MY OWN PLANE
In the war some students were soloed with as little as four hours’
training. That meant they were considered competent to go up in their
planes alone after this amount of instruction. Obviously these were
exceptional students. In civilian flying, ten or twelve hours, I
imagine, would be about the minimum training. But these hours usually
mean simply routine instruction in straight flying, comparable to
the novice driving his automobile along the level uncrowded country
highway. For the automobilist beginner the problem comes when he first
meets traffic, and a big truck, say, suddenly cuts in ahead of him. Can
he handle the emergency, or will he crash? And what will the beginner
do when his car, or the other fellow’s, skids on the wet pavement
for the first time? The answer is that good driving results from
experience and the requisite of having met many varied situations.
And so with planes. Straight flying is, of course, the necessary basis;
but it is the ability to meet crises, large and small, which counts.
And the only way to train for that is, as I have said, to have actual
instruction in stunting and in meeting emergencies. To gain experience
after the beginner has soloed, and while he is at home in a plane he
knows intimately and upon a field familiar to him, he should play
around in the air for four or five hours alone, practising landings,
take-offs, turns and all the rest of it where he is perfectly safe and
can come down easily any time.
Then he should have three or four more hours’ instruction in emergency
situations. This feature is too often overlooked. As I visualize it,
the beginner should go up with an instructor with dual controls
again and should get himself into—and out of—one scrape after another,
including forced landings. After he has done so repeatedly, he will
have confidence and a real feeling of what must be done, and done
instantly, under any given set of circumstances. More of this sort
of follow-through training and there would probably be fewer of the
accidents which too often are beginners’ bad luck.
I had rolled up the tremendous total of two and one-half hours’
instruction when I decided that life was incomplete unless I owned my
own plane. Those were the days of rather heavy, under-powered ships
which lifted themselves from the ground with a lumbering effort.
The small sport planes were just beginning to appear, most of them
in experimental stages. The field where I flew was owned by W. G.
Kinner of the Kinner Aeroplane and Motor Corporation, who was then
developing one of the first sport planes made.
I watched that plane at work in those days when I was cutting my
aviation eye teeth. Little by little I became able to distinguish the
different makes of planes, and the finer points of their performance.
I realized that the small plane took off more quickly, climbed more
steeply, was faster and easier to handle than its bigger brothers with
their greater horse power and wing spread.
After two and one-half hours I really felt myself a competent judge
of planes! A few hundred solo hours since then have modified greatly
that initial self-confidence! The fact that wise pilots with a thousand
hours or so warned me against this little fellow, influenced me not. I
wanted that sport plane that hopped off like a sandpiper and actually
seemed to like it. And I set about buying it. My pilot friends came to
me quietly. “Look out for the motor,” they said.
Power was the thing, they assured me, and the paltry 60 horse power
of the little Lawrence air-cooled motor simply didn’t measure up to
commonsense requirements. It is interesting to realize that the plane
in which Lady Heath made her famous solo flight from Croydon to South
Africa and back, the lovely little Avian which I bought from her,
actually has little more horse power than this first love of mine.
[Illustration:
description: Photo wide shot of crowds surrounding a crashed biplane
caption: MY CABBAGE PATCH LANDING, CALIFORNIA, 1921
]
[Illustration:
description: Photo wide profile shot of Earhart on a black horse
caption: “I WAS FOND OF AUTOMOBILES, HORSEBACK RIDING, AND
ALMOST ANYTHING ELSE THAT IS ACTIVE AND CARRIED ON IN THE
OPEN”
]
The small air-cooled motor I speak of was the first in this country.
The man who had built it was not well known then. He was one of a
number of able experimenters who were working out their own private
ideas, often in the face of all sorts of sacrifices. The name of the
builder of this original air-cooled engine is Charles L. Lawrence,
famous today as the creator of the Wright Whirlwind which carried
Lindbergh, Byrd, Chamberlin, Maitland and others on their famous
flights, and with which our own Friendship was equipped.
The idea of an air-cooled engine appealed to me. The elimination of
the water cooling system meant simplification and a notable decrease
in weight. Thanks largely to the lightness of the engine and resulting
light plane, it was possible for me to pick it up by the tail and move
it around the field easily, whereas with the Canucks and the others it
took at least a man, or a dolly, and great effort. I was won by the
motor, despite some weaknesses, and I have never regretted that first
enthusiasm. So I said “no” to my pessimistic pilots, and “yes” to Mr.
Kinner.
The price was $2000. After talking it over with my father he agreed
that I needed the plane and that I should have it, and promised to
help out in paying for it. But I am afraid my salesmanship was faulty
for he did not stay “sold.” I signed the sales contract and plunked
down all my available capital to seal the bargain before I knew of his
indecision. Consequently, there wasn’t any backing out even if I
had wanted to—which I emphatically did not.
