categories, general and sales expense, engineering expense, and
manufacturing expense. Now it appeared, the ratios of these expenses
to one another and to shipments, sales, and so on, were far out of
line with good practice. There were certain items in each that were
more or less fixed, but manufacturing expense now looked like the
best point of attack; it was a large part of the whole; it had large
reducible items and it could be cut without serious harm. In other
words my job was to go down to Stratford and fire enough of these
attractive Russians to bring the expense into line. Fred summed it up
this way:
“There is a limit to the contribution United Aircraft can make to
Russian relief.”
And so, next day I took a morning train from Grand Central. The
new Sikorsky factory lay just below the town of Stratford and just
above the point where the Housatonic River empties into Long Island
Sound. It was a sheltered spot and had been selected as possessing
good seaplane facilities with space for a landing field nearby. From
the outside, the high factory buildings looked new and shiny, but
as I entered the door I thought that someone had cut corners on the
details of construction.
After Arnold Dickinson had arrived, we went to work. Arnold
appreciated the problems, but hesitated to move in on them. That
remained for me, and now I began the unpleasant task that would
burden me for many years. For the good of the organization and the
salvation of jobs for the many, I must separate from our companies
many delightful people, men who, though warm personal friends,
just did not seem to have what it took to keep the wheels turning.
The task was heartbreaking but the penalties for shirking it were
inexorable. All one could do was try to perform his duty to the
company with utmost fairness and kindness, and without impairing
the morale of the individual or organization beyond the absolute
minimum. This was a job that needed doing all at once; it must not be
dragged. And so my first act at Sikorsky was to issue orders that the
manufacturing expense be reduced by 20 per cent, and forthwith. The
method of accomplishing this would be left to the local management.
That, however, did not work too well at Stratford. The cut in
manufacturing expense seemed to create not a single ripple; I soon
discovered why: engineering expense had suddenly skyrocketed. And
when I ordered it restored to its original level—I did not deem it
wise to cut back further for fear it might impair the engineering on
the Pan American project—the Sikorsky management “agreed with me 100
per cent” as they were wont to express it in their Russian slang.
But I soon found out why; the direct labor skyrocketed. Evidently
these Russian intellectuals, refugees from their own land, were so
versatile that they could play any position on the team—infield,
outfield, or umpire. The organization was like a balloon; you could
press your finger on one side and make a dent, but the other side
bulged out—and less obviously. And when I took my new organization to
task, they always “agreed with me 100 per cent,” and then proceeded
to do precisely as they jolly well pleased.
Meanwhile, we got on with the Pan American S-40’s, as they came
to be called, though this project proved to have more angles than
the Kohinoor diamond, and threatened to cost about as much. While
the specifications for the first Pan American Clippers had been
reviewed by Col. Charles A. Lindbergh, Pan American advisor, and
incorporated into the contract, they didn’t mean a thing. Before Pan
American would take delivery on the plane it must be passed by the
Department of Commerce and given an Approved Type Certificate as to
its airworthiness. Without this ATC, Sikorsky might be left with a
million dollars’ worth of airplanes and no market. Now Pan American,
our sole customer, used this advantage to insist on our incorporating
in the ships everything its own engineers or our prolific innovators
could dream up, from swivel-handled toilets to back-lighted card
tables. Thus our designs were kept in a state of continuous flux—at
company expense. Save for the redeeming qualities of Igor Ivanovich
Sikorsky himself, it is hard to imagine what might have become of us.
A man of strong convictions, for all his humbleness, he was a
brilliant engineer though never a “clever” one. Thoroughly grounded
in science and mathematics and accustomed to reason from fundamental
principles to valid conclusions, he possessed to an astonishing
degree those powers with which to divine a true course even when
the signposts were not clearly marked. This capacity he once called
“intuitive engineering” without for the moment ascribing that quality
of genius to himself.
