient horsepower for mounting on a full-sized flying machine, primar­ily due to considerations of weight. The best ones available produced only about one horsepower for each 20 pounds of engine weight. In spite of his accomplishments, Langley was not an engi­neer, nor was he an expert in either propulsion or structure. He had concluded, however, that steam engines were not suitable for large fly­ing machines. This left as the only alternative the gasoline internal combustion engine, which had been invented by Gottlieb Daimler in 1885. Meaningful advances in the internal combustion engine were, at that time, awaiting the arrival of the automobile industry. Langley also concluded that he could use some engineering assistance.

Charles Manly, who was set to graduate from Cornell University as a mechanical engineer in 1898, was recommended to Langley by a professor friend of his at that school. Langley hired Manly in June 1898, and by October the two of them had begun major work on the Great Aerodrome, as it was called (see Figure 6-2). Manly had calcu­lated that the machine would require at least two 12 horsepower motors, each weighing no more than 100 pounds. Finding none available, Langley contracted with automobile engine manufacturer Stephen Marius Balzer of New York to build it. After two years of effort, Balzer’s engine, which was a 5-cylinder radial type, was not functional

and Balzer was near bankruptcy. Manly prevailed upon Langley to assign the project of building the engine to him, and by September of 1900, Manly had produced an experimental engine weighing 108 pounds and producing І8У2 horsepower. Manly had, in effect, produced a motor that would perform to almost twice the specifications of the original. As he later said, “At the time very little was known about the ‘proper way of constructing’ an engine and what work had been done was jealously guarded against patent theft by the automobile industry.”

By January 1902, the 5-cylinder radial engine had been successfully developed and tested, and it produced 51 horsepower while weighing only 207 pounds, including water for cooling (see Figure 6-3). His weight to power ratio was an unbeliev­able 4 to 1. The unsuccessful Balzer engine’s design specification had been 8 to 1.

The remaining news about the finished air­craft known as the Aerodrome A, on the other hand, was not so good. The fuselage was con­structed of steel tubing. The wings and tail were of wood covered by Percaline (lightweight cotton). The frame of the craft, and both the design and construction of the tandem wing setup, was pro­duced without the benefit of manned glider test­ing. Given its large size (it was 52 feet long with a wing span of 48 feet), it was flimsy. It did not help that the structure had to sit 11 feet above the ground to provide propeller clearance. Strangely, the Aerodrome had no landing gear or flotation devices. There were no specific provisions for lateral control except for a rudder mounted aft and beneath the fuselage of the craft. The press assigned it the moniker “the Dragonfly.”

Refinements and finishing touches were made during 1903, and on October 7, things were all in order for the launch. Although Lang­ley had planned to use ballast or dummy passen­gers, Manly insisted that he be permitted to pilot the craft. The launching mechanism had been enlarged, inspected, and tested. The Aerodrome had been affixed atop the launching mechanism and stood ready. The engine was cranked and was running smoothly. Wearing a cork-lined coat for flotation, and with a compass affixed to his left trouser leg to assist in navigating a lengthy flight, Manly mounted the Aerodrome atop the houseboat and signaled that he was ready. Two sky rockets were launched and the tugs holding the houseboat into the wind tooted to signal the launch.

With the press in full attendance, what hap­pened next is described by Dr. A. G. Bell in a speech ten years later:

. . . but when the catapult was released the aerodrome sped along the track on the top of the houseboat attaining sufficient head­way for normal flight; but at the end of the rails it was jerked violently down at the front, and plunged headlong into the river.

Langley was lampooned in the press, his air­craft maligned as a “buzzard,” and his launch plat­form and houseboat ridiculed as the “Ark.” The Washington Post said the Aerodrome plunged into the Potomac “like a handful of mortar.” Despite the very public failure, the commitment to flight remained steadfast. Manly was chagrined but unhurt, the engine was undamaged, and the Aero­drome was repairable. On December 8, 1903, with the Wright brothers hard at work on their craft at Kitty Hawk, all was again in readiness for history to be made. According to Dr. Bell:

This time the rear guy post was injured, crip­pling the rear wings, so that the aerodrome pitched up in front and plunged over back­wards into the water. . .

The Washington Star headlined on December 9, 1903, “AIRSHIP FAILS TO FLY,” accompa­nied by a distressing photograph of the Aerodrome
just after launch, captioned “Collapse of the Air­ship.” (See Figure 6-4.) Within three years Langley was dead, the object of ridicule. In 1913 Dr. Bell believed that the catapult was the only problem:

It will thus be seen that Langley’s aerodrome was never successfully launched, so that it had no opportunity of showing what it could do in the air. The defect lay in the launch­ing mechanism employed and not in the machine itself, which is recognized by all experts as a perfectly good flying machine, excellently constructed and made long before the appearance of other machines.

The remains of Aerodrome A were carefully packed up in crates and stored at the Smithsonian Institution. But the end of the story of the Aero­drome was not yet at hand. In fact, the Aerodrome failure just two weeks before the Wright broth­ers’ first successful manned flight in Kitty Hawk,

N. C. was to fuel a controversy that would fester for decades to come. It would cause the Smithso­nian Institution to question the Wright brothers’ claims to be the true “inventors” of the airplane, which, in turn, would cause the original Wright Flyer to be sent to the London Science Museum for exhibition rather than to the Washington Smithsonian. It would play a part in the rupture of the close and fraternal early aeronautical com­munity and become a foil in the patent wars to come between the Wright brothers and the rest of the world over the issue of who owned the right to fly. The failure of the Aerodrome was to be just one poignant vignette among many as man strived to produce the world’s first practical airplane in the early years of the 20th century. [3] [4]

ate had set apart a place for Fred Rentschler in the Age of Aviation that was just begin­ning. Today, his is not a name that springs to mind as central to the development of commer­cial aviation in the United States, but it should be. He changed the aviation world. Almost single – handedly, and certainly single-mindedly, his vision and dedication made the military air forces of the United States the strongest in the world, for the longest time, and at the time they were most needed for survival of western civilization because of the advent of World War II. The giant airliners of the pre-jet world were mainly pow­ered by his designs.

Fred Rentschler (see Figure 11-1) came from solid German stock. His father, George Adam Rentschler, an immigrant from Wiirttem – berg, established a foundry in Hamilton, Ohio, where pig iron and machine castings were the mother’s milk of his upbringing. The Rentschler family also owned the Republic Motor Car Company, which built automobiles until 1916. Hamilton is but a stone’s throw from Dayton, not only the home of the Wright brothers, but also in the early years of the 20th century the locale of the National Cash Register Company, its biggest business. The Rentschler foundry supplied the company with castings for its cash registers, and

George A. Rentschler became a friend of Edward Deeds, NCR’s vice president.

Fred Rentschler grew up in Hamilton around the foundry and automobile business, graduated from Princeton University in 1909, and returned
to Hamilton to work in the family businesses. In addition to NCR, Hamilton was a center of man­ufacturing of different types, including machine tools, steel products, railroad rail and steam engines, reapers, threshers, gun lathes, and many other heavy industry products. It was the home of Niles-Bement-Pond Company, one of the world’s largest machine tool companies, which would later acquire the Pratt & Whitney Tool Company of East Hartford, Connecticut, and it was home to many powerful executives, bankers, and engi­neers. The social network of Fred Rentschler and his family was extensive.

