Richthofen flies his first solo

Posted on May 10, 2011 by aeroadmin

I am working on an article about von Richthofen for a children’s magazine, which reminded me that the Red Baron didn’t claim to be a great pilot.  Actually in the aces’ writings I’ve read, I think they’ve all said something to the effect that aerobatics are for the people back home; fancy flying is an often fatal distraction from combat.

Here’s what von Richthofen said about his first solo flight, on 10 October 1915:

There are few moments in life that produce as nervous a sensation as the first solo flight.

Zeumer, my teacher, announced to me one afternoon: “You are ready to fly alone.”  I must say that I would rather have answered: “I am too afraid.”  But this could never come from a defender of the fatherland.  Therefore, good or bad, I had to swallow my cowardice and sit in the machine.

Once again he explained every theory of movement to me.  I barely heard what he said, for I was of the firm conviction I would forget half of what he told me.

The engine started with a roar.  I gave it the gas and the machine began to pick up speed, and suddenly I could not help but notice that I was really flying.  Suddenly it was no longer an anxious feeling, but, rather, one of daring.  Now it was all up to me.  No matter what happened, I was no longer frightened.  With contempt for death I made a wide curve to the left, shut off the engine precisely over the designated tree, and waited to see what would happen now.  Then came the most difficult part, the landing.  I remembered the essential manipulations; I performed them mechanically.  However, the machine reacted differently than when Zeumer sat in it.  I lost my balance, made some wrong movements, and landed nose-first with what was once the instruction machine.  Sadly I looked at the slight damage, amid laughter from all sides.

Two days later I went to my airplane with mad passion, and suddenly all went wonderfully well.

Two weeks later I was ready to take my first examination.  I flew the prescribed figure eight and the ordered number of landings, whereupon I proudly got out of the machine and heard, to my great surprise, that I had failed.  There was nothing else to do but try once more to pass the first examination.

–Manfred von Richthofen, The Red Baron: The Fabled Ace’s Story in His Own Words, ed. Stanley M. Ulanoff, trans. Peter Kilduff (New York: Ace Books, 1969), 42-43

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World War I planes getting publicity

Posted on May 10, 2011 by aeroadmin

Article on Vintage Aero Flying Museum (VAFM) here.

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B-52, B-29, and Bugatti Veyron

Posted on April 30, 2011 by aeroadmin

Just updated the aviation t-shirt art page with all of Ewan’s designs of this type so far, including not only the B-52 and B-29 but also the OH-58 Kiowa helicopter, the Galloping Goose train engine, and the Bugatti Veyron.

He plans to sell directly to museums, so silkscreening can be done in quantity.  But if you really need a t-shirt with one of the designs on it, just contact him; something can surely be arranged.

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About the B-36 Peacemaker and other Convair aircraft

Posted on April 26, 2011 by aeroadmin

Discovered an article about the history of Convair today that discusses the XF-92A, the XFY Pogo, the F2Y Sea Dart, the F-102 Delta Dagger, the F-106 Delta Dart, the CV-240s, 880 and 990 Coronado jetliners, B-36 Peacemaker, B-58 Hustler.  Also suggests some aircraft books which I know must be good ones because Ewan has them and uses them.

I remember seeing some of these aircraft at what was then Chanute AFB.  I think there is still a static display museum there outside Rantoul, IL.

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Hat in the Ring Squadron

Posted on April 21, 2011 by aeroadmin

When I blogged about the Hat in the Ring Squadron the other day, I forgot another statement about it by Eddie Rickenbacker.  (No, I don’t plan to quote Rickenbacker forever.   I want to get back to some things about the Wrights, Fuchida, von Braun, etc.  It’s just that there are so many things in Rickenbacker’s book that explain how the Air Force became what it did.)

I was named commanding officer of the Hat-in-the-Ring Squadron.

I was simultaneously proud and humble.  I thought of the great pilots who had made their contribution to this fighting squadron – Raoul Lufbery, Jimmy Hall, Dave Peterson, Doug Campbell, Walter Smyth.  Now only three of those who had served in the 94th since the early days were left on active duty – Reed Chambers, Thorne Taylor and I.

The 94th had led all other squadrons in victories.  On the day I assumed command, however, the 27th, thanks to Frank Luke’s magnificent string, was six victories ahead of us.  That situation was not going to continue.  I do not like to come in second.

- Edward V. Rickenbacker, Rickenbacker: An Autobiography(Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1967), 147-148

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Pilots without parachutes – part 2

Posted on April 19, 2011 by aeroadmin

I am afraid, if I’d been around in WWI, I would have agreed with the argument that parachutes would tempt pilots to abandon their aircraft before it was needed.  It’s one of those things that sounds backwards enough that it might be true.  Here’s Rickenbacker’s response to that idea:

A major in the Paris headquarters of the Air Service told me that the service did not believe in parachutes.  “If all of you pilots had parachutes,” he told me coldly, “then you’d be inclined to use them on the slightest pretext, and the Air Service would lose planes that might otherwise have been brought down safely.”

I got so mad that I started hollering at him.  Other officers came in and broke it up.  It was a good thing that I had a few ribbons on my chest by that time, for otherwise I would probably have been court-martialed.

- Edward V. Rickenbacker, Rickenbacker: An Autobiography(Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1967), 143

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Pilots without parachutes

Posted on April 15, 2011 by aeroadmin

I was amazed when I learned that WWI pilots had no  parachutes.  I guess it just seemed obvious to me the man is worth more than the machine, considering all the time the USAF spends in training pilots.  But when the history of flight wasn’t much longer than anyone’s experience flying, there wasn’t much to teach someone new.  It seems they either trained themselves, or died.  Meanwhile, the airplanes were valuable, if for no other reason than that any aircraft that landed behind enemy lines could be reverse-engineered.  But still…no parachutes?