Thanks to Igor Sikorsky’s personal leadership, we finally completed
delivery of the first three Pan American Clippers. While United
absorbed a heavy loss on them, none of this resulted from changes
made necessary by official ATC tests. Unlike other companies that
later suffered severe losses from this cause, Sikorsky always managed
to pass the tests in a remarkably short time, even though radical
design features were involved. As for Pan American, that company used
the airplanes to lug tons of mail, cargo, and passengers over the
high seas for many years. The ships paved the way for a later model
that disproved “Dick” Richardson’s formula, hurdled the last long
barrier, San Francisco to Hawaii, and pointed the way to overseas air
transport by land planes. It is not unlikely that Fred Rentschler’s
investment paid off in the long run, if not on the books of Sikorsky,
on those of Pratt and Whitney and Hamilton-Standard.
With the Clippers behind us, we now had the choice of two courses:
first, we could shut down Sikorsky and save further losses; or
second, we could reorganize it and try to exploit the genius of
Igor Sikorsky without prohibitive losses. There seemed no way
to anticipate earning a profit in the near future; whatever we
tried must be for the long pull. But one thing we had definitely
determined: it was too much to expect our friends, the Russian
refugees, to implement the American techniques of production. Not
that they could not understand them, for they did understand and
admire the extraordinary manifestation of applied science that went
under that banner. The problem was rather one of temperament or
national character.
It was not until the middle of World War II that I heard this thought
advanced by Charles A. Lindbergh, one of Mr. Sikorsky’s most devoted
friends and an ardent admirer. The conversation took place much
later, but before the war had involved this country. By that time I
had become president of United Aircraft, and had persuaded Lindbergh
to join our organization in the capacity of a personal advisor to me.
The conversation took place in our home in Hartford, on one of the
many stimulating evenings my wife and I were to enjoy with Lindbergh.
He had been outlining those views on the European situation which had
involved him in so much misunderstanding. Having been in Russia and
Germany and, like his father before him, having ardently hoped for
peace for his own country, he had feared that, in joining with Russia
to defeat Hitler, we would bring about those very things which have
since justified his concern.
He thought that nations, like people, displayed traits of fundamental
character that were distinct and unchanging. These had had hereditary
origins and had been influenced by environment. They influenced the
attitudes of nations toward specific circumstances and conditions
and especially tended to determine the attitude of a nation toward
war as an instrument of policy and to dictate the methods by which
it prosecuted a war. The character of the Russians and that of the
American people, he thought, differs as night differs from day.
Theirs had been a tradition of compulsion, ours of cooperation. If in
competition with them we tried to use their methods, we must prove
quite as inept as would they in trying to use ours. But if we had
the wit to exploit our own ideology to the limit, we must surely
overcome the inferior authoritarian process. He saw the problem in
its spiritual rather than material light.
Now if consideration of matters like this appears somewhat academic,
the fact remains that they were fundamental to our decision as to
what to do with Sikorsky. On the one hand, it was clear that in
trying to operate the plant we would assume heavy management burdens
with little hope of financial reward; on the other, it was certain
that there was a pearl in the Sikorsky oyster which, unless we dived
for it, would remain quite undiscovered. Our willingness to accept
the risk of further operations there must depend upon our confidence
in the collateral benefits. This, in turn, must be based entirely
upon the quality of leadership we ourselves could display. And so,
after much soul searching, we decided to gamble on our own abilities
to direct the genius of Igor Sikorsky so as to benefit the art, if
not to swell the treasury.
With this decision taken, we cut the organization back sharply to
the double handful of men Mr. Sikorsky himself deemed vital to his
success. These included, among others, the brothers Gluhareff,
Michael and Serge, Bob Lebensky, of the experimental shop, and Buivid
of the laboratory. With the organization set, I stated the problem
as that involving the creation of a large flying boat so designed
that, when operated on the Pan American system, it could earn its
board and keep. In other words, we must move the upper limit of the
Richardson formula as high as necessary to gain our objectives. As
one contribution to this project, we had the new Hamilton-Standard
controllable-pitch propeller, then under development; as another we
had a complementary development of Mr. Sikorsky’s, a new wing-flapped
airfoil. The propeller could pull more weight into the air and fly
it; the flaps could help it into the air and get it back on the water
at a reasonable stalling speed. This made the flying-boat hull the
controlling factor; its characteristics limited the load we could
drag into the air with our new wing and new propellers. To refine the
lines of the boat hull, our engineers now devised an inexpensive but
effective test rig; they towed a model hull alongside a speed boat
and photographed its action in rough or smooth water with slow-motion
cameras.