Edwaixl Deeds had the idea to fit NCR cash registers with electric motors in order to replace the mechanical finger-force needed to ring up of the register. He brought into NCR Charles Ket­tering, an inventor and engineer (he would have 186 patents in due course) to create the electric motor application. Soon afterwards, Deeds and Kettering started a little company by the name of Dayton Engineering Laboratories to manu­facture an innovation thought up by Kettering, an electric self-starter that could be applied to automobiles. DELCO, as the company was to be known, was to be credited with taming the horse­less carriage, eliminating the need for the manly and strenuous art of hand cranking required at the time. The first starter was one of 5,000 installed in the 1912 Cadillac, and the idea rapidly spread throughout the automobile industry. DELCO forged close ties with the automobile industry. In 1916, Kettering and Deeds sold DELCO to United Motors Corporation for the whopping sum of nine million dollars.

With the profits from the DELCO sale, Deeds and Kettering formed the Dayton Air­plane Company and then brought in Orville Wright as consultant. The name was changed to the Dayton-Wright Company with the idea of producing airplanes for private use. When the United States entered the war in 1917, Deeds volunteered for work on the Aircraft Production Board in Washington. He was placed in charge of all aircraft procurement for the United States and given the rank of colonel in the Army. The Dayton-Wright Company thereby received con­tracts from the government to produce 5,000 De Havilland warplanes under license.

The state of the art of American airplane and aircraft engine design was represented by the out-classed Curtiss Jenny and the OX-2. As discussed in Chapter 9, the redesigned Packard automobile engine became the Liberty engine that would be installed into the De Havillands, and it was Deeds who engaged his automobile industry contacts to effect that redesign. The Liberty engine became America’s greatest con­tribution to the war materiel effort. The Dayton – Wright Company also produced a pilotless “flying bomb,” another of Kettering’s innova­tions, but too late for use in the war. The device was kept a military secret after the war, but the Nazi German government employed the same technology in the V-l rocket, used with some success against England in World War II. These were smart and dedicated men.

When the United States entered the war in 1917, Fred Rentschler came to Edward Deeds. Deeds found a place for him at the Wright-Martin plant in Brunswick, New Jersey, where the French Hispano-Suiza aircraft engine was being produced under license for shipment to Europe. When Rentschler arrived at Wright-Martin, pro­duction and inspection of engines was the job of a French Commission, and it was Rentschler’s job to replace the Commission. The Hispano 180, followed by the 300, were the dominant power plants of the final years of the war and gave the Allies superiority in the air. At the end of the war, Wright-Martin was turning out 1,000 engines a month under Rentschler’s direction.

After the war most of the assets of Wright – Martin were sold to the Mack Truck Company. Fred Rentschler accepted an offer to manage the remnants of the company, under the name of Wright Aeronautical, for the production of postwar aviation engines. Starting from scratch, he located another plant site in Paterson, New Jersey, to refine and improve on the Hispanos, and to design an American product based on both liquid and air-cooled experimentation. During the postwar days of plentiful engines and planes, these engines were not for personal or private use, but for the military and the government mar­ket. The trouble was, no one knew if there would be such a market. Many of the Wright-Martin engineers and technicians returned to the auto­motive industry, but a few stalwarts remained with Rentschler at Wright Aeronautical. As it turned out, these were the most dedicated and gifted of the group, and soon the company was profitable and had established a credible reputa­tion against the other two aircraft engine produc­ers, Curtiss and Packard.

In the early 1920s, the aircraft engines of choice, for both the Army and the Navy, were the 500 horsepower liquid-cooled engine, the D-12 and the Liberty. These were produced by all three companies (Wright Aeronautical, Curtiss, and Packard), but it was the air-cooled engine that had caught the attention of Rentschler and, as it turned out, the United States Navy.

he Big Four, having been established largely 1 through the efforts of Walter Brown, and having survived the Black investigation and the resulting remedial legislation (Black-McKellar), were well positioned for the beginnings of the modern era of commercial air transportation. The airlines were hurting financially, however, due to the losses experienced during the stand down period when the Army had flown the mail after the cancellation of all CAM routes in February 1934, and because the new rates mandated by Black-McKellar were set to a maximum of 33.5 cents per mile, less than a third of the going rate in 1929.

But progress had been made. In 1929, the contract mail carriers (who were to become the country’s major airlines) were still flying wood and wire airplanes, although a few had acquired the very latest technology in the Fokker or Ford trimotors. By the late 1930s, when the Civil Aeronautics Act was passed, great innovations in aircraft manufacture had occurred, largely due to a combination of commitments and risks under­taken by the airlines, by the aircraft manufactur­ers and engine manufacturers, and to government innovations achieved at the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics.

II The National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics (NACA)

We first learned about NACA in Chapter 9 in con­nection with the ending of the patent litigation between Glenn Curtiss and the Wright brothers. This one accomplishment freed up the develop­ment of aerodynamics for the country, which had been paralyzed by the patent litigation. NACA’s importance cannot be understated (in 1958 it would become NASA) as a progressive force in American aeronautics. Because of its importance, it will appear from time to time in this book.

As we saw, it was created in 1915 as an aeronautical research laboratory, at a time when the national government had fallen well behind European countries in developments in avia­tion. World War I (1914-1918) had the effect of pointing out that aviation was rapidly becoming an issue of national defense. The year 1915 was a transformational one for the United States and the world, even aside from the effects of World War I. The Panama Canal, which had opened just the year before, was treated as a national asset and essential in the defense of the United States. Robert Goddard had started experimenting with rockets and Albert Einstein had announced his
general theory of relativity. Alexander Graham Bell made the first transcontinental telephone call and a new automobile speed record had been established of 102.6 miles per hour (still slower than Curtiss’ motorcycle speed record of 136 miles per hour set in 1907).

In the United States, aerodynamic research was a far-flung undertaking. Experiments were conducted at the Navy Yard, the Bureau of Stan­dards tested engines, experiments in aeronautics were sometimes undertaken at Catholic Univer­sity in Washington, a curriculum in aeronau­tics was being developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Stanford University ran propeller tests. Although the NACA charter provided for the possibility of an independent laboratory, by 1917 none existed. NACA was set up as a loose organization, consisting of a main committee of 12 members, who met semi­annually in Washington, and an Executive Com­mittee of 7 members who did the actual work of supervising NACA activities and proposed activities. They decided their best bet was to tag along to the Army’s new proposed airfield con­struction across the river from Norfolk, Virginia, to be called Uangley Field after Samuel Pierpont Langley, formerly of the Smithsonian. NACA named its new laboratory the “Langley Memo­rial Aeronautical Laboratory,” or just “Langley.”

When completed in 1920, the small Langley NACA component consisted of a staff of just 11 people, mostly civil or mechanical engineers, who did their work without the normal formali­ties of government institutions. By 1925 the staff had grown to 100. At that time the engineers had 19 airplanes dedicated to test operations with two wind tunnels, as well as a new engine research lab for high altitude flight and increased climb capabilities.

NACA’s variable density wind tunnel, rec­ognized in the 1920s to be the world’s best, allowed the engineers to develop and test vari­ous airfoil shapes, resulting in 78 different air­foil cross-sections with designated camber lines, thicknesses, and nose features. Independent air­craft designers by 1933 could select an airfoil from the catalogue for any desired performance they wished in any airplane they were in the pro­cess of designing.

A new propeller wind tunnel was com­pleted at Langley in 1927. For the first time, this 20-foot diameter tunnel allowed the testing of full-sized aircraft models, and it was put to work on attempts to solve the problem of drag associ­ated with radial engines.

As we saw in Chapter 11, conventional wisdom in the 1920s held that inline liquid – cooled engines were superior to radial engines because of several factors, including “head resis­tance,” cooling, and horsepower. In 1926, the Navy asked NACA to conduct cowling research for radial engines at the same time that Pratt & Whitney was developing the Wasp. The Navy had found that carrier landings by aircraft using liquid cooled engines resulted in cracks in the cooling system and attachments, which mandated a different engine solution than the Army had found acceptable.

