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Realizing the Dream of Flight Biographical Essays in Honor of the Centennial of Flight, 1903–2003 Realizing the Dream of Flight Edited by VIRGINIA P

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Realizing the Dream of Flight Biographical Essays in Honor of the Centennial of Flight, 1903–2003 Realizing the Dream of Flight Edited by VIRGINIA P https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20050229888 2019-08-29T21:04:34+00:00Z Biographical Essays in Honor oi F the Centennial of Flight, 1903-2003 /. Realizing the Dream of Flight Biographical Essays in Honor of the Centennial of Flight, 1903–2003 Realizing the Dream of Flight Edited by VIRGINIA P. DAWSON and MARK D. BOWLES National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA History Division Office of External Relations Washington, DC NASA SP-2005-4112 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Realizing the dream of flight : biographical essays in honor of the centennial of flight, 1903-2003 / Virginia P. Dawson and Mark D. Bowles, editors. p. cm.—(The NASA history series) “NASA SP-2005-4112.” 1. Aeronautics—Biography. 2. Aeronautics—History. I. Dawson, Virginia P. (Virginia Parker) II. Bowles, Mark D. III. Series. TL539.R43 2005 629.13'092'273—dc22 2005018938 Tableof Contents INTRODUCTION . .vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . .xv Bessie Coleman: Race and Gender Realities Behind Aviation Dreams 1AMY SUE BIX . .1 She Flew for Women: Amelia Earhart, Gender, and American Aviation 2SUSAN WARE . .29 Sharing a Vision: Juan Trippe, Charles Lindbergh, and the Development 3of International Air Transport WILLIAM M. LEARY . .47 The Autogiro Flies the Mail! Eddie Rickenbacker, Johnny Miller, 4Eastern Airlines, and Experimental Airmail Service with Rotorcraft, 1939–1940 W. DAVID LEWIS . .69 Donald Douglas: From Aeronautics to Aerospace 5ROGER BILSTEIN . .87 Benjamin O. Davis, Jr., American Hero 6ALAN L. GROPMAN . .109 Curtis E. LeMay and the Ascent of American Strategic Airpower 7TAMI BIDDLE . .127 Willy Ley: Chronicler of the Early Space Age 8TOM D. CROUCH . .155 Who Was Hugh Dryden and Why Should We Care? 9MICHAEL GORN . .163 Wernher von Braun: A Visionary as Engineer and Manager 10 ANDREW J. DUNAR . .185 Godfather to the Astronauts: Robert Gilruth and 11 the Birth of Human Spaceflight ROGER LAUNIUS . .213 Celebrating the Invention of Flight in a Hands-On Way: 12 Replicating the 1902 Experimental Glider Flights of the Wright Brothers EDWARD J. PERSHEY . .257 ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS . .273 LIST OF ACRONYMS . .279 INDEX . .281 THE NASA HISTORY SERIES . .301 Introduction WHILE GROWING UP IN CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA, MILTON WRIGHT, THE WRIGHT BROTHERS’ FATHER, LIKED TO PURCHASE TOYS FOR HIS SONS THAT HE HOPED WOULD STIMULATE THEIR IMAGINATION. One of the most memorable gifts was a toy helicopter that was designed by the French aeronautical exper- imenter Alphonse Pénaud. Milton gave his sons this gift in 1878, and, though it was a simple device with a stick bound to a four-blade rotor set in a spindle, it had the intended effect—it caused them to dream. Twenty-five years separated the gift of this toy and their invention of the airplane, yet the Wright brothers were convinced it had exerted an important influence. Tom Crouch argued in The Bishop’s Boys that toys like these perfectly illustrated the significance of play for technological innovation. He wrote, “rotary-wing toys were to intrigue and inspire generations of children, a few of whom would, as adults, attempt to realize the dream of flight for themselves.”1 If the first powered flight on 17 December 1903 represented a childhood dream real- ized, it was only the first step in the rapid evolution of the airplane from their flimsy kite-like contraption of wood and cloth to jet airliners and rockets in space. And, as extraordinary as the achievement of powered flight seemed in 1903, before the end of the century, space travel also would become a dream realized. Soviet astronaut Yuri Gagarin 1 Tom D. Crouch, The Bishop’s Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1989), p. 57. vii Realizing the Dream of Flight first circumnavigated Earth in April 1961, and, eight years later, American astronauts took the first steps for humankind on the Moon. It is with great pleasure that we introduce Realizing the Dream: Biographical Essays in Honor of the Centennial of Flight. These essays in celebration of the Wright brothers’ first flight 100 years ago grew out of presentations by a group of prominent scholars in 2003 at a conference sponsored by the NASA History Division and held at the Great Lakes Science Center in Cleveland, Ohio. The volume focuses on the careers of some of the many men and women who helped to realize the dream of flight both through the atmosphere and beyond. These accounts are original and compelling because they exam- ine the history of flight through the lens of biography. Collectively, these individuals helped to shape American aerospace history. There are obviously many other individu- als that could, and arguably should, have been included in this collection, but we believe that the cross section of diverse individuals