In A Nutshell

 

POST, WILEY HARDEMAN (1898-1935). Wiley Hardeman Post, aviator, fourth son of William Francis and Mae (Quinlan) Post, was born near Grand Saline in Van Zandt County, Texas, on November 22, 1898. Before his death in a plane crash in 1935, Post became one of the best-known fliers in the world, mainly because of a flight around the world with navigator Harold Gatty in 1931 and a similar solo flight in 1933. In addition, he was known for his pioneer work in high altitude flight, particularly his role in developing an early pressure suit. His achievements in early aviation, more than two decades before the establishment of a United States space program, earned him a reputation as a pioneer in space flight. The airplane in which he made such contributions is today displayed at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., along with his pressure suit. Born a few years before the advent of manned flight, Post spent his early years in northeast Texas before his farm family moved west and settled near Abilene in Taylor County in 1902. Around 1907 the family moved to southwestern Oklahoma. Although Post lived outside the state the rest of his life, he traveled and worked in Texas while in the employ of Oklahoma oilmen and later married a Texas woman.

Post had little interest in farm work or school. He received an elementary education and later took a seven-month course at the Sweeney Auto School in Kansas City, Missouri. He saw his first airplane at a county fair near Lawton, Oklahoma, in 1913 and quickly determined that he wanted to fly. He later turned to oilfield work in Oklahoma and began to dabble in "barnstorming" soon after the end of World War I,^qv first as a parachute-jumper and later, after a few lessons, as a pilot. Thus began a career that would later carry him into the annals of aviation history. Eager to acquire his own airplane, Post returned to oilfield work to earn the necessary funds, but he was injured while working near Seminole, Oklahoma, on October 1, 1926. He lost his left eye in the accident and later received about $1,700 in workman's compensation. He continued to barnstorm in a plane bought with the proceeds, and, while on a tour of Texas, met Mae Laine of Sweetwater. They eloped in his plane on June 27, 1927, and were married in Oklahoma. No children resulted from this marriage. Sometime after his marriage, Post wrecked his plane and was unable to afford repairs. Now in need of steady employment, Post became a private pilot for oilmen Powell Briscoe and F. C. Hall, flying an open-cockpit Travel-Air biplane. He later acquired a pilot's license (number 3259) from the Aeronautics Branch of the United States Department of Commerce after flying a probationary period of about 700 hours. His physical handicap thus proved no barrier. Hall later gained an interest in the colorful world of aviation so aptly portrayed by Lindbergh's famous flight to Paris in 1927. In 1928 Hall acquired a Lockheed Vega aircraft, which he named after his daughter, Winnie Mae. In 1930 Hall bought a new Lockheed Vega also named Winnie Mae. It was this plane, made of plywood and designated 105W, that later made Post famous. He would fly it around the world twice and later into the stratosphere.

Click on Picture to enlarge

Post's first venture into high visibility aviation came in 1930 when he won the air derby between Los Angeles and Chicago, a special event of the 1930 National Air Races. After consulting with Harold Gatty about a flight plan, he completed the flight in a little more than nine hours, achieving an average speed of nearly 200 miles per hour. The feat earned Post $7,500 and national recognition. His next flight would bring even more accolades. This time he hoped to complete a flight around the world-a distance of more than 15,000 miles in the northern latitudes in which he chose to travel. The route took Post, accompanied again by Gatty, from New York to Newfoundland, England, and Germany, and then across Russia to Alaska (via Siberia) and back to New York City. They departed on June 23, 1931, and returned on July 1, covering the distance in eight days, fifteen hours, and fifty-one minutes. The pair later recounted their experience in Around the World in Eight Days: The Flight of the Winnie Mae, (1931) a ghost-written account with an introduction by Will Rogers. Aviation magazine, a leading spokesman for the aviation industry, ranked the flight as a superlative achievement, comparable to Lindbergh's. Following a flurry of post-flight activity, Post fell out with Hall and bought the Winnie Mae. He subsequently made plans to circle the earth again, this time alone.