By 1927, after hundreds of tests, a techni­cal breakthrough was achieved, and subsequent practical tests showed that the military test air­craft increased its speed from 118 to 137 miles per hour solely by use of the NACA-conceived cowling. When applied commercially, NACA estimated savings to the airmail/airline industry of over $5 million, which was more than all the money that had been appropriated for NACA from its inception to 1928.’

The results of cowling research alone justi­fied NACA’s creation. The cowling-drag break­through boosted the preeminence of American engine and aircraft design, and allowed the cre­ation of the modem reciprocating-engine airliners of the 1930s, like the Boeing 247 and the DC-3 with their all-metal construction, retractable land­ing gear, and powerful radial engines.

Now let us take a look at the commercial side of aviation as we progress through the 1930s.

After World War II, commercial aviation inter­ests in England conceded that the state of British aircraft technology and production was woefully behind that of the United States. The British, by necessity, had concentrated their efforts on fighter aircraft during the war, while the United States had been able to pursue transport devel­opment as well. The British concluded that they could never catch up with the Americans in exist­ing technology, but they saw a chance at leveling the competitive playing field with the United States by using the conventional turbojet in a new series of passenger transports.

In 1949, the De Havilland Comet began flight-testing with a design expectation of speeds of 480 miles per hour at flight levels of 35,000 feet. (See Figure 19-4.) While pressurized aircraft had been flying since the late 1930s, no airliner had faced the stresses that would be imposed at this projected altitude. The De Havilland Comet completed testing and entered into service on British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) in May 1952, to the thrill and applause of the world. The first turbojet airliner halved flight times over BOAC’s world routes. To the surprise of many, the Comet made money even though

its operating costs were three times that of the DC-6, even charging regular fares. The differ­ence was that the Comet flew virtually full on all flights, proving that high-density seating was commercially feasible, at least on the vibration- free Comet. Next, Air France inaugurated jet ser­vice on some of its routes with the Comet. In the United States, it was still DC-7 and Superconstel­lation piston engine service.

The Comet had three serious accidents in 1953. The third one involved the airplane com­ing apart in the air, possibly due to a design flaw, but it had occurred in connection with suspected thunderstorm penetration and was written off to the expected result of thunderstorm force. A fourth accident on January 10, 1954 grounded all seven of the Comets. This fourth Comet was lost over the Mediterranean Sea as it climbed above

26,0 feet. Its wreckage fell into the sea and was not immediately available for study. A com­mission formed in England to study the accidents came up with some 50 fixes to be incorporated into the Comet fleet. These adjustments were made and the Comets resumed service.

The wreckage of the Mediterranean crash was recovered and taken to the Civil Aviation Investigation Branch in England for analysis. As

the investigation was proceeding, another Comet disappeared on April 8, 1954 on a flight from Rome to Cairo as it climbed to 35,000 feet. The fleet was again grounded and an all-out investi­gation was ordered to resolve the cause. It was fully appreciated that the future and reputation of the English aircraft production industry was now at risk, as was the entire future of commercial jet transportation.

The Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farn – borough, headquarters for British aeronautical research, was given the task of solving the mys­tery of the Comets’ crashes. A test procedure was contrived to expose the fuselage to a lifetime of pressurization and depressurization cycles, but at a rate 40 times faster than would normally occur. On June 24, 1954, the Comet’s fuselage failed, developing a structural crack at the corner of one of the square windows, and expanding away down the fuselage. This indicated that the Comets likely had exploded, not unlike a bomb, due to the interior pressure of the aircraft. In August 1954, the last section of the doomed Rome to Cairo Comet was recovered. The investigators’ conclu­sion of the cause of the crash was confirmed as the Comet’s fuselage disclosed an almost exact duplication of the test results. The Comet 1 never flew again. Two later iterations of the Comet never flew commercially. The official findings of the British government’s inquiry included that “more study both in design and by experiment” was needed to secure an economically safe life of the pressure cabin. These requirements were not met until 1958, at which time the Comet 4 made the first transatlantic jet commercial flight, on October 4, 1958. By then, the British advantage had been lost, and the United States aircraft pro­duction community was just getting started.

The responsibilities of the FAA discussed above grew and were assumed over time as civilian aviation sector activities developed. All of these responsibilities relate to civil aviation operations occurring on the surface of the earth and within the earth’s atmosphere. When the United States began operations beyond the earth’s atmosphere with the first U. S. space launch in 1958, and for many years thereafter, all U. S. space activities were the exclu­sive province of either NASA or the military.

With the passage by Congress of the Com­mercial Space Launch Act of 1985, the Office of Commercial Space Transportation (referred to as FAA/AST) was created within the FAA. Under this statute, AST has the responsibility to:

* Regulate the commercial space transporta­tion industry, only to the extent necessary to

ensure compliance with international obliga­tions of the United States and to protect the public health and safety, safety of property, and national security and foreign policy interests of the United States;

• Encourage, facilitate, and promote commer­cial space launches by the private sector;

• Recommend appropriate changes in federal statutes, treaties, regulations, policies, plans, and procedures;

• Facilitate the strengthening and expansion of the United States space transportation infrastructure.

FAA/AST is organized into three divisions:

• Space Systems Development Division (AST-100)

® Licensing and Safety Division (AST-200)

• Systems Engineering and Training Division (AST-300)

Because the FAA has been assigned an entirely new role in aviation safety, staffing and expertise concerns have been expressed both within and out­side the agency. This has been compounded by the fact that, while the original thrust of the FAA’s over­sight related to unmanned launches of expendable launch vehicles, commercial space activity is rapidly expanding into space tourism, so that the FAA’s responsibility for licensing reusable launch vehicle missions will need to expand correspondingly. As of the end of 2009, FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation had a staff of 71 full-time employees, including 12 new aerospace engineers, and had established field offices at Edwards Air Force Base and NASA’s Johnson Space Center.

For a more thorough discussion of commer­cial space launch activities in the United States and the role of FAA/AST, please refer to Chapter 41.

Late in the autumn of 1878, our father came into the house one evening with some object partly concealed in his hands, and before we could see what it was, he tossed it into the air. Instead of falling to the floor as we expected, it flew across the room till it struck the ceiling, where it fluttered awhile, and finally sank to the floor. It was a little toy, known to scientists as a “helicoptere," but which we, with sublime disregard for science, at once dubbed a “bat.” It was a light frame of cork and bamboo, covered with paper, which formed two screws, driven in opposite direc­tions by rubber bands under torsion. A toy so delicate lasted only a short time in the hands of small boys, but its memory was abiding.

Later, the boys became experts in kite build­ing and in flying them until their age made this activity unseemingly childish. They also built model “helicopteres,” making them larger and larger. The larger they become, they discovered, the less they flew. In this way they began to learn the rudimentary physics of aerodynamics, that a machine having only twice the linear dimensions of another would require eight times the power to achieve lift. Thus, were they introduced to coef­ficients of aerodynamic lift.