We Americans had no parachutes.  Some German pilots and all their balloon observers were equipped with parachutes, and often I was pleased to see an enemy bail out of his burning plane or balloon and escape being burned alive.

- Edward V. Rickenbacker, Rickenbacker: An Autobiography(Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1967), 127

With parachutes, both of those fine young men would have lived.  It was absolutely criminal for our higher command to withhold parachutes from us.  Men who could have lived on to serve America both in war and in peace perished in agony because of the lack of a parachute.  What reward did Raoul Lufbery gain for his role in helping to develop American air mastery?  Death on a picket fence when a parachute would have saved his life.

- Ibid, 142

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Aircraft blueprints and sounds

Posted on April 8, 2011 by aeroadmin

I am working on an article about the history of blueprinting.  That reminded me of a site to recommend: Aviation Shoppe.  They sell blueprints of airplanes and they know what blueprints are (many people think bluelines are blueprints.)

The link is to their page of blueprints for WWI fighters.  They also have a place on the site where you can listen to aircraft sounds.  But if you like aircraft sounds enough to wait for a long download, you should listen to this recording we made of a 1909 Bleriot when we were visiting the Shuttleworth Collection in England in April a couple years ago and they just happened to be starting up the Bleriot.

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Manfred von Richthofen scores a victory

Posted on April 6, 2011 by aeroadmin

Long quote, from Manfred von Richthofen, about what it was like to score a victory.  No comment from me; what could I possibly say about it?

I was very proud when I heard that the Englishman I had shot down on the twenty-third of November 1916 was the man we called “The English Immelmann”: Major Lanoe G. Hawker.

I was on patrol that day and observed three Englishmen who had nothing else in mind than to hunt. I noticed how they ogled me, and since I felt ready for battle, I let them come.  I was lower than the Englishmen; consequently, I had to wait until they came down to me.  It did not take long before one dove for me, trying to catch me from behind.  After a burst of five shots the sly fellow had to stop, for I was already in a sharp left curve.  The Englishman attempted to get behind me while I attempted to get behind him.  So it went, both of us flying like madmen in a circle, with engines running full out at three-thousand-meter altitude.  First left, then right, each intent on getting above and behind the other.  I was soon acutely aware that I was not dealing with a beginner, for he did not dream of breaking off the fight.  He had a very maneuverable crate, but mine climbed better, and I finally succeeded in coming in above and behind him.

We had by this time come down to two thousand meters without having reached an outcome, and my opponent must have realized that it was now high time for him to make himself scarce.  The wind was working in my favor and we were circling more and more over our positions until finally we were nearly over Bapaume, about a kilometer behind our Front.  My opponent waved to me quite cheerfully as we were at a thousand meters altitude as if to say:  “Well, well, how do you do?”

The circles that we made around each other were so narrow that I estimated them to be not further than eighty to a hundred meters.  I had time to view my opponent.  I peered perpendicularly at him in his cockpit and could observe every movement of his head.  If he had not had his flying helmet on, I could have seen what kind of face he made.

Gradually this got to be too much for the brave sportsman, and he finally had to decide whether to land on our side or fly back to his own lines.  Naturally, he attempted the latter, after trying in vain to evade me through looping and such tricks.  In so doing, my first bullets flew by his ears, for prior to that I had not fired a shot.  At about a hundred meters altitude he tried to escape toward the Front by flying zigzag, making his plane a difficult target to hit.

It was now the given moment for me.  I followed him from fifty down to thirty meters altitude, firing steadily.  The Englishman had to fall.  A jam in my guns almost cost me success.

About fifty meters behind our lines he plunged down with a shot through the head.  His machine gun was pulled out of the ground and now graces the entrance over the door to my house.

–Manfred von Richthofen, The Red Baron: The Fabled Ace’s Story in His Own Words, ed. Stanley M. Ulanoff, trans. Peter Kilduff (New York: Ace Books, 1969), 61-62

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Hat in the Ring Squadron – origin of the insignia

Posted on April 2, 2011 by aeroadmin

A few weeks ago, I saw the Hat in the Ring insignia on a box of children’s toys.  I’m not sure what the connection is, but I think there must have been one, because the Hat-in-the-Ring insignia has too much history to be used casually.  However, it seems to be mostly unknown today.

I myself learned its history from visiting the Vintage Aero Flying Museum, which exists to honor the Lafayette Escadrille, the US contribution to WWI air warfare before the US “threw its hat in the ring”.  Eddie Rickenbacker commanded the squadron in WWI, and was instrumental in getting the old insignia back in WWII.  Here’s how it came about:

Surely now we would be the first American squadron to go into action against the enemy.

The honor deserved a distinctive insignia.  One of the pilots, Lieutenant Johnny Wentworth, was an architect, and he was asked to design it.  We all threw out ideas. Major Huffer, the CO, suggested Uncle Sam’s stovepipe hat with the stars and stripes for a hatband.  Our flight surgeon, Lieutenant Walters from Pittsburgh, mentioned the old American custom of throwing a hat into the ring as an invitation to battle.  And thus one of the world’s most famous military insignia, the Hat-in-the-Ring, which became a part of my entire life from then on, was born.

- Edward V. Rickenbacker, Rickenbacker: An Autobiography(Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1967), 122

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