Despite the bad economic conditions that prevailed in the early 1930s, he raised the necessary funds and began the time-consuming process of planning the flight. He would follow basically the same route, but this time he would make fewer stops. Innovations included the use of a variable pitch propeller, an automatic direction-finder radio, and an automatic pilot furnished by the Sperry Gyroscope Company. Such equipment led the New York Times to note: "He will ride around the world on radio waves while the robot flies the plane." Post completed the flight in mid-July 1933, spanning the route in less than eight days, beating his earlier time by more than twenty-one hours, and becoming the first solo flyer to circle the earth. Post later turned to high-altitude experiments, sponsored by Frank Phillips of the Phillips Petroleum Company. With the aid of engineers from the B. F. Goodrich Company, he designed and built a pressure suit that would allow him to fly as high as 50,000 feet. The Winnie Mae underwent several innovations, including the use of a super-charger. Although Post made several flights into the stratosphere and later attempted to break the cross-country speed record, he was plagued by mechanical failures. Nevertheless, his achievements later earned him the reputation as the discoverer of the jet streams. His 1933 flight had won him the coveted Harmon International Trophy, a feat shared with Lindbergh, Igor Sikorsky, and James Doolittle. Post, accompanied by humorist Will Rogers, died in an airplane crash near Point Barrow, Alaska, on August 15, 1935. He was buried in Memorial Park Cemetery in Edmond, Oklahoma. Shortly after Post's death his widow sold the famed Winnie Mae to the Smithsonian. His accomplishments are still recognized by aviation experts.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Stanley R. Mohler and Bobby H. Johnson, Wiley Post, His Winnie Mae, and the World's First Pressure Suit (Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1971). New York Times, August 27, 1930, July 16, 1933.

 

Wiley Post

Pilot of the Winnie Mae

First to Fly Solo Around the World, Lost over Alaska

 

When Wiley Post and Will Rogers crashed at Point Barrow, Alaska on August 15, 1935, the world mourned the loss of the great flier and the beloved humorist.

Post twice set the record for flying around the world:

• June, 1931 - 8 days, 16 hours - with navigator Harold Gatty
• July, 1933 - 7 days, 19 hours - solo

Also a scientific innovator, Post developed a pressure suit that permitted him to fly the Winnie Mae into the stratosphere.

He was a natural flier. No less an authority than Eddie Rickenbacker declared that Post was "a man born with as sensitive a touch as any aviator could develop."

 

His Youth

Wiley Post was born in Texas on November 22, 1898. Never much of a student, Wiley was interested in mechanical things. His family moved around a bit; when Wiley was 11, they settled in Garvin County, Oklahoma. He saw his first airplane at an air show in nearby Lawton County, grew up in Lawton Co.). Post's first job was with the US Army. He switched to work in the oil fields in 1919, but whether times were tough, or Post was just wild, he stole a car in 1921. He was convicted and sentenced to ten years, but was paroled after one year. He lost his left eye in an oil field accident in the mid-1920's, and used the $1800 settlement to buy his first airplane. In 1925, he first met his fellow Oklahoman, Will Rogers; Rogers needed to get to a rodeo, and Post was pleased to fly the famous humorist there. He became the personal pilot of F.C. Hall, a wealthy Oklahoma oilman, and had use of Hall's personal plane, an open cockpit Travel-Air biplane.

 

The Winnie Mae

Later Hall bought a Lockheed Vega, largely for Post's use, nicknamed Winnie Mae for the oilman's daughter. The Depression intervened, and Hall was sold the plane back to Lockheed. In 1930 Hall bought a later version of the Lockheed Vega, a model 5-C, again nicknamed Winnie Mae. This later aircraft is the one most often seen in photographs of Wiley Post.

 In 1930, the Lockheed Vega was the hottest airplane of its type. Specifications and performance data for the "Wasp" powered Lockheed Vega 5-C:

length 27'8", wing span 41', height 8'6", wing area 275 sq. ft,
empty weight 2361 lbs., useful load 1672, payload 1012, gross wt. 4033 lbs.,
max. speed 170 MPH, cruise 140 MPH, landing 54 MPH, ceiling 20,000 ft.,
gas capacity 96 gal., oil 10 gal., range 725 miles.
price at the factory, July 1928 - $18,500.

The Lockheed Vega was one of the most famous record-breaking airplanes of the early 1930s. The beautifully streamlined, high-wing, single-engine monoplane was designed by John Northrop and Gerrard Vultee, two aviation pioneers who later established their own aircraft companies. Although the Vega first flew in July, 1927, it was during the early 1930s that the plane established its reputation for rugged reliability and airworthiness. It was designed as a small transport aircraft, carrying six passengers and a crew of two. Lockheed built about 130 of them between 1927 and 1934.