In the late 19th century, the bicycle was advanced technology, and its popularity made its commercial appeal very great. The Wrights opened a bicycle shop in Dayton, Ohio, and became adept at machinery and mechanics. In the middle of the decade of the 1890s, the brothers had some limited knowledge of the small group of engineers and scientists who had conducted experiments with gliders and flying machines. But it was not until the death of Otto Lilienthal, in 1896, that they seriously took up the study of aeronautics. They began reading works by Chanute, Lilienthal, Langley, and arti­cles published by the Smithsonian Institution. They saw at once that the field of aviation was neatly divided between the advocates advanc­ing theories and experimentation related to
propulsion, or powered flight, like Langley and Maxim, and those advocates of soaring flight, like Lilienthal, Mouillard, and Chanute. The sympathies of the Wright brothers lay with the latter group, based on the sound logic that until the problem of control of an aerial vehicle could be solved, the question of power would not be relevant. They, therefore, zeroed in on the prob­lem of control.

As they educated themselves with the avail­able literature, they also noted that the years between 1895 and 1900 represented a brief time of heightened activity in aeronautics, and a time of great public expectation that a solution to the problem of flight would be found. But successful flight did not materialize. Maxim, after spending $100,000 in the effort, abandoned his work. The Ader machine, built at the expense of the French government, was a failure. Lilienthal and Pilcher were killed in experiments, and Chanute and most others seemed to be having little success. The Wrights concluded that the public, distressed and disappointed by the failures and tragedies, had given up on the idea of manned, powered flight. As they said, the whole process seemed to have been shuffled off to that purgatory of sci­ence and engineering that was concerned with such things as the perpetual motion machine.

So it was that they harked back to their days of kite flying. They began their active experi­mentation in October 1900 at Kitty Hawk. (See Figure 7-1.) They chose that venue for its con­stant, substantial breezes, and because of the ele­vation of the sand dunes and unobstructed terrain that joined the sea. Their machine was designed in large part from the work of Chanute with its struts and wire bracing, and from the Lilienthal tables from which the coefficient of lift could be calculated. It was to be flown tethered to the ground, as a kite with a man aboard, and also as a glider. The 1900 experiments failed to con­firm published data on wind pressures and lift, although they did confirm the basic effectiveness of lateral and vertical control, innovations that were original to the Wrights. The main problems

of lift and drag were daunting, but as the brothers left Kitty Hawk as winter approached, they were encouraged enough to plan improvements to be tested the next summer.

On their return to North Carolina on July 11, 1901, the design of the glider was essentially the same (see Figure 7-2), except that it was made larger and the camber of the wings was increased in order to attempt to provide for greater lift.

Still, the amount of lift achieved was disappoint­ing. The brothers reluctantly concluded that the published data of flight, particularly as concerned lift, could not be trusted. The center of pressure calculated from the tables was too far forward, resulting in a nose-heavy trim. Even attempts to manipulate the “warping mechanism” of the wings while attempting on-board gliding did not result in the satisfactory trials experienced the year before. Wilbur and Orville were so dispir­ited that they broke camp a month earlier than they had planned, and returned to Dayton. As recollected by Orville:

… we doubted that we would ever resume our experiments. Although we had broken the record for distance in gliding, and although Mr. Chanute, who was present at that time, assured us that our results were better than had ever before been attained, yet when we looked at the time and money which we had expended, and considered the progress made and the distance yet to go, we con­sidered our experiments a failure. At that time I made the prediction that men would sometime fly, but that it would not be within our lifetime.1

also provided insight into the need of a vertical “vane” as they called it; what today is known as a rudder. (See Figure 7-3.)

The design of the 1902 glider (see Figure 7-4), incorporating the results of their testing in the wind tunnel, was the first aircraft that solved the fundamental problems of soaring flight, lift and control, and it constituted a major departure from their first two gliders. They returned to Kill Devil Hills in the late summer of 1902 and by the mid­dle of September, they had begun kiting experi­ments. In a letter to Milton Wright on October 2, 1902, Wilbur wrote:

Our new machine is a very great improve­ment over anything we had built before and over anything any one has built. We have far beaten all record for flatness of glides as we in some cases have descended only degrees from the horizontal while other machines descended from 7.5 to 11 degrees. . . . This means that in soaring we can descend much slower, and in a power machine can fly with much less power. The new machine is also much more controllable than any heretofore built so the danger is correspondingly reduced. We are being

When they returned to Dayton, Wilbur and Orville began to believe that the information that had previously been developed, particularly the Smeaton coefficient and data compiled by Otto Lilienthal regarding pressures, were in error. They determined to verify all of the necessary data, such as coefficient of lift and wind pressures, from their own experimentation. Rather than secure this information from building and crashing more glid­ers, they set about to make these determinations more scientifically. They constructed a state-of – the-art wind tunnel and developed instruments to quantify lift and drag. They tested over 80 differ­ent wing configurations in their wind tunnel and, in the process, confirmed that prevailing data on coefficient of lift were wrong. They also were able to identify an optimum shape of wing, one much longer and narrower, for their new machine. Tests

careful and will avoid accident of serious nature if possible. Yesterday I tried three glides from the top of the hill and made 506 ft, 504.4 ft, and 550 ft, respectively in dis­tance passed over. Everything is so much more satisfactory that we now believe that the flying problem is really nearing its solution.

bicycle shop was left unattended for extended periods of time. They hired a machinist in 1901 by the name of Charlie Taylor to mind the store in their absence and to take on bicycle repair work that they would have to miss due to their absence. It was Taylor who built the one-cylinder engine that the Wrights used to drive their wind tunnel for the 1902 Dayton experiments. When the Wrights finally got to the matter of propulsion for the Flyer, they turned to Charlie Taylor.

They calculated that the engine could weigh no more than 180 pounds and that it would take at least 8 horsepower to sustain the Flyer in flight. Taylor came up with a 4-cylinder in-line water cooled engine that weighed 178 pounds and produced 16 horsepower, that is until the valves heated up, and then it put out only 12 horsepower. It had no carburetor, and with a weight to power ratio of 14 to 1, this was not nearly the engine that Charles Manly had built

for Langley, whose ratio was 4 to 1, but it was enough for the Wrights’ purposes in 1903.

The second part of the propulsion problem was the propeller. There were no available data on aircraft propellers, and their research into marine propellers turned out to be a dead end. They approached the problem in the same way as they had approached the wing lift. They just rotated the wing 90 degrees, put a twist in it and they had created a propeller. The efficiency of the propeller designs was tested in the wind tun­nel until the best was found.

There was no guesswork in the 1903 experi­ments. The Wright brothers had brought the scientific method to their task, and the total design had been proven on paper. They also possessed the skills of mechanics and craftsmen to put it all together in the final product and in a workmanlike manner. Free, controlled, and sustained powered flight was at last achieved on December 17, 1903 in their design known as the Flyer I. (See Figures 7-5 and 7-6.) This
craft was damaged after its fourth flight (852 feet in 59 seconds), although it was salvaged and returned to Dayton, Ohio. In 1928, Orville sent it for display to the London Science Museum. Since 1949, it has been on display at the Smith­sonian Institution.

The Wrights continued their research and development at Huffman Prairie, Ohio, begin­ning in 1904. They built a second powered model, the Flyer II (see Figure 7-7), that was virtually identical to the Flyer /, but 320 pounds lighter. They attempted short hops in the Flyer II, but they were having difficulty with the under­powered engine and the lack of the favorable winds enjoyed at Kitty Hawk. In September 1904, they developed a catapult launching sys­tem to get the airplane quickly up to flying speed. This system allowed them to again concentrate on flying and on extending the range of their flights. On May 23, 1904, the Wrights invited newspaper reporters to view their experiments on condition that no photographs be taken. Lack of

wind, a cranky engine, and control problems left the reporters less than impressed, all of which contributed to the belief that the Wrights’ claims were overblown. This failure also reinforced their
penchant for conducting their work in secret. Yet they persevered, and by the end of 1904 they had made 105 successful flights and logged a total of 45 minutes flying time.

