Read Online The Aviators: Eddie Rickenbacker, Jimmy Doolittle, Charles Lindbergh by Winston Groom - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Winston Groom
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needed to be tarted up so as to look more scholarly. He went back to the drawing board, and in June 1925 the Massachusetts Institute of Technology awarded him a doctorate in aeronautical sciences, one of the first of its kind. Doolittle was proud of that, but for the rest of his life he regretted that he had rewritten the paper so it would “be locked away and never read by anyone.” He thought it could have saved lives. 4
B Y THE MID-1920S AIRCRAFT ENGINES had become increasingly powerful and public fascination with flying led to the great popularity of air racing competitions—which had come a long way and were a far cry from the days of the flying circuses. Since the end of the First World War the speed of aircraft had increased past 250 miles per hour and flying clubs throughout the world held races and offered silver loving cups as trophies and often handsome cash prizes to the winners. As with the setting of speed or distance records, the military services encouraged their pilots to enter these competitions as a way of publicizing themselves, if not actually justifying their existence. Jimmy Doolittle finished on top in many of these events, and his national reputation as a flying ace continued to grow. Air racing competition between the army and the navy pilots had become almost frenzied. Doolittle’s first crack at a championship came in October 1925, when the army entered him in the prestigious Schneider Cup, a seaplane race in Baltimore. The problem was that Doolittle had never flown a seaplane before.
In less than a week he was obliged to learn the techniques of flying a plane with an entirely new configuration and center of balance from anything he had ever flown before—not to mention taking off and landing on water. He had had to put pontoons on his sleek and powerful 610-horsepower Curtiss R3C racer, while the navy pilots had flown with them since their first days at flight school.
After the elimination in qualifying rounds of more than half the entrants in various crashes and malfunctions, the racing field now consisted of four planes: two navy pilots, an Italian pilot, and Doolittle. The racecourse was laid out as a 31.7-mile triangle in the Chesapeake Bay, marked off by tall pylons. The racers had to fly around the course seven times, for a total of about 220 miles. After observing qualification tests, Doolittle thought he saw a way to shave a little time by banking steeply past the pylons and gunning out of the turn, but he mentioned none of this to the navy pilots, whose entourage included most of the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis as well as various admirals, Washington naval attachés, and a squadron of navy planes that flew in formation over the spectators. Also present was Orville Wright, who had started it all back in 1903. It was a sunny but choppy autumn day on the Chesapeake. To compete with the navy’s flying squadron the army had sent a blimp that cruised out over the bay “like a majestic silver fish,” according to a report in Aviation magazine.
Doolittle drew first position. His plan was to climb rapidly, then dive sharply as he passed the pylons, banking steeply to get a speed advantage. Once Doolittle had the lead he kept it; the Italian plane dropped out and it became a race between the army and the navy.
Then one of the navy pilots developed engine trouble and had to land on the bay, and on the final lap the other found his plane engulfed in flames from an engine fire (somehow he brought the aircraft safely down on the water). U.S. Army Lieutenant Jimmy Doolittle won the day at a record-setting average speed of 232.573 miles per hour, while the two planes entered by the U.S. Navy had to be ignominiously towed back to shore in full view of the navy brass and the corps of midshipmen from the United States Naval Academy.
Doolittle’s grease-smeared smile was featured prominently in the sports pages at home and abroad, including the New York Times , which, in noting that
B Y THE MID-1920S AIRCRAFT ENGINES had become increasingly powerful and public fascination with flying led to the great popularity of air racing competitions—which had come a long way and were a far cry from the days of the flying circuses. Since the end of the First World War the speed of aircraft had increased past 250 miles per hour and flying clubs throughout the world held races and offered silver loving cups as trophies and often handsome cash prizes to the winners. As with the setting of speed or distance records, the military services encouraged their pilots to enter these competitions as a way of publicizing themselves, if not actually justifying their existence. Jimmy Doolittle finished on top in many of these events, and his national reputation as a flying ace continued to grow. Air racing competition between the army and the navy pilots had become almost frenzied. Doolittle’s first crack at a championship came in October 1925, when the army entered him in the prestigious Schneider Cup, a seaplane race in Baltimore. The problem was that Doolittle had never flown a seaplane before.
In less than a week he was obliged to learn the techniques of flying a plane with an entirely new configuration and center of balance from anything he had ever flown before—not to mention taking off and landing on water. He had had to put pontoons on his sleek and powerful 610-horsepower Curtiss R3C racer, while the navy pilots had flown with them since their first days at flight school.
After the elimination in qualifying rounds of more than half the entrants in various crashes and malfunctions, the racing field now consisted of four planes: two navy pilots, an Italian pilot, and Doolittle. The racecourse was laid out as a 31.7-mile triangle in the Chesapeake Bay, marked off by tall pylons. The racers had to fly around the course seven times, for a total of about 220 miles. After observing qualification tests, Doolittle thought he saw a way to shave a little time by banking steeply past the pylons and gunning out of the turn, but he mentioned none of this to the navy pilots, whose entourage included most of the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis as well as various admirals, Washington naval attachés, and a squadron of navy planes that flew in formation over the spectators. Also present was Orville Wright, who had started it all back in 1903. It was a sunny but choppy autumn day on the Chesapeake. To compete with the navy’s flying squadron the army had sent a blimp that cruised out over the bay “like a majestic silver fish,” according to a report in Aviation magazine.
Doolittle drew first position. His plan was to climb rapidly, then dive sharply as he passed the pylons, banking steeply to get a speed advantage. Once Doolittle had the lead he kept it; the Italian plane dropped out and it became a race between the army and the navy.
Then one of the navy pilots developed engine trouble and had to land on the bay, and on the final lap the other found his plane engulfed in flames from an engine fire (somehow he brought the aircraft safely down on the water). U.S. Army Lieutenant Jimmy Doolittle won the day at a record-setting average speed of 232.573 miles per hour, while the two planes entered by the U.S. Navy had to be ignominiously towed back to shore in full view of the navy brass and the corps of midshipmen from the United States Naval Academy.
Doolittle’s grease-smeared smile was featured prominently in the sports pages at home and abroad, including the New York Times , which, in noting that
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