In addition to Wiley Post, two female aviators, Amelia Earhart and Ruth Nichols flew the planes.

Post first achieved national prominence in 1930,when he won the National Air Race Derby, from Los Angeles to Chicago. The side of the Winnie Mae's fuselage was inscribed: "Los Angeles to Chicago 9 hrs. 9 min. 4 sec. Aug. 27, 1930." The Winnie May is on display at the Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum (NASM).

 

Around The World In Eight Days

In 1931, he flew around the world in the Winnie Mae with his navigator, Harold Gatty. (Gatty was a renowned aviator in his own right. An Australian naval cadet, he had accompanied Roscoe Turner on a trans-continental flight in 1929. In 1930, he flew with Harold Bromley on an unsuccessful Trans-Pacific attempt. He devised the ground-speed and drift indicator which formed the basis of the automatic pilot. During the War, he served on McArthur's staff as Director of Air Transport and wrote the Raft Book-a survival manual for downed Allied aircrews. He founded Fiji Airways, now Air Pacific, in 1951.)

On June 23, 1931, Post and Gatty left Roosevelt Field, New York. They made fourteen stops: first at Harbor Grace, Newfoundland; then Chester, England; Hanover and Berlin, Germany; Moscow, Omsk, Novosibirsk, Irkutsk, Blagoveshchensk and Khabarovsk, all in the Soviet Union; Nome, Alaska; and Edmonton, Canada. They then flew to Cleveland, and back to New York on July 1, having traveled 15,474 miles.

Here's their partial itinerary, copied from the program of the July 7 Hotel Astor Banquet.

LOG OF THE "WINNIE MAE" (New York Daylight Savings Time) TUESDAY, JUNE 23 4:56 A.M. - Took off from Roosevelt Field, N.Y. 11:48 A.M. - Landed at Harbor Grace, N.F. 3:28 P.M. - Took off from Harbor Grace WEDNESDAY, JUNE 24 7:45 A.M. - Landed at Sealand Airdrome, near Chester, England 9:05 A.M. - Took off from Sealand Airdrome 12:45 P.M. - Landed at Hanover, Germany 1:50 P.M. - Took off from Hanover (Returned immediately for fuel.) 2:15 P.M. - Again took off from Hanover 3:30 P.M. - Landed at Tempelhof Airdrome, Berlin THURSDAY, JUNE 25 2:38 A.M. - Took off from Berlin 11:30 A.M. - Landed at October Airport, Moscow 11:00 P.M. - Took off from Moscow FRIDAY, JUNE 26 7:05 A.M. - Passed over Omsk, Siberia 9:32 A.M. - Landed at Novo-Sibirsk 6:45 P.M. - Took off from Novo-Sibirsk SATURDAY, JUNE 27 A.M. - Landed at Irkutsk, Siberia JUNE 28 - JULY 1 - Blagovyeschensk, Siberia - Khabarovsk, Siberia - Solomon, near Nome, Alaska - Fairbanks, Alaska - Edmonton, Canada - Cleveland, Ohio - Landed at Roosevelt Field, N.Y.

The flight proceeded smoothly, across the Atlantic and Europe. But two inches of water covered the airfield at Blagovyeschensk (Siberia) and the Winnie Mae bogged down in the mud. After wasting fourteen hours grappling with the plane, Post and Gatty were finally rescued by a detachment of American soldiers with a tractor. Dirty, but not damaged, the Winnie Mae once again soared through the sky. In Khabarovsk, USSR, the plane was grounded for several hours while mechanics inspected the engine. Luckily, the Winnie Mae was in perfect running order, and the around-the-world flight continued. After a 17-hour leg, they landed in Alaska.

Their most serious setback occurred on June 30, in Solomon, Alaska, where they bent the Winnie Mae's propeller. In his book, Around the World in Eight Days, Post described the takeoff from Solomon:

With 100 gallons of fuel aboard, we started to take off. Taxiing back along the beach, the ship started to sink into the sand. With a quick thrust I banged the throttle open to pull her through it before we were stuck. But all I succeeded in doing was to boost the tail up into the air. With a loud slap the propeller cut a hole in the sand and bent both tips on the blades. I cut the emergency switch just in time to keep 'Winnie Mae' from making an exhibition of herself by standing on her nose. That would have been fatal to our hopes.

I jumped out and surveyed the damage. With a wrench, a broken-handled hammer, and a round stone, I drew out the tips of the blades so they would at least fan the air in the right direction.