In 1905 the Flyer III was launched (see Figure 7-8). After a series of serious mishaps, the Wrights made several significant changes to the Flyer based on their conclusion that longitu­dinal stability was the problem. They increased the area of the elevator to almost two times its former dimension. Believing that the elevator was too close to the wings, they extended it to a point almost twice as far from the leading edge of the wing as previously. When testing resumed, it was immediately apparent that these changes had made the Flyer truly airworthy. This was regarded by the Wrights as their final design, having with it solved all major control problems, and it became generally acknowl­edged to be the world’s first practical airplane. (See Figure 7-9.) On October 5, 1905, the Wrights completed a flight of 24 miles in 38 minutes, landing only when the gas tank on the airplane ran dry. Being highly satisfied with their design, but wondering what practical use
the airplane could be, they lobbied the U. S. government, suggesting that the airplane might be used for military scouting and reconnais­sance. The War Department was not interested, advising the Wrights that the United States had “no requirements” for their invention.

The Wrights had applied for, but still had not secured, a patent in 1905 and they were not willing to make the details of their product pub­lic. After the negative press received in 1904, reporters were not invited to view the machine or its performance and the few articles published about it during this time were generally inaccu­rate. Their sole support came from Octave Cha – nute, who had seen the aircraft, had seen it fly, and who knew the details of its construction. His correspondence with his contacts throughout the world was about the only sustaining force that kept the Wrights’ accomplishments above rank rumor. When visitors began to come to Dayton to view their machine and to interview them, the

Wrights shunned all publicity and even disas­sembled the Flyer and stowed away the parts from view for almost three years. The Flyer did not fly again until 1908 when it was adapted to carry two people.

Rejected at home, the Wrights turned to Europe, where aviation was taking hold. The asking price for the aircraft was $200,000, a very large sum in those days. Although they guaran­teed its performance, they refused to demonstrate it to a prospective purchaser until a price had been negotiated and paid. Not surprisingly, no sales were recorded. At the same time, experi­menters were proceeding with their own indi­vidual designs and making progress, although none had come close to accomplishing what the Wrights had. This fact, in addition to the secrecy that surrounded the Wrights’ 1905 experiments, produced widespread skepticism in the aviation community. Skepticism even took the form of
sarcasm and taunting. Consider the tone of the following article from the very prominent Scien­tific American magazine, entitled “The Wright Aeroplane and Its Fabled Performance.”3

A Parisian automobile paper recently pub­lished a letter from the Wright brothers to Capt. Ferber of the French army, in which statements are made that certainly need some public substantiation from the Wright brothers. In the letter in question it is alleged that on September 26, the Wright motor-driven aeroplane covered a distance of 17.961 kilometers in 18 minutes and 9 seconds, and that its further progress was stopped by lack of gasoline. On September 29 a distance of 19.57 kilometers was cov­ered in 19 minutes and 55 seconds, the gas­oline supply again having been exhausted. On September 30 the machine traveled 16 kilometers in 17 minutes and 15 seconds;

this time a hot bearing prevented further remarkable progress. Then came some eye­opening records. Here they are:

October 3: 25.535 kilometers in 25 minutes and 5 seconds. (Cause of Stoppage, hot bearing.) October 4: 33.456 kilometers in 33 minutes and 17 seconds. (Cause of Stoppage, hot bearing.) October 5: 38.956 kilometers in 33 minutes and 3 seconds. (Cause of Stoppage, exhaus­tion of gasoline supply.)

It seems that these alleged experi­ments were made at Dayton, Ohio, a fairly large town, and that the newspapers of the United States, alert as they are, allowed these sensational performances to escape their notice. When it is considered that Langley never even successfully launched his man-carrying machine, that Langley’s experimental model never flew more than a mile, and that Wright’s mysterious aero­plane covered a reputed distance of 38 kilometers at the rate of one kilometer a minute, we have the right to exact further information before we place reliance on these French reports. Unfortunately, the Wright brothers are hardly disposed to pub­lish any substantiation or to make pub­lic experiment, for reasons best known to themselves. If such sensational and tre­mendously important experiments are being conducted in a not very remote part of the country, on a subject in which almost every­body feels the most profound interest, is it possible to believe that the enterprising American reporter, who, it is well known, comes down the chimney when the door is locked in his face—even if he has to scale a 15-story sky-scraper to do so—would not have ascertained all about them and pub­lished them for broadcast long ago? Why, particularly, as it is further alleged, should the Wrights desire to sell their invention to the French government for a “million” francs. Surely their own is the first to which they would be likely to apply.

We certainly want more light on the sub­ject.4

On May 22, 1906, the U. S. Patent Office granted Patent No. 821,393 to the Wrights for their design. The patent was broad enough to cover the entire craft, although the main claim in the patent was to the means of control. Diagrams, accompanied by step-by-step explanations of the workings of their three-dimensional means of con­trol, clearly show the originality of their design.

Ultimately, the infant aviation community did not accept that the work of the Wright broth­ers was worthy enough as to command royalties. In Europe, the patent was to be ignored and the Wrights’ lateral control innovations were to be shamefully duplicated, as in the Bleriot mono­planes, for example. In the United States, Glenn Curtiss would begin developing designs of air­planes with a form of aileron control without payment of royalties. But he strenuously main­tained that the incorporation of the “aileron” into the wing was outside of the Wrights’ patent. It was subsequently demonstrated, in fact, that the “warping” of the wing had the long-term physi­cal effect of weakening the structure of the wing. The aileron, of course, has no such effect.

In 1907, though, things began to improve for the secretive Wrights. The War Department that year announced a competition for an air­plane for government use. The specifications tracked those that the Wrights had earlier adver­tised to the government. The Wrights returned to Kitty Hawk, a more isolated venue than Huffman Prairie, re-established their camp, and began testing their modified Flyer, which now had two side-by-side seats mounted in the upright position. This version was known as the Model A.

By 1908, the Wrights were satisfied with their modified design and were ready, not only for the Army competition, but to begin the European marketing of the Flyer. The Wrights decided to divide their efforts. Orville returned to Dayton and prepared a machine for demon­stration. Wilbur journeyed to France to fulfill the terms of a contract that had finally been suc­cessfully negotiated for the sale of the Flyer. The terms of the French contract varied significantly from the bid submitted by Orville to the U. S. War Department.

The bid to the United States government was for one aircraft, for $25,000, deliverable in 200 days with an additional 30 days allowed for flight demonstration. The French contract agreed to deliver four aircraft, for $4,000 each, and to receive a lump sum payment of $100,000 and a 50% interest in the French purchasing company. The French contract also required that the aircraft successfully complete flights of 31 miles each, while carrying a passenger, and that the Wrights teach three students to fly and solo.

Wilbur was to be the subject of extensive ridicule on his arrival in France, where the terms of the contract had been widely publicized, and where it was generally believed that no aircraft was capable of accomplishing the requirements of the contract. As far as the French knew, the successful short flight of M. Santos-Dumont in 1906 outside of Paris not only established him as the first to fly, but also created the “opera­tions envelope” for the “aeroplane” in general (that original flight covered a distance of 200 feet). Wilbur set up operations outside of Paris and resolutely went about preparing to meet his part of the bargain. After flawless demonstra­tions in August 1908, not only of the capabilities of the Model A but also of his piloting skills, the combination of which greatly surpassed anything the French had ever seen, he almost overnight became a national hero. Wilbur then began a series of record-setting accomplishments: [5]

5. November 23, 1908—A new altitude record bringing with it a prize of 2,500 French francs.

6. December 31, 1908—A new duration and distance record (2 hours, 18 minutes) for the Coupe de Michelin Trophy and a prize of

20,0 French francs.

