Walking on Air

by Janann Sherman

  Her altimeter topped at 25,400, smashing Thaden’s record by 5,200 feet and Zimmerling’s altitude record for light planes by nearly 1,500 feet. This was, said the newspaper, “a personal triumph and a convincing demonstration of the ruggedness and power of the Monocoupe.”49 The sealed barograph was lifted out of her plane and sent to Washington to be verified.

  The press talked with Vernon that night. He expressed pleasure that his wife had been successful. “But I wasn’t worried about it,” he said, “I knew she would make it.”50 Phoebe told her husband on the phone that she was “pretty thrilled and happy …. I’m coming home in about two weeks—just as soon as I can complete my plans for the Cleveland race.”51 She announced to the press that she would enter the Cleveland transcontinental race to be held in August “provided event officials permit feminine pilots to compete. It was announced recently that a special race would be arranged for women if five entries in each of the two classes could be secured.”52

  Three weeks later, the Bureau of Standards announced that its calibration of the barograph carried by Phoebe Omlie did not substantiate the establishment of a new record. The calibration indicated she reached a maximum altitude of 17,467 feet. Bitterly disappointed, Phoebe said that she could not believe that her altimeter could vary by as much as 8,000 feet.53 She said she hoped to make another attempt and that when she did, two barographs would be carried along with a new altimeter for her Monocoupe.54

  But first she had other obligations. She was booked to compete in an air race sponsored by the Iowa Aeronautical Association in connection with the state aviation show at Des Moines. The unusual format for the race provided that the pilot must start from some point outside the state of Iowa and arrive at Des Moines between 8 AM and noon on 19 July. Prizes were awarded on the basis of speed, distance covered, and the combined weight of the pilot, plane, and baggage.55

  Four Monocoupes entered the race, one starting from Hasting, Nebraska, another from Manhattan, Kansas, a third began in Dodge City, Kansas. Phoebe elected to make the longest flight of the race, beginning at Albany, New York.56 She flew nonstop from Albany to Moline, then continued on to Des Moines the following morning. Despite encountering two severe thunderstorms en route, she made excellent time and, given her great distance, was the clear winner. She was barred from the free-for-all light plane race at the meet, but handily defeated “all other feminine entries in the 30-mile race for women,” and shone “in various types of exhibition flying.”57 By this time it was the end of July and Phoebe was keen to join the Cleveland air races, which had finally decided to let “the girls” have a transcontinental race of their own.

  The National Air Races were a combination of major public spectacle and industrial fair. Calling itself the “Air Classic of the Century,” the ten-day extravaganza featured nine cross-country derbies, thirty-five closed-course race events, stunt flying in a wide variety of airplane sizes and capabilities, army and navy maneuvers, gliders, dirigibles, and parachute jumping. A new $10 million public hall in downtown Cleveland housed some 250 exhibits of aircraft, motors, and accessories. The “most expensive airplane ever placed on exhibition” was a jewel-encrusted model tri-motor airplane valued at $400,000. Boeing’s newest tri-motor transport was on display outside Cleveland City Hall. Reflective of the ballyhoo of 1920s air-mindedness, the events and races had a kind of split personality. On the one hand, the stunts and daredevil aspects dazzled the crowd, but on the other, organizers were committed to winning public acceptance for commercial aviation by emphasizing safety, economy, comfort, and reliability.58

  It was this second aspect that the organizers had in mind in sponsoring a women’s derby. Having women participate would surely demonstrate that aviation was safe and easy. Marketing director for the derby, Frank Copeland, asserted that “If the … weaker sex accomplishes the art of flying, it is positive proof of the simplicity and universal practicality of individual flying.”59 Or, as Louise Thaden once put it, “Nothing impresses the safety of aviation on the public quite so much as to see a woman fly a plane.” If a woman can handle it, she said, “the public thinks it must be duck soup for men.”60 For their part, the women wanted to compete for the same reasons men did: to experience adventure, to make history, to demonstrate their abilities, “to show the world that we could do it.”61 German pilot Thea Rasche remarked, “Flying is more thrilling than love for a man and far less dangerous.”62