But misfortunes never come singly. Harold was swinging the prop for a prime with the switch cut to restart the hot engine. He called 'all clear' to me, and I switched on and whirled the booster. One of the hot charges of gasoline caught on the upstroke of the piston, and with a back fire the Wasp kicked. The propeller flew out of Harold's hands, and the blade opposite smacked his shoulder before he could jump clear of the track. He dropped like a log. It was fortunate, to say the least, that it was the flat side of the blade which hit him, though it gave him a bad bruise and a wrenched back. If the prop had been going the other way, he might have been sliced in two.

Like a major, Harold climbed in as soon as he had recovered his senses, and we took off for Fairbanks. I was cautious as I had ever been on that run along the shifting sands of Solomon beach. Luck was with me, and we got away without misfortune No. 3. I hope we didn't leave it behind for the next bird who lands there!

The damaged prop was replaced in Fairbanks with a spare obtained from Alaska Airways. They climbed over the 10,000 foot Rockies, to Edmonton, where they landed at Blatchford Field, another water-logged strip. While they had touched down there, they couldn't possibly take off from it. The locals helped them haul the plane over to Portage (now Kingsway) Avenue, which served well enough for the Winnie Mae to get airborne. They landed at New York's Roosevelt Field on July 1.

They were welcomed across the country, including lunch at the White House on July 6. The next day, a ticker tape parade in New York City and a banquet given by the Aeronautical Chamber of Commerce of America at the Hotel Astor. Speakers included Post, Gatty, Mayor Jimmy Walker, and Assistant Secretary of Commerce Clarence Young.

After the flight, he acquired the Winnie Mae himself. Sources differ as to whether he had a falling-out with F.C. Hall, and bought the plane, or "Hall's admiration for his pilot manifested itself in the gift of the Winnie Mae." - as noted on the NASM web site.

Post and Gatty published a ghost-written account of their journey, titling it Around the World in Eight Days, a play on the title of Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days. Will Rogers contributed an introduction.

 

Solo

He spent the next year improving his airplane, installing an auto-pilot made by the Sperry Gyroscope Company and a radio direction-finder which homed in on target radio stations.

In 1933, he repeated his round-the-world flight, but this time did it solo, with the aid of the auto-pilot and radio compass. He took off from New York's Floyd Bennett Field on July 15, bound, non-stop, for Berlin. Despite bad weather over the Atlantic, he made it in 26 hours, setting a record for a New York-to-Berlin flight. After a couple false starts, he departed Germany, only to be forced down in Moscow by trouble with his auto-pilot. While more repairs were needed in Novosibirsk and Irkutsk, he reached Khabarovsk ten hours ahead of his previous record.

In Alaska, his radio direction-finder malfunctioned, and he got lost.

My friend, Larry Rivers, a pilot from that part of Alaska, offered this comment on the itinerary:

I expect that he had crossed from Anayder or Providania Russia, hit the Alaska Coast, then followed it down to Bethel where he could get fuel. From there he could easiely follow the Koyukuk River in to Fairbanks or hopped over the Alaska Range and gone to Anchorage. Either are the normal routes through that part of Alaska. Flat is located east of Bethel which is a coastal town on the Bering Sea. Its at the mouth of the Koyukuk River, about due west of Anchorage.

Click on Picture to enlarge

Worried about the 20,000 foot mountains in his way, he touched down at a 700-foot landing strip in a small mining town, Flat, Alaska. He smashed his prop and right landing gear in the process.

  Some local miners repaired on the aircraft, and the prop was flown to Fairbanks to be straightened. The photo shows the miners lifting the Winnie Mae straightened. Ed Olson, the Flat mine owner, took the photo, which is in the collection of Gene Jenne in Talkeetna Alaska, who received the photo from Ed Olson.

After repairs, he continued on to Edmonton (July 22), and then flew over 2000 miles non-stop to New York. 50,000 people greeted him when he landed back at Floyd Bennett Field at 11:50 PM, July 22, 1933. Only making eleven stops, despite some major mishaps, he had knocked 21 hours off his previous record, completing the solo flight in seven days, nineteen hours.

 

Into The Stratosphere

 

Wiley Post was the first to test a pressure suit.

Always fascinated by the scientific challenges of flight, in 1934 he focused on high-altitude, long distance flight, - funded by Frank Phillips of the Phillips Petroleum Company.