Wilbur became the toast of France, the recipient of medals, commendations, and the honoree of testimonial dinners. He was even given a standing ovation by the French Sen­ate. Flights were conducted throughout Europe for the remainder of 1908 and into 1909 with increasing acclaim from the Europeans. (See Figure 7-10.) Audiences were had with King Alfonso of Spain, King Victor Emmanuel of Italy, and King Edward VII of England. During the demonstrations in Italy, the American indus­trialist J. P. Morgan chanced to see one of the flights and was later instrumental in helping the Wrights secure financial backing from wealthy investors in New York. In England, the Wrights met Charles Rolls of Rolls-Royce renown, who purchased a Wright Flyer for his personal use, the first private airplane purchase in history.

Meanwhile, in September 1908, Orville began the demonstrations for the U. S. government in Ft. Myer, Virginia. (See Figure 7-11.) The demonstrations were attended by Lt. Thomas Selfridge, as a government representative, and he was authorized to accompany Orville as a pas­senger on one of the flights being evaluated by the government. (See Figure 7-12.) As we will see in the next chapter, Selfridge was a member of the Aerial Experiment Association (AEA), which had designed and, for the first time in America, publicly flown an airplane. The Wrights, in fact, regarded the activities of the AEA as an infringe­ment on their patent.

Orville was not pleased that Lt. Selfridge was to be given an up-close look at the Flyer, but the flight proceeded aloft with the two antago­nists aboard. As the aircraft flew at 80 feet, one of the propellers somehow struck a bracing wire,

FIGURE 7-10 Wilbur Wright flying in France—1909.

FIGURE 7-11 Orville Wright at Fort Myer, Virginia—1908.

FIGURE 7-12 Lt. Thomas Selfridge and Orville Wright prior to a take off at Ft. Myer, Virginia—1908.

causing it to snap in two. Orville was unable to control the Flyer, and it dove almost vertically into the ground in front of the horrified specta­tors. Lt. Selfridge was killed, becoming the first fatality due to an airplane accident, and Orville was very seriously injured. The demonstrations were cancelled.

« If you are looking for perfect safety, you will do well to sit on a fence and watch the birds; but if you really wish to learn, you must mount a machine and become acquainted with its tricks by actual trial.»

Wilbur Wright, from an address to the Western Society of Engineers in Chicago, 18 September 1901

After his release from the hospital, Orville traveled to France as a part of his recuperation and participated along with Wilbur and their sister Katherine in the victorious tour of Europe. When the Wrights returned to the United States in May 1909, they were welcomed as national heroes. President Taft feted them at the White House and awarded them a Congressional medal.

The War Department had extended the time for completion of flight tests that had begun in 1908 until Orville could recover from his injuries. The tests were resumed on June 29, 1909 with a new model of the former Model A Flyer. This version was called the Military Flyer, weigh­ing 740 pounds and with a Wright 4-cylinder 34 horsepower engine, which offered more speed. On July 12, Orville completed the duration por­tion of the Army requirements by staying aloft for 1 hour and 12 minutes with Army Lt. Frank Lahm aboard the aircraft, exceeding the test parameters. Orville next began the flight to meet the Army speed requirement of 40 miles per hour. He climbed the Flyer to 400 feet and, assum­ing a slight nose-down attitude, streaked past his launching derrick at 42.583 miles per hour. He flew a victory lap around Arlington National Cemetery and landed. The first military aircraft had just been purchased at a cost of $30,000 ($25,000 contract price plus bonus of $5,000 for the extra two miles per hour attained in the test). Wheels were installed on this version in 1910.

The Wright Company was formed in November 1909 as an aircraft production com­pany with the backing of New York financiers, and the brothers continued to improve on the Model A design. The Model В was the first pro­duction airplane with a 75-horsepower Rausen – berger engine, and was the first Wright aircraft to fly without a canard in front. It was also the first to have a single elevator located aft, although it continued to use wing warping for banking con­trol. The military version of the Model В adopted ailerons for the first time for lateral control.

The Wright Company produced a number of different models through 1916, the last year of production, with various design modifications, although Orville Wright sold his interest in the company to a group of financiers in 1915. The Model F was the first Wright airplane to adopt a fuselage, on which the elevator was placed atop the rudder located on the tail of the aircraft. The Model К was the first tractor (forward-facing propellers) airplane produced by the Wright Company, and on the К model wing warping was finally abandoned completely in favor of aileron control.

Wilbur Wright died of typhoid fever in 1912, and although Orville remained in the avia­tion arena for years, he was never to take another principal role.

« It may be that the invention of the aeroplane flying-machine will be deemed to have been of less mate­rial value to the world than the dis­covery of Bessemer and open-hearth steel, or the perfection of the tele­graph, or the introduction of new and more scientific methods in the man­agement of our great industrial works.

To us, however, the conquest of the air, to use a hackneyed phrase, is a technical triumph so dramatic and so amazing that it overshadows in importance every feat that the inven­tor has accomplished. If we are apt to lose our sense of proportion, it is not only because it was but yesterday that we learned the secret of the bird, but also because we have dreamed of flying long before we succeeded in ploughing the water in a dugout canoe. From Icarus to the Wright Brothers is a far cry.??

Waldemar Kaempffert, The New Art of Flying, 1910

Endnotes

1. Kelly, Fred. The Wright Brothers: A Biography authorized by Orville Wright (New York, Ballantine Books, 1956).

2. Charles Manly had been working on the Balzer engine since 1900 and, by the first part of 1902, had success­fully upgraded the Balzer motor from a heavy 12 horse­power engine to a marvel of 51 horsepower weighing only 207 pounds. It had a weight to power ratio of 4 to 1.

3. January 13, 1905, Vol. XCIV, No. 2, page 40.

4. See Appendix 2, an address by A. G. Bell on the presenta­tion of the Langley Medal to Gustave Eiffel in 1913. In this speech Dr. Bell provides a then contemporary explanation of the confusion and general lack of awareness that the public and the scientific community labored under regard­ing innovations of flight.

It was generally believed that no air-cooled type of engine could ever supplant the exceed­ingly efficient water-cooled engines that had been developed both in the automotive and air­craft industries. The ability to operate large dis­placement engines at high crankshaft speeds was central to this efficiency, and air-cooled engines could not match those crankshaft speeds. Cooling was a big problem. It was also believed that the excessive “head resistance” of radial engines would not compete with in-line water – cooled engines, generating excessive drag. Yet, if they could be made to work, air-cooled engines offered many advantages over liquid-cooled engines, with their associated requirements of plumbing, radiators, and attendant weight. Hardly anyone believed that the radial would work, except Fred Rentschler, and perhaps Charles Lawrance. The Curtiss Aeronautical and Packard factories were firmly committed to liquid-cooled engines.

Lawrance Aero Engine Company was experimenting with a small, З-cylinder French radial in Lawrance’s New York City loft, but it was underfunded and disorganized and it was not making much headway. Lawrance and his backers approached Wright Aeronautical for talks, and Rentschler was assigned to confer with them. The Lawrance group said that the Navy was interested in the air-cooled engine and would contract for a properly developed radial that could be produced in sufficient numbers. This was soon confirmed by the head of the Bureau of Aeronautics, Admiral Moffet, who asked Rentschler to come down to Washington to talk about the Lawrance situation. As a result of this discussion, Wright Aeronautical took over the Lawrance operation and moved it to New Jersey in 1923.