To pay for that plane I got the first job I ever had, the telephone
company taking me on as unskilled labor. I was associated with the
office boys at the back of the office, an association which I was told
was one of the worst in the organization. We did things to the mail,
opened it, sorted it, distributed it. I also filed letters and then
tried to find them again. I liked the job and the boys, who were very
funny and not the criminals they were pictured.
Perhaps this move on my part doesn’t seem very convincing, for
obviously my salary as playmate of office boys would have to run on
for a long time before it would wipe out the balance of the $2000. But
it did help my credit immensely! I think it made my flying companions
believe I was in earnest.
It also affected mother to the extent that she finally wiped out my
indebtedness, on condition I resign and stay home a little. By the way,
_she_ has remained sold, and it was her regret she wasn’t with me
on the trans-Atlantic flight, if I would go.
There was a partnership of interest, and of near poverty, between many
of us in those days. Aviation demanded much from its devotees—and there
was plenty of opportunity for sacrifice. Many of the pioneers sank
their teeth into aviation’s problems at the very beginning—or was it
the other way about?—and simply wouldn’t let go.
So I owned my own plane. Immediately I found that my whole feeling
toward flying had changed. An added confidence and satisfaction came.
If I crashed, it was my own responsibility and it was my own property
that was being injured. It is the same sort of feeling that obtains,
I think, in driving. There is a freedom in ownership which is not
possible with a borrowed car.
Of course I had shouldered a new responsibility. I had an
expensive, inanimate object on my hands. I wanted it to look all right
on the outside and _be_ all right on the inside. Few words are more
expressive than “care and upkeep.” Fortunately in their obligations
I was remarkably lucky. The plane was an experiment for Kinner,
a model for production. Obviously he wanted to have demonstrated
exactly what it could do. When I was around, I was informally a sort
of demonstrator—we agreed that he could use it for demonstration in
return for free hangar space, and I was given much mechanical help, and
other assistance in addition to hangar space. It was this situation, I
suppose, which really made it possible for a “telephone girl” to carry
on. At any rate, to me the important fact is, that I secured many free
hours in the air and much kindly help.
Demonstrating has other advantages; it means an effort to sell someone
something. And selling involves debating the virtues of the thing
to be sold, the prospective purchaser usually being on the silent
end of the debate. So I found myself studying the virtues of my plane,
and in so doing, those of others.
The first thing most people want to do when they get a new car is to
take someone out driving in it; a desire which seems to apply equally
to a plane. Somehow I have always felt a little differently. It
isn’t that I am not proud of my possession, but that I always have a
suspicion that my pride may run away with my prudence. If it be car or
plane, my inclination is to be absolutely sure of myself before I whisk
anybody else’s body around in it. Consequently my air passengers were
few.
As a matter of fact, I have never asked any men to take a ride. I think
I have always feared that some sense of gallantry would make them
accept, even though they did not trust me. So my male passengers have
always had to do the asking.
There were plenty of potential joy riders around the fields in
those days. Many of them had drifted into aviation after the war—or
rather had not drifted out. They wanted to be near planes, and accepted
any opportunity to take a ride no matter who the pilot or what the
machine. From this gang have graduated many of the men who are today
the real working human backbone of the industry.
From them were recruited the gypsy flyers who barnstormed their way
around the country and whose activities actually figured largely in
the development of American aviation. It was they who kept alive
public interest. Mostly they flew wrecks, old war crates tied together
with baling wire. Anything that would get off the ground—most of the
time—was good enough for them. Many of them, of course, paid a heavy
price for their devotion.
I didn’t like public flying. It didn’t coincide with my ideas of what
I wished to do with my plane. It was hard enough to keep out of
the papers anyway in those days if one flew. The slightest mishap was
called a crash and disasters were played up lugubriously.
For me flying was a sport and not a circus—I used to sneak away to
a secluded field and practise, with no one to bother. I appeared in
public only on special occasions. For instance once I was invited to
take part in a meet held by the Aero Club of Southern California at
Pasadena. It was purely a public demonstration, a sort of circus, yet
it was for a purpose—to raise money for the Club and to arouse local
interest in flying.
I was asked to do a little stunting, the usual thing on occasions of
this kind. The little plane looked well in the air, so I accepted. The
minute I flew up to the field I began to feel like a clown, although
happily there were two of us female freaks to divide the honors and the
odium.
[Illustration:
description: Drawing of giant Columbia and Britannia shaking hands
across the Atlantic; Earhart plane flies below; U.S.
(Uncle Sam) and J.B. (John Bull) look on
caption: “LADIES’ DAY”
Sykes in the _New York Evening Post_
]
[Illustration:
description: Photo full shot of seated Brynjulf Strandenaes applying
paint to Earhart painting
caption: BRYNJULF STRANDENAES PAINTS A PORTRAIT
]
There was plenty of chatter about two “aviatrixes,” but the
chatterers never knew that they came near having something actually
to talk about. For, as I reached the field, after flying from my own
hangar, a spark plug blew out. Luckily I was over the field just then
as otherwise I might have made my landing in a treetop. One cylinder
dead in eight is not so serious a matter as one in three. I had only
three and wished for eight just then.