And while we pushed on with our concept of a wholly new design in
which we would accept no compromise that impaired the economy of
operation, we all sweated out the days and nights of tests and
experiments. But there was one critical item on which I did no
sweating. Had Mr. Sikorsky revealed to me the fact that the wing
loading he had selected would be too high to conform to the current
Department of Commerce requirements, and that he would have to sell
the Department a new concept of landing in a power stall before
he could get his ship accepted, I am sure I should not have had
the courage to risk all that money on his persuasive qualities. As
it was, he kept me in ignorance of the risk, assumed it wholly to
himself, and let me know about it only after he had made his sale.
The principle of high wing loadings, involving a new type of approach
and landing, is now so thoroughly accepted that few pilots know how
it came about. The principle is inherent in current air economics
and the limits have gone steadily upward. In 1927 I had solemnly
announced for the Design Section of BUAERO that we would not consider
wing loadings in excess of 10.5 pounds per square foot. Today, the
new Boeing Stratocruiser utilizes loadings eight times that high.
And so Igor Sikorsky built the famous S-42’s, forty-passenger flying
boats, designed to hop from New York to Bermuda to the Azores and to
Portugal on what was called the “stepping-stones” route to Europe.
So well did he design the planes that, when the British refused to
give Pan American landing rights at Bermuda because they had no
similar boat with which to match the service, Pan American turned
westward to the Pacific and used the new Clippers to pioneer the run
to Australia, the Philippines, and China. On this run the controlling
factor was the great distance to Honolulu, 2,400 miles against 1,900
miles from Bermuda to the Azores, but the Sikorsky boat hulls,
derived from model-towing tests, could take off nearly 20 per cent
more load than that originally contemplated. Thus they removed the
last barrier to overseas air commerce.
From the United point of view, while we made no money on the
transaction, and, accounting-wise, lost a hundred thousand dollars
on the ten ships, cash-wise we bore no out-of-pocket loss. And
while the project took a lot of nervous and physical energy out
of management, it paid dividends to the aviation art as a whole.
Meanwhile we kept our eyes open for a chance to work into some Army
or Navy business, though a number of important changes had taken
place.
First of all, shortly after President Roosevelt had been inaugurated,
Postmaster James Farley had canceled the air-mail contracts and
Senators Black and Nye had broken out in a rash of Congressional
investigations. These had upset the five-year procurement programs of
both Army and Navy and reacted adversely upon many manufacturers. For
a while, Admiral Moffett had held the fort, but then a great tragedy
had deprived aviation of one of its foremost figures at its time of
greatest need.
The admiral, continuing his absorption with the development of
lighter-than-air craft, had succeeded in building and operating the
_Macon_ and the _Akron_ and had established a new field near San
Jose, California, one that now carries his name. Here the _Macon_
carried out operations with the fleet until an unfortunate accident
resulted in her complete loss. The Old Man, still faithful to the
rigid airship, continued to fly in them himself until the night the
_Akron_ sailed out over the Atlantic and was destroyed. The admiral
was lost at sea along with other gallant airmen, close friends
and classmates of mine. The loss was disastrous enough from the
personal angle, for Admiral Moffett was loved and admired by all
his aeronautic organization to a degree seldom attained by any man.
Coming as it did at the time of greatest trial on the political
front, it deprived us of the one person who might have guided us
through our worst rocks and shoals. The admiral was buried at
Arlington along with so many of the young lads he had inspired. With
his passing, gloom settled over us all.