The engine at the time was known as the J-l radial, but the Lawrance group lacked the funds and technical expertise to bring its power up to military standards. Within several months, the Wright engineers had redesigned the engine into a workable product, and they continued to improve the design, reliability, cooling, and fuel consumption. The engine design would ultimately be known as the “Whirlwind,” a 200-horsepower, 790-inch displacement radial designated the J-5 or R-790, and it was introduced in 1925. The Navy bought it and used it, mostly in trainers. It made an unheard-of endurance flight of over 50 hours in April 1927 and it was selected by Charles Lind­bergh for his transatlantic flight from New York to Paris in May 1927.

But Rentschler would not be there at the end. In the summer of 1924 it became appar­ent that the board of directors of Wright

Aeronautical, which was composed of invest­ment bankers who had no appreciation for what Rentschler was trying to accomplish, was going to make the arduous effort of creating a competi­tive radial engine very difficult, if not impossible.

The Whirlwind was a fine machine, but Rentschler was convinced that the radial engine concept could be much more powerful and much more efficient, and that it could compete with the 400- and 500-horsepower liquid-cooled engines on which the military relied. But development would take more time and much more money, and the Wright board of directors was not inter­ested in such costly projects.

Rentschler had decided to leave the com­pany. He was discouraged and he had taken ill. He resigned and was determined to give it all up. But on recovering his health at the beginning of 1925, he set out to find a way to continue his quest in radial aviation engines. Although he had little money, he did have hometown contacts, and his brother, Gordon, was a vice-president of National City Bank of New York. Gordon had also been recently elected to the board of direc­tors of Niles-Bement-Pond, a Hamilton company well known to both Gordon and Fred. Colonel Deeds was also on the Niles Board, and Niles owned Pratt & Whitney Tool Company. Pratt & Whitney was sitting on piles of cash from World War I operations.

Rentschler went down to Washington for a confidential talk with Admiral Moffet, and to seek some insight as to how the Navy might view his move from Wright Aeronautical. The discussions went extremely well; the admiral told him that the Navy would be “overwhelm­ingly” interested if such a powerful radial could be produced.[8]

Rentschler’s next stop was an all-day appointment with the president of Niles-Bement – Pond in New York City, James K. Cullen, who was a close friend of Rentschler’s father in Hamilton. Rentschler told Cullen that he estimated he would need $500,000 through the design, con­struction, preliminary tests, and proof of the new

engine. If the engine proved reliable, he would need up to another one million dollars before any return could be expected. Cullen didn’t blink; instead he said he would provide the money from “surplus funds.” It got better. Cullen said there was empty space at the Pratt & Whitney plant in East Hartford and that Rentschler could have it for his use—he could also use the P&W name!

Contract arrangements were completed on July 14, 1925, with Rentschler taking 50 percent of the stock of the new company, which was to be called Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Company, and Pratt & Whitney Tool Company taking the other 50 percent. The core engineering group from Wright Aeronautical, George Mead, Don Brown, and Andrew Willagoos, committed to joining him. They roughed out the general char­acteristics of the proposed new engine, including displacement, power range, and a weight limita­tion. They included innovations never before used, either in the United States or in Europe.

Wasting no time, the group set up shop and went to work in the Willagoos garage in Mont­clair, New Jersey, while the move to Hartford was arranged. The goal was understood by all: an air-cooled radial in the 400-horsepower class. By August the plant was operating in Hartford, and by Christmas Day 1925, the new engine had been completely designed, machined, and assem­bled. Within a few hours on the test stand, power readings showed well above 400 horsepower. It weighed 650 pounds. It was proving to be a thoroughbred.

Navy personnel were swept off their feet. By October 1926, the Navy sent a contract for 200 of the engines and Pratt and Whitney Aircraft was on its way. Due to the sound it made, the group decided on “Bees” as a general designa­tion for the P&W engine types. Rentschler’s wife suggested that the first engine type be called the “Wasp.” And so it was.

There was still the question of “head resis­tance”; Packard and Curtiss maintained that the radial could never match their engines in speed, even though their engines were heavier. Rentschler believed that, if properly cowled, the radial could be cooled at high speed. Nine out of ten “experts” disagreed. In side-by-side tests, however, the Wasp held a slight edge in speed over the Curtiss D-12, and the Wasp out climbed and turned inside its competitor. The installed weight differential between the Wasp and the Liberty was 1,000 pounds, and between the Wasp and the D-12, 650 to 700 pounds. These figures translated into useful load for a Wasp-driven airplane.

The P&W engineers continued to design and test, and soon they had developed the 500-horsepower “Hornet,” which the Navy liked as well. By 1927, when the first large aircraft carriers, the Lexington and the Saratoga, were launched, all 160 airplanes on deck had either Wasp or Hornet engines. It took the Army two years to come around to the Wasp and Hornet for their fighters. For the rest of the decade, P&W engines set the standard. By 1929, 2,500 Wasps had been delivered, and the engine was to remain in production until 1960. When the last Wasp was turned out, the production run numbered 34,966.

But the company was soon in for some com­petition. After the departure of Rentschler and his engineers from Wright Aeronautical, the company regrouped. By 1929, Wright Aeronautical had perfected the 575-horsepower air-cooled Cyclone that was to see extensive use in the coming years in both civilian and military aircraft, installed in the DC-3 and B-17. Wright Aeronautical, ironi­cally because of the long-standing enmity between the Wright brothers and Glenn Curtiss, merged with Curtiss Aircraft on July 5, 1929 and operates under the name Curtiss-Wright to this day.

The development of the heavy radial engine in 1925 and 1926 transformed the aviation industry, leading to the privatization of airmail, the build­ing of larger aircraft, the creation of the first safe passenger airlines, and creating a rehable, lighter – weight engine. It would lead to the first transcon­tinental airline, composed of Boeing and P&W, and to the merging of P&W with Chance Vought Aircraft, Hamilton Standard, and Sikorsky. We will get more into those details in the next chapters.

Because of these developments, the role of government was just beginning to define itself in the new world of commercial aviation. [9] 1

Regulation

Chapter 12 The Privatization of Airmail

Chapter 13 The Founding of the Airlines

Chapter 14 New Deal—The

Roosevelt Administration

Eastern Air Lines emerged in 1934 as the surviv­ing entity following Black-McKellar. The pre­decessor company, Eastern Air Transport, was owned by the holding company, North American Aviation, which in turn was controlled by Gen­eral Motors as of 1933. Eddie Rickenbacker (see Figure 15-1), World War I hero and fighter ace, was hired by General Motors as a consultant and then was made general manager of Eastern Air

Transport in 1934. Eastern Air Transport was successor to the original line, Pitcairn Aviation, and it later absorbed the Luddington Line and New York Airways before becoming Eastern Air Lines. When General Motors tired of the airline business in 1938, Rickenbacker purchased the company and steadily increased its business and its mileage.

In 1937, Eastern Air Lines had routes from New York to Miami and to Atlanta and points south and west, New Orleans, Houston, and San Antonio, all through Washington, D. C. It also flew the Chicago to Miami route through India­napolis, Nashville, and Atlanta.

TWA

TWA was the designation taken by the airline combined at the behest of Walter Folger Brown. A combination of the former Transcontinental Air Transport (TAT) and Western Air Express, it flew the middle transcontinental route from New York to Los Angeles under the name Transcontinental and Western Air. After Black-McKellar, the air­line simply added “Inc.” after its name in order to comply with the prohibition of Postmaster Gen­eral Farley that precluded those airlines which had participated in the Brown meetings from bid­ding on the new airmail contracts in 1934.

TWA had been a part of North American Aviation in the early 1930s, and General Motors controlled the holding company. After Brown – McKellar, General Motors sold its interests to John D. Hertz and Lehman Brothers, who then had effective control of TWA.