Since the Winnie Mae's cabin could not be pressurized, he developed, with B.F. Goodrich Company, an early pressure suit. The suit was constructed of double-ply rubberized parachute cloth glued to a frame with pigskin gloves, rubber boots and an aluminum & plastic diver's helmet. It had arm and leg joints that permitted easy operation of the flight controls and also enabled walking to and from the aircraft. The helmet had a removable faceplate that Post could seal when he reached a height of 17,000 feet, a liquid oxygen source breathing system, and could accommodate earphones and a throat microphone. The liquid oxygen was contained in double-walled vacuum bottles, and as the super-cold gas boiled off, it could be used for breathing and suit pressurization. In his first flight using the pressure suit, Sept. 5, 1934, above Chicago, he reached 40,000 feet. In the super-charger equipped Winnie May, Post set unofficial altitude records (as high as 50,000 ft), discovering the jet stream in the process.

In March 1935, Post flew from Burbank CA to Cleveland OH in the stratosphere using the jet stream. He took his famous five year-old single-engine Lockheed Vega 2,035 miles in 7 hours and 19 minutes with an average ground speed of 279 mph in a 179 MPH aircraft. At times, his ground speed exceeded 340 MPH. He attempted four transcontinental stratospheric flights, all ending in mechanical failure, before retiring his beloved aircraft. Post's pioneering accomplishments were the first major practical advance in pressurized flight.

 

His Last Flight

 

Will Rogers Cowboy Humorist Radio Commentator Newspaper Columnist & Author Movie Star Philanthropist In the 1920's and 30's, Will Rogers, an Oklahoman and part Cherokee Indian, was an American icon. That era was so different from now, that it's difficult to describe his popularity. We have our celebrities today, but are any of them "beloved"? Will Rogers was. A few of his most famous quotes: "I only know what I read in the papers." "I never met a man I didn't like." "Everybody is ignorant, only on different subjects." Check out the Will Rogers web site.

In 1935, Post became interested in surveying a mail-and-passenger air route from the West Coast to Russia. Funded by the airlines, he began to assemble a hybrid plane built from two wrecks. The low-wing monoplane consisted of a Lockheed Orion fuselage and long wings from a Lockheed Explorer. He installed a 550 HP Wasp engine, and oversize 260 gallon gas tanks. He planned to add pontoons, to land in Alaska's and Siberia's many lakes.

His friend Will Rogers visited him frequently at the Lockheed airport in Burbank where the strange beast took shape. Rogers called the red-and-silver plane Aurora Borealis, but others called it "Wiley's Orphan" or "Wiley's Bastard." Post insisted that it didn't have or need a name, just a number. When the pontoons he had ordered did not arrive, he had a set installed that were designed for a much larger plane. Altogether it was a dangerously heavy aircraft, which they loaded down further with hunting and fishing equipment.

After a test flight in late July, 1935, Post and Rogers left Seattle in the unique plane in early August. Rogers commented on the huge pontoons, but Post dismissed his concerns. Their itinerary: Seattle - Juneau, Alaska - Dawson CITY, Yukon Territory - Aklavik, NWT - Matanuska Valley, Alaska -Fairbanks, Alaska - Point Barrow, Alaska.

Larry Rivers, offered this comment on this flight's itinerary:

Note that there are two Dawson's in Canada. Dawson Creek (start of the Alcan highway) and Dawson City (gold rush city). The route from Juneau would hit Dawson City. As the route is not very direct, they must have been working around a great deal of weather.

They probably left Dawson and, due to the weather, had to go south west to the Matanuska Valley, where I am sitting now, as I write this email. At that point they would have fueled in Palmer, Alaska, or a few miles further west in Anchorage. From there they would have headed north up the Susitna Valley to Fairbanks where they likely stopped again for fuel. From Fairbanks they could have flown to Barrow, Alaska.

From Fairbanks, it is NW to Bettles and Barrow. Coastal weather up there is horrible. I fly it a couple months a year and the wind comes off the Arctic ice, across the open leads and turns into ice fog. That lays on the ground about 400 feet thick and you dare not enter if you don't know exactly where you are going. Last trip I landed at Wainright for the same reason. When it was time to leave I made two attempts to get out of it. Once I returned to Barrow and spent another night. The next day I tried to skud run to the mountains and it was too thick so I went up and IFR to Bettles.