  Since the announcement, race coordinators had been debating the ground rules, mostly designed to protect the women from potential hazards. Suggestions included requiring the women to carry (male) navigators so they wouldn’t get lost, male mechanics to keep their planes running, and to begin the race somewhere east of the Rockies to spare them the dangerous mountains. These ideas were met with stiff protests from the women pilots who argued that should male navigators or mechanics accompany the women, any Hollywood starlet could enter and have her mechanic do the flying. Further, with a man along, women pilots would be assumed to have had the men do the flying. Amelia Earhart told the New York Times, “I for one and some of the other women fliers … think it is ridiculous to advertise this as an important race and then set us down at Omaha for a level flight to Cleveland. As for suggesting that we carry a man to navigate our own course through the Rockies I, for one, won’t enter. None of us will enter unless it is going to be a real sporting contest.”63

  The suggestions were dropped. This first National Women’s Air Derby, Santa Monica to Cleveland, would cover 2,700 miles over eight days, with seventeen stops in as many cities. It would be a real test of their navigational and piloting prowess and include tangible rewards. The Santa Monica Exchange Club, which sponsored the race, put up $8,000 in prize money and sponsors at the various overnight stops put up lap prizes for each leg of the race.64 The women’s race was one of three cross-country races set to converge at the 1929 National Air Races and Aeronautical Exposition at Cleveland. The other two cross-country races for men began at Portland, Oregon, and Miami Beach, Florida.65 The Graf Zeppelin, in the course of its around-the-world flight, was also heading for the rendezvous in Cleveland.66

  Seventy women held U.S. Department of Commerce licenses in the summer of 1929 (compared to over 9,500 men), but only forty met the Women’s Derby requirements: one hundred hours of solo flight including twenty-five hours of solo cross-country flights of more than forty miles from the starting point. In addition to a Department of Commerce pilot’s license, competitors had to hold a license issued by the Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI) and an annual sporting license from the National Aeronautic Association, the American representative of the FAI.67

  Twenty women signed up to participate. They came from across the United States and included Thea Rasche, Germany’s first female stunt flier, and New Zealander Jessie “Chubby” Keith-Miller, the first woman to fly from England to Australia.68 More than half were experienced pilots like Phoebe and Ruth Nichols, who had both been flying since 1922.69 Phoebe had accumulated over 2,000 hours of flying time, making her the most experienced pilot in the race. Though she was still wearing braces on her legs and hobbled with a cane in each hand, that didn’t seem to affect her flying. She had even come up with a method to reduce her fatigue in the air by rigging up a door spring on the stick to act as a stabilizer.70 Her most important asset was her experience in the Ford Reliability Air Tour. As a result, she was intimately familiar with what she and her machine were capable of as well as many of the challenges a cross-continental race entailed.

  Seven women held transport licenses in 1929, and six of them were in the race.71 Some of the women flew for a living, like Phoebe, Louise Thaden, and Ruth Nichols, who demonstrated airplanes for their manufacturers, and Marvel Crosson, who was an experienced bush pilot in Alaska. Many had gone after records for endurance and altitude, but Louise Thaden held the trifecta: she had set a woman’s altitude record at 20,200 feet in December 1928; a women’s endurance record at 22 hours, 3 minutes, 28 seconds in Ma
rch 1929; and a women’s speed record at 156 miles per hour in April 1929.72 Ruth Elder had just made an unsuccessful attempt to be the first female to replicate Lindbergh’s achievement of a solo transatlantic flight.73 More than half of the entrants were relative newcomers to flying, having acquired their licenses within the past year. And a few, like Opal Kunz, Gladys O’Donnell, and Mary Von Mach, had barely achieved the minimum flying hours in time for the race.74 Amelia Earhart, the most famous of the women competing, was better known for her writing and speaking tours following her famous transatlantic flight—as a passenger—the previous June. She was flying the derby to prepare herself to fly the Atlantic, this time as the pilot.75 G. P. Putman, Amelia’s sponsor and later husband, offered Elinor Smith, a highly experienced pilot, a guaranteed two-year income if she would consent to be Amelia’s pilot and mechanic during the derby. Smith would fly the plane while Amelia would appear to be doing it. Putnam indicated that Amelia was not “physically sturdy” nor experienced enough to fly herself. Smith refused. As a consequence, Smith was unable to secure a ship to fly in the derby, although she did compete in closed-course races in Cleveland at the end.76