Jack Frye, at the age of 26, was TWA’s operational vice president in 1930. He had founded Standard Air Lines in the 1920s, after stints at flight instructing and stunt flying, and went with the company when it was purchased by Western Air Express. With the merger of Western and TAT, he suddenly found himself in charge of operations of a transcontinental airline. TWA, and most other airlines, relied heavily on the trimotors in the early 1930s. With the 1931 crash of the Fokker Trimotor in which Notre Dame football coach Knute Rockne was killed, government-mandated inspections of that plane’s wooden wing structure became cost-prohibitive, not to mention the fact that the flying public thereafter was not keen on stepping aboard that airplane. Frye needed new equipment.

In 1932, Frye had heard the buzz in the avia­tion community of a new prototype in the works at Boeing, the model 247. (See Figure 15-2.) This airplane was to be a giant leap forward with its low mono-wing, and two engines instead of three that were mounted into the wings in nacelles (taking

advantage of NACA research) that greatly reduced drag. The 247 used stressed all-metal skin, retract­able landing gear (a first), insulated cabin walls, hot water heating, and double ventilation systems. This airplane would fly from one coast to the other in only 19’/2 hours, 12 hours less than with the trimotors. Fueling stops were reduced from 14 to 6. Frye decided that TWA had to have these airplanes.

When he inquired, he was advised that United Airlines (the sister company to the Boe­ing manufacturing arm) had already placed an order for 60 of the new planes, an order that it would take all of two years to fill, thus pre­cluding any deliveries to other airlines. The 247 became operational in June 1933.

In the fall of 1932, Frye wrote to a number of aircraft manufacturers setting out airplane perfor­mance specifications for new equipment that TWA would be interested in purchasing. Although the specifications included that the airplane have three engines, the engineers at a small company located in California, known as Douglas Aircraft, believed that the performance specifications could be met with a twin engine design, including the require­ment for a 10,000 foot minimum service ceiling on one engine (necessary to clear the Rockies).

A prototype was fielded in July 1933, the DC-1 (see Figure 15-3), the designation for the Douglas Commercial Number 1. If this had been poker, the DC-1 would have called the В-247 and raised it. The DC-1 engine mountings and cowling were similar to the 247, incorporating the design developed by NACA, but the land­ing gear of the DC-1 folded up into the engine nacelles. The engines, Wright Cyclones, had been engineered to produce 710 horsepower due to 87-octane gasoline having become commer­cially available during the period of the plane’s construction. Although the constant speed propel­ler was still a few years off, the DC-1 did have a 2-speed propeller that could be set either for takeoff or for cruise (a first). Additional firsts included an automatic pilot and efficient wing flaps. Flight tests showed that Frye’s perfor­mance specifications had been met. Only one DC-1 was built and that one was purchased by TWA. It was placed in limited service in 1933.

When Postmaster General Farley sent his notice dated February 9, 1934, canceling all air­mail contracts effective February 19, 1934, Frye decided to make his own statement. With Eddie Rickenbacker of Eastern Air Transport as co-pilot, on February 18, 1934, Frye took off from Los

Angeles in the DC-1 loaded with airmail and flew it to Newark, with fueling stops in Kansas City and Columbus, in 13 hours and 4 minutes, setting the transcontinental speed record at the time.

The DC-2, with 14 seats, was brought to production in 1934, and 193 were built. The next year, in 1935, Douglas came out with the DC-3 (see Figure 15-4) (21 seats) with 900-horsepower

Wright Cyclones (DC-ЗА with 1,200-horsepower P&W engines), and Douglas would, before it was all over, build 455 of them for commercial use and 10,174 for the military. By 1936, the DC-3 had reduced the transcontinental flying time to about 17 hours. The airplane was awarded the Collier Trophy in 1936 and became known as “the plane that changed the world.” And, indeed, it was used all over the world—in World War II in Burma, this airplane, which at normal configu­ration seated 21 passengers, set a load record of 72 refugees safely delivered, and 6 more stow­aways were discovered on landing.

By late 1938, pressurized airplanes were on the drawing boards. Boeing designed a com­mercial transport, the 307 (see Figure 15-5), I scheduled for delivery in 1939. It was based on < the basic B-17 design with four 900-horsepower I Wright R-1820 Cyclone engines. This airplane

СГ)

% had a service ceiling of 26,200 feet and was I the first commercial liner pressurized for high – | altitude flight. The airplane came to be known as I the “Stratoliner.” Jack Frye decided that TWA had to have them too, so he placed an order

with Boeing for five of the new planes. But his board of directors, chaired by John D. Hertz of Lehman Brothers, did not agree. In December 1938, TWA’s board voted to cancel Frye’s order to Boeing for the B-307.

Jack Frye knew that this dispute represented an essential disagreement concerning his and the board’s vision for the future of TWA. He also knew that this disagreement would likely mean his being removed if control of the company remained in the hands of the present directors. Jack Frye was acquainted with Howard Hughes (see Figure 15-6), the eccentric multimillionaire and aviation pioneer in his own right, who was then living in Los Angeles and involved in the movie-making business. Hughes had an abid­ing interest in aviation and had even worked for American Airlines, under an assumed name, as a co-pilot in 1932, flying between Los Angeles and Chicago. He listened to Frye, sided with his logic in the B-307 dispute with the board of directors, and agreed to buy the company. He began secretly buying up TWA stock. By April, it was public knowledge that Hughes was becoming a substantial stockholder in the airline, so much so that the significant interests repre­sented by Lehman and Hertz decided to pull out of the company, the second time Lehman had

departed the field. Control was effectively passed to Howard Hughes, the Boeing order for the 307 was reinstated, and the future of TWA remained firmly in the grip of Jack Frye, now with Howard Hughes. On July 8, 1940, the 307 was placed into service on the New York to Los Angeles route, reducing the transcontinental flying time to 14l/2 hours.

Hughes was a singular individual and unique in all known respects. He was born wealthy, son of the founder of the Hughes Tool Company of Houston, Texas. As soon as he could, he left Houston, began traveling the world, and wound up in Hollywood. He entered the film business and, in the process of directing his first film, Hell’s Angels, a story of British pilots in World War I, he became fascinated with aviation and learned to fly.

Even as a young man, Hughes was obses­sive, wanting to be the best, to know the most, and never to fail. With absolutely no concerns about money, he began the design and build­ing of an airplane racer, the H-1, with which he would set a world’s speed record of 352 miles per hour in 1935. He set a transcontinental speed record of 7 hours and 27 minutes with the H-l in January 1936. He flew practically every com­mercial airplane in production over the next sev­eral years, gaining experience in long-distance navigation and planning, as well as execution at the controls, until he launched his most ambitious attempt yet: a round the world flight in the Lock­heed Electra.

The record in 1938 stood from Wiley Post’s solo circumnavigation in 1933 at 7 days and 18 hours. Hughes’ route took him from New York to Paris in less than half the time it took Lind­bergh, then across Europe into Russia and Siberia to Alaska. From Fairbanks he refueled in Min­neapolis and returned to Floyd Bennett Field in New York triumphant in three and a half days, halving Post’s record.

Hughes had some prior acquaintance with TWA; in fact, one of its vice presidents had been a stunt pilot for Hughes’ movie, Hell’s

Angels. Hughes was also more pilot than busi­nessman. As Jack Frye would later remark, “One thing about Hughes, he did have an understand­ing about the airplane.” He fully understood the advantage of having an airplane that could top most of the weather, so he agreed with Frye’s position on the Boeing 307.