Post and Rogers did not know the area. They were brave indeed to even venture into the area in poor weather. They were headed to Barrow for fuel, then west to Providania, Russia a route he had flown the other direction. They may have been headed to Nome, and then across the water (just logical) but encountered weather, in which case he would have had no other place to go except Barrow. Or maybe Barrow was just part of the adventure.

While Post piloted the plane, Rogers banged out his newspaper columns on his typewriter. On the way to Point Barrow, they became lost in bad weather; they landed in a lagoon a few miles from Point Barrow to ask directions.

Larry Rivers suggests this scenario:

The boys were skud running in strange and unforgiving country. They were heavy and worried. Mostly their attention was outside the aircraft, watching the contrast between water and land along the coast so they did not lose ground reference with gray fog on gray water. They were running on the forward tanks, intending to refuel them in Barrow. Since they had poor maps and were flying on pilotage they probably were concerned about how much further they had to fly in that crud. When they saw people, they landed for directions, (we all do it) and probably considered it a place they could stop if they had too... but... they learned Barrow was just a few miles away. Rather than figure out how to tie down the aircraft when there are no trees, and set up camp (unpack the plane) they decided to go on. ("Will, my boy, its only 15 miles, I think we can make it, and then we will have fuel, a warm bed, weather services and tie downs..lets push on north, and we will wait there for better weather.")

They jumped back in the plane, were still concerned about weather and worried that they might not see good enough to get from the lake back to the coast, which they needed to follow to Barrow. Minds were on other things and they forgot to check fuel and switch to a fresh tank. (we have all done that too) In the air they intended to stay low, so they could see the ground and not lose ground reference in the ice fog. Minds on everything except fuel...then the engine quit. Having just taken off they were not up to cruise speed, and did not have enough wind over the horizontal to prevent tail stall, and not enough altitude to dump the nose even if they had. In that position, they were nearly behind the power curve on take off (we have all done that too I hate to admit), and when the engine quit there was nothing available to hold the nose down. It would have pitched up steeply, stalled immediately, and the aircraft would have come down. Probably in a tail slip first until wind got on the rudder and weather vane would have made it rotate, in which case it could have hit nose first.

The engine quit when they tried to take off again, and plane plunged into the lagoon, tearing off the right wing, and killing both men instantly.

The Barrow folks that took part in this report that the aircraft was "Experimental" and had huge fuel tanks. The aft tanks were full, and the forward tanks had run dry. The aircraft was terribly tail heavy with the fuel load. When they took off, they mistakenly remained on a nearly dry tank. When the aircraft rotated into flight and started to climb, the engine experienced fuel starvation, or at least interruption due to empty or nearly empty forward tank. When the engine sputtered and lost power the aircraft was at low airspeed and there was not enough elevator control to keep the nose down. Simply out of the weight and balance envelope. Without thrust, the tail would have dropped, and the aircraft would have plummeted to the earth. Not necessarily in a nose heavy dive.

An Inuit named Clare Okpeah saw the plane wreck and ran the fifteen miles to Barrow to report it. When he described the two men to Army Sergeant Stanley Morgan, Morgan knew that it must be the two famous travellers. He radioed the War Department, and led a recovery party to the site. The remains of both men began the final journey back to Oklahoma.

Shortly after Post's death his widow sold the famed Winnie Mae to the Smithsonian.

The Will Rogers and Wiley Post Monument, across from the state-owned Wiley Post-Will Rogers Memorial Airport, was dedicated in 1982 to commemorate the 1935 plane crash that killed the humorist and the famous pilot. Two monuments now on the National Register of Historic Places are located at the crash site.
 

Sources:

• Larry Rivers - At the bottom of his family page, see the Post-Rogers Memorial in Barrow. Larry has flown and lived in the Arctic, has a lodge 80 miles from the Arctic coast and has flown the Arctic for 25 years. One of the few Alaskan guides licensed to hunt the ice pack, he is a commercial rated pilot with Instrument, Multi engine and Float ratings. Currently with 10,000 hrs. logged as pilot-in-command in single engine aircraft in Alaska.
• National Aviation Hall of Fame - article on Wiley Post
• NASM article - photo of Winnie May on display
• Wiley Post - Will Rogers Airport - in Point Barrow, Alaska
• Wiley Post's grave/memorial
• book review and brief bio
• Wiley Post bio
• takeoff from Solomon, Alaska

 

 

More About Wile Post

 

Click on Picture to enlarge

Wiley Post was one of the most celebrated pilots in aviation history. He set two trans-global speed records during the 1930s, one with a co-pilot, and one by himself. Post also developed the first practical pressure suit and helped pioneer high-altitude flight. Many Americans related to Post's ability to overcome his difficult circumstances, particularly during the Great Depression. His tragic and untimely death in 1935 stunned the nation and robbed aviation of a valuable innovator.

