Aviation History – Page 3 – Old Magazine Articles

1912: An Important Year in Military Aviation
(The Literary Digest, 1912)

1912 was the year that the Lewis Gun was first mounted on military aircraft. The military possibilities of this combination was immediately recognizable to all onlookers:

The potential results of swooping aircraft, armed to the teeth with death dealing bullets, is staggering to ordnance officers of the Army and Navy who discuss it. ‘Where will this lead?’ they ask. Is it possible that the air is to harbor the greatest destructive forces in modern warfare? There seems nothing to prevent it.

Click here to read an article about the development of aerial reconnaissance during W.W. I.

Flight Clothing for Aviators
(Sears and Roebuck, 1918)

The inability of the Sears & Roebuck Company to understand the nature of early aviation was made manifest by the fact that the first pilots used to wear horse-back riding clothes before taking to the skies.

Attached, you will find two pages from the Sears Military Equipment Catalog of 1918, pictured are flight-clothing items offered for military or private purchase.

Two Color Photographs of French Military Aircraft
(1915)

Two color pictures of French World War I aircraft said to have played a part during the Battle of the Marne. At this point in the war, aircraft was primarily used for observation, which explains why the planes are unarmed.

Odd-Shaped Propeller More Efficient
(Popular Mechanics, 1918)

For at least one week in 1918, the slide-rule jockeys lounging about in the faculty watering holes at the aeronautical engineering brain-trusts believed that the propeller illustrated herein was pretty slick, and bound to bring greater speed to the aircraft of the day. But the bright lads at OldMagazineArticles.com couldn’t help but notice that this propeller design was never seen any time after this issue of POPULAR MECHANICS was on the stand, so we have our doubts concerning the increased efficiency that the propeller was credited in creating…

What do you think?

Charles Lindbergh Goes to War
(Collier’s Magazine, 1946)

When America entered the Second World War, Charles Lindbergh reached out to President Roosevelt and expressed his desire to serve; in light of the fact that Lindbergh had made numerous trips to Germany and met with Goering on several occasions, the President cordially declined his offer. However, these liaisons did not exclude him from working in the private sector for one of the many defense contractors, which is precisely what he did.

These two articles were written by an Army Air Corps colonel shortly after the war recalling his unexpected brush with Lindbergh when he was serving in New Guinea. The United Aircraft Corporation had hired the Lone Eagle to serve as a technical observer in the Pacific, where he could study the combat performance of the P-38 fighters. The articles served to expose to the American people that Lindbergh had performed a variety of patriotic tasks far beyond his corporate job description:

My God! He shouldn’t go on a combat mission, when did he fly the Atlantic? Must have been in 1927 and he was about twenty-five then. That would make him at least forty-two years old, and that’s too old for this kind of stuff.

His Route to Paris
(Literary Digest, 1927)

Attached is a 1927 illustration depicting that broad expanse that separates the continents of Europe and North America and presents for the viewer the various transatlantic routes chosen not only by Charles Lindbergh but other pilots as well.

The Women’s Air Derby: Santa Monica to Cleveland
(Literary Digest, 1929)

To those of us living in the digital age, the concept that the pilots of an airplane race should be segregated by gender in order to compete seems just like a dictate from Sharia law – but for our great-grandfathers, it made perfect sense. This article is about the Women’s Air Derby of 1929, which had a list of women pilots that read like the Who’s Who of 1920s women aviation.

Amelia Earhart was one of the competitors.

Excursions Into Hunland
(Vanity Fair, 1918)

An American fighter pilot of the R.F.C., Lieutenant E.M. Roberts, gave this account of the deadly game of Boche-hunting above the clouds:

I noticed he was going down a little, evidently for the purpose of shooting me from underneath. I was not quite sure as yet that such was really his intention; but the man was quick…he put five shots into my machine. But all of them missed me.

I maneuvered into an offensive position as Quickly as I could, and I had my machine gun pelting him…The Hun began to spin earthward.

Ruth Elder: American Super-Girl
(Literary Digest, 1927)

An article about American pilot Ruth Elder (1902 – 1977), who attempted to be the first woman aviator to fly to Paris; crashing in the Atlantic mid-flight:

she has to her credit the longest flight made entirely over water, beating the Pacific fliers by about 200 miles…She will rank with the most daring fliers of this year of aerial wonders.

Elder parlayed her notoriety into a starring roll in a Hollywood movie that came out the following year: Moran of the Marines.

Read a 1918 article about the women’s city.

Notable Flights 1919 – 1931
(the Literary Digest, 1935)

Attached herein is a printable list of the important record-breaking flights in aviation history that made the world sit up and take notice.

Count Von Zeppelin Dies
(The Atlanta Georgian, 1917)

A short notice reporting on the 1917 death of Count Ferdinand Adolf August Heinrich Von Zeppelin (b. 1838). The count is reported to have died a sad and broken man over the failure of his airships to hasten a decisive ending to the First World War and remorseful that his name would forever be associated with the first air raids on civilian targets.

One of the First to Soar to 30,000 Feet
(The American Legion Weekly, 1919)

An article about Roland Rohlfs (1892 – 1974), chief test pilot of the Curtiss Engineering Corporation and his Curtiss Wasp triplane, the aircraft he flew at an altitude of 30,000 feet when he set a new speed record (163.1 mph) in 1919.

The Verville Packard Battle Plane: 178 Miles Per Hour
(The Independent, 1920)

A short notice reporting on the one pride and joy of the U.S. Army Air Service, the Verville Packard, and how this one aircraft performed at the Pulitzer Trophy Airplane Race of 1920. The article is illustrated with a photo of the plane and the aviator, Lt. C.C. Mosley, who piloted the craft at the impressive speed of 156.5 mph.