Read Online The Spirit of ST Louis by Charles A. Lindbergh - Free Book Online

It's good enough for visiting friends in St. Louis, but I want something better than that for a conference with the Wright people. I'll need a felt hat and an overcoat, and I haven't either one. All the successful businessmen I know wear felt hats and overcoats—they give an impression of dignity and influence.
    Car lights skim along the road and stop opposite my plane. "Hello there!"
    "Hello!" I shout.
    "Need any help?" Figures appear in the lantern light.
    "No, thanks very much." I hurry back over the fifty yards I've covered.
    "Want a ride to town?"
    "No, I've got to stay with the plane."
    "Engine trouble?"
    "Weather."
    "Hell, you're not going to stay here all night are you? The weather won't get any better."
    "You're the air-mail pilot, aren't ya?" another man breaks in. "You fellers can have your job. I wouldn't fly one of them things for a million dollars."
    "I feel just like my dad. He says he just a' soon fly in one of 'em as long as he can keep one foot on the ground. Haw-haw-haw!"
    That joke comes out wherever an airplane lands, and the teller always expects you to laugh with him.
    "Man, I wouldn't think of going up in one of 'em. I get dizzy looking down from my barn roof. How does it feel to be a aviator? You fellers sure live with your life in your hands."
    "My uncle saw a airplane fall once. They was two fellers in it. The passenger, he got killed right off. The pilot wasn't dead, though. He was just all smashed up—bones busted and bleeding all over. They took him to a hospital. I guess he died too, a couple of days later."
    "D'ya have a radio set on board?"
    "No, mail planes don't carry any radio."
    "I never could understand how these things stay up in the air." One of the men pokes a wing with his finger.
    "How fast can you make this machine go?"
    "It can do about a hundred and twenty miles an hour at full throttle," I reply.
    "Jesus Christ! Say, that's two miles a minute. How'd you like to travel two miles a minute, Bill? That would take you from the farm to town in about two minutes, wouldn't it?"
    "Hell, it takes longer than that to get started."
    "Do you s'pose people'll ever travel around in airplanes like they do in automobiles?"
    Lights are coming along the road from the south. It's probably the mail truck. I leave my new friends, and go round and unstrap the hatch to the mail compartment.
    The truck pulls in through the gate.
    "Well, it isn't often you do us the favor of stopping at Springfield for the night."
    I know that voice—it's Mr. Conkling, the postmaster. I jump down off the fuselage, and we shake hands. He's a big man, getting on in years.
    "Tie your plane down and come in for supper with us," he says.
    "I'd like to," I tell him, "but I can't leave it that long. The engine would freeze up."
    I hand the mail sacks over to the driver as we talk. "Well, can't we send you something to eat?"
    "No, thanks. I'm not hungry."
    I'm used to going without meals, and I don't want to bother him to make another trip from town. Postmaster Conkling climbs back into the truck. He's one of the few people who understand an air-mail pilot's life. He accepts my statement, offers what help he can, and doesn't argue about problems of the storm and night.
    "Good-by and good luck," he calls. "We notified both St. Louis and Chicago that you got down all right. Let us know if you need anything."
    The truck grinds off, and the car of visitors follows. I'm alone on the field, in the night. The time is quarter past seven.
    I'd better start the engine before it gets too cold—if I can start it. You're never sure with a Liberty; it's really a stunt for one man, and a very dangerous stunt if he doesn't watch himself. The trick of handling a propeller is to make your muscles always pull away from it. If you lean against a blade, on contact, you're asking for some broken bones. I put a lantern on the ground next to my cockpit, and line the other three up in front and a little to the left of the propeller. I hang my pistol