Tales of the Air Mail Pilots
Nowhere else in the world has such a determined and successful effortbeen made to carry the mails by airplane as in the United States. Notsince the Armistice have aviators in any part of the globe experiencedsuch thrilling and terrifying adventures as Uncle Sam’s aerialpostmen.
Two years ago I flew as a passenger from New York to Chicago, over theAlleghanies, with “Slim” Lewis and Wesley Smith, two of the Air Mail’sbest pilots, at the controls. But nothing happened, except that, aftersome eight hours of rather monotonous flying, we arrived at Chicagoafter dark, could not locate the Air Mail flying field, and werecompelled to land on the prairie west of the city. This was nothingmore than an incident; only the pilot who flies day after day, weekafter week, in all sorts of weather, is fortunate—orunfortunate—enough to experience real adventures.
A few weeks ago I journeyed over the entire Air Mail route, from NewYork to San Francisco. I traveled by train this time, and stopped atevery flying field of consequence in search of stories of adventure.And I marveled that these quiet, smooth-faced, unassuming,well-dressed young men, most of whom are married and drive their owncars, could have passed safely through the experiences which I shallrelate. Yet there they stood before me.
In order to understand how these mishaps came about, it is necessaryto familiarize oneself with the duties of the pilots and the purposeof the Air Mail Service. Every day, whatever the weather, two sturdyairplanes, loaded with mail, climb into the air above their respectiveflying fields near New York and San Francisco, and start across thecontinent. At the next landing field—there are thirteen of thembetween the two oceans—pilots and machines are changed, just as thecrew and locomotive of the Limited are changed at each division point.
When night comes, these pilots pick up their beacons as sailors do,for no longer do lighthouses belong only on capes and reefs. They arestrung along the plains from Cleveland to Cheyenne, making a GreatWhite Way a thousand miles from the sea.
Along this route—the longest regularly operated airway in the world—Itraveled until I reached Salt Lake City. There, while in the act ofsigning the hotel register, I heard a familiar sound—the drone of aLiberty motor. Directly over the center of the city appeared a DeHaviland plane, speeding eastward at the rate of two miles a minute,or twice as fast as our fastest passenger trains.
“That’s Ellis, on his way to Rock Springs,” my host volunteered.
Salt Lake City is probably the most difficult spot along the entiretranscontinental route for the pilot to get out of. The city issituated on a plain 4,200 feet above sea level, almost entirelysurrounded by mountains. To the eastward, between Salt Lake and RockSprings, Wyoming, is the country God forgot.
Circling above the flying field to gain altitude, Ellis steered acourse over Immigration Canyon, down which Brigham Young and his wearyfollowers came in 1847. Ten minutes from the field, he cleared RedButte, 7,000 feet above sea level a