American Aviation Heritage
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National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior National Historic Landmarks Program American Aviation Heritage Draft, February 2004 Identifying and Evaluating Nationally Significant Properties in U.S. Aviation History A National Historic Landmarks Theme Study Cover: A Boeing B-17 “Flying Fortress” Bomber flies over Wright Field in Dayton, Ohio, in the late 1930s. Photograph courtesy of 88th Air Base Wing History Office, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. AMERICAN AVIATION HERITAGE Identifying and Evaluating Nationally Significant Properties in U.S. Aviation History A National Historic Landmarks Theme Study Prepared by: Contributing authors: Susan Cianci Salvatore, Cultural Resources Specialist & Project Manager, National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers Consultant John D. Anderson, Jr., Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, University of Maryland and Curator for Aerodynamics, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Janet Daly Bednarek, Ph.D., Professor of History, University of Dayton Roger Bilstein, Ph.D., Professor of History Emeritus, University of Houston-Clear Lake Caridad de la Vega, Historian, National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers Consultant Marie Lanser Beck, Consulting Historian Laura Shick, Historian, National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers Consultant Editor: Alexandra M. Lord, Ph.D., Branch Chief, National Historic Landmarks Program Produced by: The National Historic Landmarks Program Cultural Resources National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Washington, D.C. United States Air Force Air Force Materiel Command Wright-Patterson Air Force Base Ohio National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers Washington, D.C. Revised March 2011 TABLE OF CONTENTS FOREWORD....................................................................................................................................1 INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................................3 HISTORIC CONTEXTS PART ONE: THE PIONEERING YEARS, 1861-1909 .............................................................. 6 1. BALLOONING IN THE CIVIL WAR ....................................................................................... 7 2. EARLY AVIATORS & FLYING MACHINES .........................................................................12 Samuel Pierpont Langley .......................................................................................................12 Octave Chanute ......................................................................................................................15 Wright Brothers .....................................................................................................................18 Glenn Curtiss .........................................................................................................................26 Marketing the Flying Machine...............................................................................................29 PART TWO: THE EARLY YEARS & WORLD WAR I, 1909-1918 .......................................32 3. AN INDUSTRY EMERGES .......................................................................................................33 Making Airplanes...................................................................................................................33 Airshows & Exhibition Flying ...............................................................................................35 4. TRAINING THE MILITARY, 1909-1914 ..................................................................................39 5. MILITARY AVIATION’S POTENTIAL, 1913-1917 ................................................................46 6. AMERICA AT WAR, 1917-1918 ...............................................................................................52 PART THREE: BETWEEN THE WARS, 1918-1939 .................................................................61 7. POST-WAR DEVELOPMENTS, 1918-1926 .............................................................................62 Flying the Mail ......................................................................................................................62 Early Airport Development ...................................................................................................70 Barnstorming & Air Races ....................................................................................................73 Commercial Aviation ............................................................................................................76 8. THE GOLDEN AGE OF AVIATION, 1926-1930 .....................................................................81 Lighted Airways & Aids to Navigation ................................................................................82 Airports .................................................................................................................................86 9. THE GOLDEN AGE OF AVIATION, 1930-1939 ......................................................................92 A National Network of Air Routes ........................................................................................92 New Eras in Passenger Service ..............................................................................................96 Air Racing & Record Setting .................................................................................................104 The Everyman’s Aircraft .......................................................................................................109 Air Traffic Control .................................................................................................................111 Airports ..................................................................................................................................113 i Balloons & Scientific Research .............................................................................................122 10. AERONAUTICAL TECHNOLOGY .........................................................................................125 Era of the Mature Propeller-Driven Airplane ........................................................................125 11. MILITARY AVIATION BETWEEN THE WARS ..................................................................137 Army Aviation .......................................................................................................................137 Naval Aviation .......................................................................................................................145 Manufacturing ........................................................................................................................149 PART FOUR: WORLD WAR II, 1939-1945 ...............................................................................155 12. MILITARY AVIATION & WORLD WAR II, 1939-1945 ......................................................156 Manufacturing ........................................................................................................................156 Training .................................................................................................................................158 Municipal Airports in Wartime ..............................................................................................167 Research & Development ......................................................................................................169 Rotary Flight ....................................................................................................................170 Radar ................................................................................................................................175 PART FIVE: POST WAR & COLD WAR AVIATION, 1945-1978 .........................................178 13. MILITARY AVIATION & THE COLD WAR, 1945-1975 ............................................................... 179 Berlin Airlift...........................................................................................................................179 First Strike Capability, 1945-1953 .........................................................................................181 Korean War, 1950-1953...................................................................................................184 Massive Retaliation, 1954-1961 ............................................................................................187 Flexible Response, 1961 ........................................................................................................188 Vietnam, 1961-1973 ........................................................................................................190 14. CIVIL AVIATION, 1946-1958 .................................................................................................196 Commercial Aviation .............................................................................................................196 Airports ..................................................................................................................................200 Ground-Based Airway ...........................................................................................................205 Research & Development ......................................................................................................209 The Era of the Plastic Balloon .........................................................................................209