Post was born in 1898 in Grand Saline, Texas, to farmers. When he was five, they moved to Oklahoma. Post dropped out of school in the eighth grade. On the family farm, he started learning all he could about machines. His love for mechanical devices became apparent during a trip to a county fair in 1913. There he saw his first airplane and instantly knew that he wanted to become an aviator. Like other young men, though, Post was practical and began working as a mechanic in an oil field instead. Still, one day, when a plane flew overhead, he remembered his dream and started pursuing it.

Post broke into aviation when a barnstorming troop came to Oklahoma in 1924. The troop's skydiver was injured and Post convinced the owner to let him fill in. Although Post had no experience, he made the jump. Over the next two years, he jumped 99 times, sometimes earning as much as $200 a fall. But Post wanted to be a pilot, not a skydiver, and decided to return to the oil fields to make enough money to buy his own aircraft.

One day in 1926, though, a serious accident jeopardized his dream. A stray chip hit Post in his left eye. A massive infection developed and began to affect both his eyes. Post, fearing blindness, agreed to let doctors remove his left eye in the hope that the infection would recede and, fortunately, it did. With only one eye, Post had trouble with depth perception, but he trained himself to gauge distances through practice; he learned to land a plane by using the height of telephone poles and two-story buildings. Although the accident had cost him his eye, he used his $1,800 worker's compensation check to buy his own plane, a Curtiss Canuck (the Canadian version of the Jenny). Over the next few years, Post made a living teaching student pilots, flying oilmen to their rigs, and barnstorming on weekends.

Click on Picture to enlarge

Wiley Post with Orion-Explorer hybrid seaplane, which was built by mating the wing of Explorer 4 with an Orion 9E

Soon after, Post started working for F.C. Hall, an important oilman, as his personal pilot. Hall was an aviation enthusiast and owned a Lockheed Vega, one of period's most advanced planes. The oilman named the Vega the Winnie Mae, after his daughter. Realizing Post's aviation ambitions, Hall encouraged Post to use his plane when he did not need it. In 1930, Post entered the prestigious 1930 Men's Air Derby Race from Los Angeles to Chicago. He won the race by more than 1-1/2 hours, despite a faulty compass. Impressed by Post's abilities, Hall told Post he could use his plane to pursue any air records he wished.

Post decided to attempt a new speed record for around-the-world travel the very next year. Despite the then current record of 20 days, 4 hours, Post predicted that he could accomplish the task in 10 days. To help him, Post chose Harold Gatty, a well-known Australian navigator and aviator. While Gatty plotted a route, Post made several changes to the Winnie Mae including an improved instrument panel, adjustable seats, and a special navigation station. On June 23, 1931, the two men took off from Roosevelt Field, Long Island, the same field Charles Lindberg h had started from four years earlier. Over the next several days, Post and Gatty faced some serious challenges, including getting bogged down in a muddy field and a bent propeller that they hammered back into place. But after 8 days, 15 hours, and 51 minutes, they landed back on Long Island on July 1 and smashed the previous record. Post and Gatty became heroes overnight.

After his record-setting flight, Post wanted to open his own aeronautical school, but no one would back him. People doubted his ability to operate such an institution because of his rural background and limited formal education. Post consequently became depressed. It also hurt him that people believed that Gatty had been the real brains behind their trans-global trip. Determined to disprove his nay-sayers', Post decided to fly solo around the world and attempt a new record.

Post took off from Floyd Bennett Field, Long Island, on July 15, 1933. Aboard the Winnie Mae were two new devices--a Sperry gyroscope and a radio direction finder--that would make his flight without a navigator that much easier. The gyroscope automatically corrected the plane if it deviated from a particular bearing, while the radio direction finder helped the pilot navigate toward certain distinct radio transmitters. Although Post had problems with his gyroscope and he suffered another bent propeller, he repaired both items and stuck to his predicted pace. The result was a new around-the-world record of 7 days 18 hours and 49 minutes. Post had bettered his previous record by 21 hours.