contained in this volume is important because it is symbolic of the dream of flight as a whole. These people all devoted their lives, and sometimes even sacrificed them, to the demands required for its realization. The reasons behind the dreams were diverse. The technological potential first demon- strated by the Wright brothers enabled those who followed them to use flight as a means of racial uplift, gender equalization, personal adventure, commercial gain, military supe- riority, and space exploration. The history of flight is more than a story of technology; it had important cultural consequences as well, and these are some of the themes that the following biographies explore. We have arranged the essays roughly chronologically, though the careers of the people described here often span more than one period of history. None of the people in this volume were inventors like the Wright brothers, but their contributions to flight were nevertheless significant. They were daredevil pilots, entrepreneurs, business men and women, military strategists, and managers of large-scale technology who advanced the art, science, and business of air and space travel, often through sheer force of character. The final paper serves as an epilogue as well as a tribute to the Wright brothers. It describes a reenactment of their important glider experiments at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, where the Wrights’ childhood dream was first realized. BARNSTORMERS AND ENTREPRENEURS In 1900, at the point when they were ready to build a full-scale glider, Wilbur Wright wrote to Octave Chanute, an authority on flying machines, for advice on where to try out their latest glider. Wilbur admitted his obsession with flying, stating, “I feel that it will soon cost me an increased amount of money, if not my life.”2 While neither brother died 2 Ibid., p. 181. viii Introduction in an airplane crash, many other early aviators lost their lives, including Bessie Coleman, the first African American female pilot and the first of her race to earn an international pilot’s license. In “Bessie Coleman: Race and Gender Realities Behind Aviation Dreams” (chapter 1), Amy Sue Bix describes the obstacles Coleman faced because of her gender and race, explaining the social context that allowed Coleman to promote the association of flying with social uplift for her race. Although race worked to her advantage in draw- ing media attention, it also affected her ability to earn as much as her white counterparts. Nevertheless, Coleman was compelled by the “gospel of aviation” to escape the bounds of gravity. She confronted, like other women and minorities, the challenges of pursuing her dream despite the social assumption that it was inappropriate for marginalized groups to fly and the technological dangers of undependable planes. Bessie Coleman’s contemporary, Amelia Earhart, was able to capitalize on the huge popularity of aviation after Charles Lindbergh’s transatlantic flight. In “She Flew for Women: Amelia Earhart, Gender, and American Aviation” (chapter 2), Susan Ware argues that Earhart used her fame as an aviatrix to advance a strongly feminist ideology, demonstrating the capabilities of women in a modern world. Earhart took to the skies not only for the thrill of aviation, but also to use women’s competence as pilots as a tool to end prejudice against them. Ware believes that Earhart’s disappearance in 1937, and the mystery surrounding this event, has obscured her legacy as a strong voice for femi- nism. Ware points out that women could earn a living from flying only as long as it was considered a form of entertainment. As the aircraft industry took shape in the 1930s, they encountered gender barriers that prevented them from becoming commercial pilots. The irony of Earhart’s disappearance is that by 1937 she was already part of the bygone era of stunt flying, and today she is remembered more for the fact that she is missing than for her piloting accomplishments, such as being the first woman to cross the Atlantic by plane. Though women like Coleman and Earhart were strong individuals at the forefront of the emergence of aviation, they were unable to open the skies for women. The commercial airlines industry froze them out of the business side and also excluded them from flying. Men were the pilots; women were the stewardesses. The next three essays feature larger-than-life male characters who played signal roles in shaping commercial aviation. In “Sharing a Vision: Juan Trippe, Charles Lindbergh, and the Development of International Air Transport” (chapter 3), William Leary discusses the emergence of international commercial air transport using the vantage point of the relationship between Charles Lindbergh and Juan Trippe. In the 1920s, they dreamed of a time when a commercial aviation industry would carry passengers around the world in both comfort and safety. They worked to achieve this dream by first provid- ing commercial air service to Latin America in the early 1930s. Leary shows how Lind- bergh’s technical expertise and international fame coupled with Trippe’s determination and entrepreneurial skills created Pan American Airways—one of the greatest airlines of the 20th century.
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