When Adm. E. J. King succeeded to command of BUAERO, he brought
to it a type of leadership quite different from that which had
characterized its thirteen years under Admiral Moffett. Admiral King,
who was one day to become Commander in Chief during World War II,
was a man of strong convictions who made his own decisions. With his
brilliant intellect and decisive manner, he dominated the Bureau
completely.
The cancellation of air-mail contracts set off a chain reaction that
disrupted the whole United Aircraft and Transport structure. To
comply with the law requiring separation of manufacturing companies
from transport organizations, United Airlines was split off into a
separate company known as United Airlines Transport Corporation. With
the transport link between the eastern and western manufacturing
groups thus disrupted, we divided them into two separate companies.
The four Connecticut companies, Pratt and Whitney, Hamilton-Standard,
Chance Vought, and Sikorsky, comprised the new United Aircraft
Corporation. The western group took the name of Boeing Airplane
Company.
In the reorganization, William E. Boeing severed all his aviation
connections. Frederick B. Rentschler resigned the presidency of
United. Phillip G. Johnson, deprived by law of his right to manage
the airlines, later moved to Canada to create the great Trans-Canada
Airlines. Donald L. Brown moved up from Pratt and Whitney to become
president of United Aircraft Corporation, and I became its senior
vice-president. Thus a Congressional investigation that proved no
wrongdoing deprived the country of the services of three outstanding
pioneers.
President Roosevelt had, meanwhile, appointed Admiral Reeves
Commander in Chief, United States Fleet. Having in mind the progress
of events in the Pacific, I had undertaken a study of a big boat
designed to scout its vast areas, using available harbors as bases of
operations. About the time the job was completed, the admiral invited
me to join him on the _California_, at Hampton Roads, to watch the
aircraft carriers in operation. Frank Wagner, his Operations officer,
met me at Old Point Comfort and the admiral himself greeted me at the
gangway. The bulkheads of his cabin had been papered with charts of
the Pacific, evidence enough of the Old Man’s absorption with that
problem. When, after lunch, he developed his estimate of the Pacific
situation and asked if I thought it possible to build a flying boat
capable of patrolling the area, I was able to produce from my brief
case exactly what the doctor had ordered. The hearty laugh with which
Bull Reeves greeted this legerdemain brought back memories of the
happy days of FLEET AIR.
Under pressure from the fleet, BUAERO, which at this time was
absorbed in carrier aircraft and about ready to wash up big boats,
invited bids on which Sikorsky won the award. As the designs
progressed, BUAERO developed increasing interest in the project and
finally authorized a second development by Consolidated Aircraft of
San Diego. In the competition for the production order, Sikorsky lost
out to Consolidated on price, but the Sikorsky design was selected
by the new transoceanic operator, American Export Airlines, for whom
we built three passenger ships. The American line, organized and
operated under the able leadership of John Slater, provided nonstop
flying-boat service from New York to Foynes, Ireland, and during
the war provided comfortable berths for many very important people
while many others of the same character shivered in bucket seats in
hastily improvised land-plane service via Newfoundland, Iceland, and
the Azores. In other words, Sikorsky flying boats showed the way to
transoceanic service and, at the moment, actually outperformed the
land plane.
However, even under such fair terms as those granted us by American
Export Airlines, we did not succeed in avoiding serious losses at
Sikorsky. Meanwhile, Pan American had turned to Martin and then
Boeing, and each of these able builders had suffered similarly. By
that time, too, the aircraft industry had suffered from the political
debacle in Washington. We had reached the end of our rope and could
no longer afford to contribute either our management or engineering
talents, let alone our slender capital, to the subsidization of
airline operations. We decided to drop out of the big-boat business.
And when I broke this sad news to Mr. Sikorsky—by then I had become
president of United Aircraft—he received it like the great gentleman
he is. He understood our problem; he was grateful for all the
consideration the company had given him. He wondered if perchance we
would grant him one more favor; he would like to go back to his first
love—experimenting with helicopters. He thought he might succeed now
where he had failed before. A modest sum of money would meet his
requirements and he hoped this was not asking too much.