Post's next goal was to win the MacRobertson Race, a race from England to Australia. He believed the key to winning would be to fly in the sub-stratosphere--somewhere between 30,000 and 40,000 feet (9,144 and 12,192 meters) altitude--where the air is lighter and a plane can travel much faster. But since the Winnie Mae was not airtight or pressurized, and the atmosphere at higher altitudes is too thin to breathe, he set out to build a pressure suit that would allow him to breathe as if he were at 5,500 feet (1,676 meters). The B.F. Goodrich Rubber Company helped Post develop a pressure suit. After rejecting two other models, he successfully tested his third model on September 5, 1934, during a flight over Chicago at 40,000 feet (12,192 meters).

Click on Picture to enlarge

By the time Post had perfected his pressure suit, the MacRobertson race had already ended. He decided to use his new suit to try to set a transcontinental flight record instead. Post made four attempts at the record, but each time he failed because of mechanical problems, or in one case, sabotage by a rival pilot. Nevertheless, he did establish a new air speed record during one of the flights by traveling 2,035 miles (3,275 kilometers) in 7 hours and 19 minutes. During that flight, the Winnie Mae reached 340 miles per hour (547 kilometers per hour), more than a third faster than its normal maximum air speed. Post had proven that high-altitude flight was the key to faster air speeds.

In 1935, Will Rogers, the famous American humorist and one of Post's friends, hired Post to fly him through Alaska in search of new material for his newspaper column. Post had recently purchased a hybrid aircraft made of parts from two used Lockheed planes. The new aircraft consisted of an Orion's fuselage and an Explorer's wings. For Post, who was short on cash, it was the most advanced plane he could get for the money. Post had decided to add pontoons to the plane to manage the water landings in Alaska. He had originally ordered some special pontoons for the trip, but when they did not arrive on time, he substituted floats that were much longer than he needed. These floats made the plane nose heavy and difficult to control, and his decision to use them probably cost him his life. On August 15, 1935, as Post and Rogers took off for Point Barrow, Alaska, the plane's engine stalled and the aircraft plummeted nose first into a lake, killing them both.

Wiley Post was one of the world's great aviation pioneers. Although many people believed that Post's solo trans-global flight was his most significant accomplishment, or as fellow aviator Howard Hughes said, "the most remarkable flight in history," Post's development of the pressure suit and his substratospheric flights probably had a greater impact on aviation because they advanced the science and theory of flight. Nevertheless, regardless of which of Post's accomplishments one considers, it is clear that Post made many vital contributions to aviation.

--David H. Onkst

Sources and further reading:

Burke, Bob. From Oklahoma to Eternity: The Life of Wiley Post and the Winnie Mae. Oklahoma City: Oklahoma Heritage Association, 1998.

Hallion, Richard P. Test Pilots -- The Frontiersmen of Flight. Revised Edition. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1988.

Mohler, Stanley R. and Bobby H. Johnson. Wiley Post and his "Winnie Mae," and the World's First Pressure Suit. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1971.

Niven, David. The Pathfinders. Alexandria, Va.: Time Life Books, 1980.

Post, Wiley and Gatty, Harold. Around the World in Eight Days: The Flight of the Winnie Mae. New York: Rand McNally and Company, 1931.

Sterling, Bryan B. and Sterling, Frances N. Forgotten Eagle: Wiley Post, America's Heroic Aviation Pioneer. New York: Carroll & Graf. 2002.

Sterling, Bryan B. and Sterling, Frances N. Will Roger and Wiley Post: Death at Barrow. New York: M. Evans and Company, Inc., 1993.

 

Wiley's Pressure Suit

Wiley Post's pressure suit allowed him to cruise for long distances at high altitude in the jet stream, and was a precursor to modern pressure and space suits.

On March 15, 1935, Post flew from Burbank, California, to Cleveland, Ohio, a distance of 2,035 miles, in 7 hours, 19 minutes. At times, the Winnie Mae attained a ground speed of 340 mph, indicating that the airplane was indeed operating in the jet stream. He reached an unofficial altitude of more than 50,000 feet.

(right) In this photo, Wiley Post is at the far left as the suit is pressurized for testing. The Winnie Mae is in the background.

The suit is currently on display at the National Air & Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center adjacent to Washington D.C.'s Dulles Airport.

 

 

 

USE YOUR BROWSER "BACK" BUTTON TO RETURN TO PERVIOUS PAGE