  The women flew a variety of machines, from light sport planes to high-performance aircraft, from Phoebe’s 110 hp Monocoupe to Amelia’s giant six-passenger 450 hp Lockheed Vega. Six of the competitors flew 225 hp Travel Airs. Most of the planes had open cockpits, subjecting their occupants to high winds, relentless sun, and needles of rain.77 The planes were divided into two classes based on cubic-inch piston displacement (the sum total volume of all of the engine’s cylinders). In the CW class were the lighter sport planes with 510 cubic inches or less.78 The DW class covered planes with up to 800-cubic-inch displacement engines.79 Pilots could either fly alone or carry one other woman who had never soloed in an airplane to act as her mechanic. No male person would be allowed to ride in any ship in the derby.80

  They gathered at Clover Field in Santa Monica on 18 August 1929 for the eight-day race that would land them in Cleveland on the twenty-sixth. Phoebe almost didn’t make it on time for takeoff. She’d gotten a late start and encountered a headwind on the way west. It was dark when she arrived in the Los Angeles area, and she couldn’t find the airport. They either had no lights or had shut them off. She was low on gas so she picked out a dark spot she hoped was a hayfield and landed. She taxied to a house on the edge of the field where the farmer and his boys helped her stake her plane down. As they were walking to the house, a car arrived with two men who demanded to know who she was and what she was doing there. She explained she had arrived for the Women’s Derby set to start the next day, but had been unable to spot the unlighted airport. Being low on gasoline, she had landed in the field. The men, from the sheriff’s office, suspected she was “running dope.” They finally consented to drive her to the airport where people there could identify her and verify her story. Mollified, they released her. It turned out she was only about six miles from the airport; she flew in the next morning for the start of the race.81

  A crowd estimated at 200,000 and hordes of press greeted the women pilots at Clover Field, many of them enchanted with the very idea of a woman setting off alone across the sky.82 Among them was pilot and humorist Will Rogers, who had been invited to provide commentary. He joined with the many others engaged in trivializing the women’s skills and achievements. The women were entering a world reserved for men, rejecting roles women were expected to play. The men regarded them with a mixture of dread and derision and this was reflected in Rogers’s remarks. Though he avoided some of the more common sobriquets of the day like Petticoat Pilots and Flying Flappers, as he looked over the field of female pilots, he remarked that it looked like a “powder puff derby” to him. The name stuck.83

  Far more interest was shown in the pilots’ clothing than the displacement of their engines. Most wore coveralls or jodhpurs, but they would need more feminine garb for the many banquets and public events they would have to attend along the way. Having very little room on board, some of the women sent clothes on ahead. Marvel Crosson told reporters that she would not be sending clothes but would wear a dress beneath her aviation coat and “take a toothbrush. That’s all.” Gladys O’Donnell impatiently told reporters that “flying fast will be hard work.” She would wear coveralls “and nothing else,” pointedly adding, “This is no tea party.”84

  The race was serious business. Planes were often unreliable and much of the terrain they would cover was remote and potentially hazardous. Limited navigational aids—a road map and a compass—made them vulnerable to losing their way, and poor wind information might force them to use more fuel than they anticipated. It was so risky that all the pilots were required to carry a gallon of water, enough food for three days, and a parachute.85