Quite certain that no one could possibly build a successful
helicopter but that Mr. Sikorsky at least deserved a try, I
magnanimously agreed to back him. Igor Sikorsky did invent the
helicopter, just as the Wrights before him had invented the airplane,
by diligent study, by painstaking experiment, by teaching himself to
fly and then teaching others. In so doing, the man who had given the
world the means of vaulting the last barrier to air commerce went
to the other extreme to create the only vehicle that can operate in
three dimensions without a prepared surface from which to take off
or land. Aviation owes much to his creative mind, one that not only
finds no difficulty in reconciling science and religious faith, but
on the contrary, exercises that intuitive quality that marks real
genius.
The moral of this brief review of the history of a representative
airplane company is that profit has a counterpart in loss, and both
are essential to progress. Again, financial results are not the
sole measure of excellence; there is also the intangible factor
of stewardship. When the final account is cast up, Igor Ivanovich
Sikorsky will rank among the immortals of American aviation.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The Courage of Conviction
One of the important considerations that had influenced my decision
to resign from the Navy had been my desire to work on constructive
tasks with men whose competence I had admired. Among these were Fred
Rentschler, Bill Boeing, George Mead, Claire Egtvedt, George Wheat,
Don Brown, Phil Johnson, and Chance Vought. As fate dealt the cards,
however, the decade of 1930 saw the passing of Chance, George, and
Don, and of these, Chance was the first. During the summer of 1930,
after I had added Sikorsky to my responsibilities, Chance died of
septicemia, something which today would respond quickly to the new
drugs. With him, much of the sparkle went out of United Aircraft.
By the time I joined United, Chance had already come to realize that
his famous Corsair two-seater, which had done so well on battleship
catapults and carrier decks, had all but been outmoded by the passage
of time alone. And he was at a loss to know what to do about it,
and talked far into the night about that problem. His untimely
death relieved him of all necessity for further worry, but it also
handed the job to me. Worse still, the Vought company, like most
other aviation concerns, had always been a one-man show and there
were no more Chance Voughts standing around to be hired, even with
more jobless men around than the country had ever known. And so we
faced the task of creating a new organization—one of a type then new
to aviation—of developing some new product and of marketing it in
what was becoming a tough market indeed. In this job we pinned our
hopes on some of the old-timers in the Vought organization and on a
relative newcomer, Charles J. McCarthy.
“C.J.,” as we called him, to differentiate the airplane engineer from
“J.F.,” the financial wizard, had been in BUAERO in charge of the
new department called “Stress Analysis” at the time when I had been
chief of the Engine Section. It was C.J. who had flown to Norfolk
with me the day the Wright T-3 engine jumped out of a torpedo bomber
when the wooden propeller flew apart, and it had been out of that
experience that we decided to standardize on metal propellers. It
was curious how, in the aviation slipstream, we milled around, each
trying to add his little push to the effective forward thrust. For
Chance had offered C.J. a job in his company, and C.J. had accepted.
Now I began to look upon him as my second there, and between us we
decided to bring in a new chief engineer.
The newcomer was Rex Beisel, a man who had received good training
in the old school of Curtiss Airplane Company but had gone west to
create a new private airplane. The stock-market crash had made Rex
available and we now promptly scooped him up. We thought Rex a bit
opinionated, and expected to have to handle him roughly at times, but
we knew there was great capacity there. And in this we were right,
for Rex created a strong engineering organization as a substitute for
the genius of Chance Vought, and came ultimately to head the Vought
Division in his own right. The story of how this was done, like the
story of Hamilton-Standard, or Sikorsky, or Pratt and Whitney, or any
of the great independent outfits like Grumman, or Martin, or Douglas,
or Boeing, is worth a book in itself; but for our purposes here we
can sweep in only those high lights that seem to back light the
slipstream itself. And though the several stories run concurrently,
we are concerned more with events than with precise timing.