It happened that my own engine was on the repair bench and the boys at
the field, determined to get me to the meet, had worked all night
switching the motor from the Goodyear pony blimp over to my plane. In
the blimp the motor had been run at a low speed and as a result when I
turned it up to my requirements one of the spark plugs could not stand
the strain. After a new extra long plug was inserted I started out
again.
It was a beautiful day with splashes of clouds which sailed up over the
mountains from the desert westward. They made a perfect background
for the audience below and a perfect playground for anyone in the sky.
Speaking seriously, the most effective stunting, from an artistic
point of view, should be staged against just such a sky. Alternate
white and blue with irregular outline brings out the full grace of the
maneuvering plane.
A good deal of air racing was going on then all over the country. But
my feeling toward it was similar to my feeling toward any other public
flying. It was not for me. I wasn’t good enough. I remember one funny
offer. A group of people, wanted to stage a race and seemed to think
that I was timid about entering. So they suggested that I let their own
pilot fly most of the race, then come down and let me get aboard, out
of sight of the audience, and finish up as the “lady flyer” who had
piloted the plane to victory.
Another proposal I remember.
“How would you like to make some easy money?” I was asked.
“How?”
“Bringing some stuff across the border.”
Stuff—liquor, aliens or dope?
“Liquor?” I guessed.
My philanthropic friend shrugged his shoulders. “A woman can get by
where a man can’t. No one would ever suspect you. There’s not a thing
to be afraid of. You could do it easy.”
It was a pretty compliment, but I declined.
One day I went up with my plane to establish its ceiling—that is, to
see how high it would go.
There is a point in altitude beyond which, of course, a given plane
cannot climb, just as with automobiles, there is a limit to the grade
that can be negotiated and a speed that can be attained. In flying,
an added factor is entailed, in the rarification of atmosphere with
height, which affects plane, motor and personnel.
To make the record official I asked the representative of the Aero
Club of Southern California to seal my barograph. This instrument
records altitude in ink on a revolving drum. When sealed it is
impossible for the flyer to alter it.
It was a good day and I climbed easily for about 13,000 feet.
Thereafter I began to have trouble. My spark control lever became
disconnected and I could not regulate the spark in my engine. As a
result a terrific vibration and knocking started. I thought the engine
would jump out of its frame. There wasn’t anything to do but come down,
although I was still climbing fifty feet a minute.
As soon as the official read my barograph there was great rejoicing,
for apparently I had established a woman’s altitude record. The news
got in the papers. One clipping read:
Miss Amelia Earhart, local aviatrix, established a new altitude record
for women yesterday under the auspices of the Aero Club of Southern
California.
Flying her own Kinner Airster, containing a 60-foot power motor,
she ascended more than 14,000 feet.
Her sealed barograph registered little vibration until about 12,000
feet, where Miss Earhart said something went wrong with the motor. At
the time she was climbing easily, about 50 feet a minute, which would
have continued perhaps for several thousand feet more if the engine
difficulty had not arisen.
Although my figure of 14,000 feet was not extraordinary, the
performance of my engine was interesting. With the little Lawrence
power plant of less than 60 h.p. I had gone up much farther than some
of the higher powered planes which should have been more efficient.
A little while later I made another attempt. The weather was pretty
good at the start. At 10,000 feet I ran into clouds. At 11,000 feet
sleet, and at about 12,000 feet dense fog. This was an entirely new
experience, and very disquieting. For the first time in my life, I had
that strange feeling experienced by the flyer in fog.
Under such circumstances it is impossible to tell what the plane
is doing. It may be upside down or turning giant circles. Without
instruments the pilot simply does not know his position in space—there
are no outside landmarks with which to check. Of course, if one is
really upside down for any length of time one’s feet drop back from the
rudder and the safety belt tightens; or if in a skid a side blast of
wind gives a belated warning, etc.
It was extraordinarily confusing and, realizing I could not go farther,
I kicked the ship into a tail spin and came down to 3000 feet where I
emerged from the fog and landed.
I remembered one of the old-timers came up and looked at my barograph
record. His eyes fixed on a vertical line just before the record ended.
“What does that mean,” he asked. “Did you go to sleep along in there?”
I told him about getting out of the fog by way of a tail spin.
He certainly wasn’t impressed favorably. “Suppose the fog had lasted
all the way to the ground?” he asked.
I bring this experience up because of its important bearing both on
the training of pilots and on flying in general; especially schedule
flying. It is immensely important for a pilot to learn to fly by
instruments, as distinct from flying “by horizon.” The night flyer
or the avigator in fog must depend upon his instruments to keep his
course, equilibrium and altitude. It did not require the flight of the
Friendship through long hours of fog and cloud to teach me the profound
necessity of this.