  Nineteen planes lined up at the field. Mary Haizlip’s plane had failed to arrive; she would join the race later. The deafening growl of aircraft engines vibrated the air. Louise Thaden described waiting for takeoff with “dry mouths, wild pumping hearts, sweating hands fumbling over maps, controls, adjusting goggles …. [The pilots experienced] hope, determination, a feeling of history in the making … adventure, youth soaring carefree on wings of romance.”86

  A pistol shot fired at Cleveland and radioed to Clover Field was the signal for the takeoff. The winner would be the one who completed the race in the shortest elapsed time. This meant that the women in the CW class had little chance against the higher-powered and thus faster planes, but there would be a trophy for the winner in the light planes and lap prizes along the way.

  The six CW entries went out first, at one-minute intervals. Then after a ten-minute pause, the DW planes left at one-minute intervals. Their first leg was deliberately short, a sixty-six-mile hop to San Bernardino, a chance to shake down the planes before the longer laps and to enjoy the first of many chicken dinners. The flight path followed the pass between the San Bernardino Mountains to the north and the San Jacinto Mountains to the south. Here the cool, moist coastal air met the hot dry desert air, fueling violent updrafts and downdrafts that tested the strength of the planes and the resolve of the pilots.87 This first stop set the stage for the others to follow. Three things were immediately clear: the pilots could count on mechanical failures, challenging landing fields choked with dust, and over-scheduling of their time. Engine trouble and forced landings began immediately; crack-ups they called them, as though they were minor inconveniences: broken propellers, shattered undercarriages, smashed landing gear. Repair crews on the ground and accompanying the race in chase planes usually had the planes back in the air overnight. Dust was a major hazard at every airport along the route. Runways were graded dirt. Most planes did not have brakes. Instead they had tail skids, flat metal shoes that dug into the ground to slow their speed upon landing. These were perfect for grass landings but a big problem when dozens of planes were landing on a dirt runway. The tail skids stirred up dust that rose dozens of feet into the air, as impenetrable as thick fog, obscuring vision and camouflaging the runway.

  With their schedules at the whim of dignitaries, chambers of commerce, exchange club coordinators, and aggressive reporters, the women had little choice but to be available and gracious for an endless stream of events, speeches, luncheons, banquets, autographs, and interviews, many of which lasted late into the night. All this activity left the women with little time to take care of their planes, plan for the next day’s flight, or sleep.

  Phoebe, first out, was the first to arrive in San Bernardino, thirty-two minutes and fifteen seconds later.88 Amelia Earhart and Mary Von Mach arrived late, having turned back to Santa Monica with engine trouble, before resuming the race. Thousands of spectators, eager to see the women, had parked along the graded runway, narrowing the field and allowing no margin for error. This was particularly treacherous for the large planes. The landing gear consisted of two wheels in front and a small wheel or skid on the tail; this nose-high posture meant that visibility was blocked during takeoff and landing. T
he pilot had to lean out the side to see the runway, plan the landing, then land essentially blind.

  The women were landing dangerously close together in the swirling dust. Von Mack, upon seeing how crowded the field was, elected to land elsewhere and try to catch up the next day. Amelia came in hot, overshot the runway, and scattered the crowd. Opal Kunz ground-looped off the short landing strip and collapsed one side of her landing gear.89 At San Bernardino, a mechanic mistakenly poured oil in “Chubby” Keith-Miller’s gas tank; the same thing had happened to Ruth Elder in Santa Monica. Fortunately, the mistakes were caught in time.90

  The race almost halted at San Bernardino when a protest developed over the next stop. The women balked at continuing the flight because of their objections to a recent change in the route that required them to land at Calexico on the Mexican border. The field, they argued, was too small to permit fast planes to land safely. After long and contentious debate, a compromise was reached at midnight: the pilots would fly low over Calexico to permit checkers to register their numbers. The next landing would be at Yuma.91 Because of the distance, the morning takeoff time was changed from 8 AM to 6 AM. To bed by 2, up at 4, ready to take off at 6.92