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[Illustration: ©_Wide World Photos_

“WE”]

“WE”

BY CHARLES A. LINDBERGH

THE FAMOUS FLIER’S OWN STORY OF HIS LIFE AND HIS TRANSATLANTIC FLIGHT, TOGETHER WITH HIS VIEWS ON THE FUTURE OF AVIATION

WITH A FOREWORD BY MYRON T. HERRICK U. S. AMBASSADOR TO FRANCE

[Illustration]

FULLY ILLUSTRATED

G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS NEW YORK--LONDON The Knickerbocker Press 1927

This is a copy of the First Edition of “WE”

[Illustration: G.P. Putnam’s Sons]

July, 1927

[Illustration: The Knickerbocker Press New York]

Made in the United States of America

DEDICATED TO

MY MOTHER

AND TO THE MEN WHOSE CONFIDENCE AND FORESIGHT MADE POSSIBLE THE FLIGHT OF THE

“SPIRIT OF ST. LOUIS”

MR. HARRY H. KNIGHT MAJOR WILLIAM B. ROBERTSON MAJOR ALBERT BOND LAMBERT MR. J. D. WOOSTER LAMBERT MR. HAROLD M. BIXBY MR. EARL C. THOMPSON MR. HARRY F. KNIGHT MR. E. LANSING RAY

FOREWORD

When Joan of Arc crowned her King at Rheims she became immortal. When Lafayette risked his all to help the struggling Americans he wrote his memory forever across a mighty continent. Shepherd boy David in five minutes achieved with his sling a place in history which has defied all time.

These three shining names represent the triumph of the idealism of youth, and we would not speak of them with such reverence today had their motives been less pure or had they ever for an instant thought of themselves or their place in history.

So it was with Lindbergh, and all the praise awarded him, judged by the rigid standards of history and precedent, he has merited. He was the instrument of a great ideal and one need not be fanatically religious to see in his success the guiding hand of providence.

For he was needed and he came at the moment which seemed exactly prëordained. He was needed by France and needed by America, and had his arrival been merely the triumph of a great adventure the influence of his act would have gone no further than have other great sporting and commercial achievements.

There have been moments here in France when all that my eye could reach or my intelligence fathom appeared dark and foreboding and yet, in spite of all, my soul would be warmed as by invisible sunshine. At such times when all human efforts had apparently failed, suddenly the affairs of nations seemed to be taken from out of the hands of men and directed by an unseen power on high.

Just before the Battle of the Marne I was standing on the Seine embankment.

A great harvest moon was rising over the city near Notre Dame. It seemed to rest on the corner of a building. The French flag was blowing steadily across its face. In fleeting moments while this spectacle lasted people knelt on the quay in prayer. I inquired the meaning of these prayers. The answer was that there is a prophecy centuries old that the fate of France will finally be settled upon the fields where Attila’s horde was halted and driven back and where many battles in defence of France have been won. And pointing up the Seine to the French flag outlined across the moon people cried, “See, see the sign in heaven. It means the victory of French arms. The prophecy of old is come true and France is once again to be saved on those chalky fields.”

Now when this boy of ours came unheralded out of the air, and circling the Eiffel tower settled to rest as gently as a bird on the field at Le Bourget, I was seized with the same premonition as those French people on the quay that August night. I felt without knowing why, that his arrival was far more than a fine deed well accomplished, and there glowed within me the prescience of splendor yet to come. Lo! it did come and has gone on spreading its beneficence upon two sister nations which a now-conquered ocean joins.

For I feel with every fibre of my being that Lindbergh’s landing here marks one of the supreme moments in the history of America and France, and the faith we have in the deciding power of spiritual things is strengthened by every circumstance of his journey, by all his acts after landing, and by the electrical thrill which ran like some religious emotion through a whole vast population. “The Spirit of St. Louis” was to the French people another sign come out of the sky--a sign which bore the promise that all would be well between them and us.

What a happy inspiration it was to christen his ship with such a name! It brought as from on high a new spiritual message of peace and good-will, and it was more than a coincidence that Lindbergh should drop from his ship his farewell message to Paris on that spot, in the Place de la Concorde, where once the Spirit of Saint Louis was invoked in tragic circumstances. The priest who stood there beside King Louis the Sixteenth as the guillotine fell, cried defiantly to the assembled mob: “The Spirit of Saint Louis ascends to the skies.” With Lindbergh, _out_ of the skies, the noble Spirit of Saint Louis came back to France.

France took Charles Lindbergh to her heart because of what he was and because of what she knew he represented. His little ship came to the meeting place of the greatest conference that has ever gathered between two nations, for under the shadow of its wings a hundred and fifty million Frenchmen and Americans have come together in generous accord. No diplomatic bag ever carried so stupendous a document as this all unaccredited messenger bore, and no visiting squadron ever delivered such a letter of thanks as he took up the Potomac in returning. Has any such Ambassador ever been known?

Lindbergh was not commissioned by our government any more than Lafayette was by his; in each case it has been merely left for statesmen to register and approve the vast consequences of their acts. Both arrived at the critical moment and both set in motion those imponderable forces which escape the standards of the politician’s mind. Who shall say but that they were God-sent messengers of help, smiling defiance of their faith at an all too skeptical world? What one accomplished has already changed history through a century; what the other has just done the people of America and France will take good care shall not be wasted.

The way Lindbergh bore himself after getting here was but the continuation of his flight. He started with no purpose but to arrive. He remained with no desire but to serve. He sought nothing; he was offered all. No flaw marked any act or word, and he stood forth amidst clamor and crowds the very embodiment of fearless, kindly, cultivated, American youth--unspoiled, unspoilable. A nation which breeds such boys need never fear for its future. When a contract for one million dollars was sent him through his associates he cabled back to them, “You must remember this expedition was not organized to make money but to advance aviation.” There is the measure of his spirit; the key to his intentions.

Flying was his trade, his means of livelihood. But the love of it burned in him with fine passion, and now that his fame will give him a wider scope of usefulness, he has announced that he will devote himself wholeheartedly to the advancement of aeronautics.

His first step in that direction is the publishing of this book, and no one can doubt that its influence will be of enormous value in pushing on man’s conquest of the air. It will be idle for me or anyone else to estimate now what these results will be. But America vibrates with glowing pride at the thought that out from our country has come this fresh spirit of the air and that the whole world hails Lindbergh not only as a brave aviator but as an example of American idealism, character and conduct.

MYRON T. HERRICK. _United States Embassy Paris June Sixteenth, 1927_

CONTENTS

PAGE

I.--BOYHOOD AND EARLY FLIGHTS 19

II.--MY FIRST PLANE 39

III.--BARNSTORMING EXPERIENCE 63

IV.--HEADING SOUTH 84

V.--TRAINING AT BROOKS FIELD 104

VI.--RECEIVING A PILOT’S WINGS 126

VII.--I JOIN THE AIR MAIL 153

VIII.--TWO EMERGENCY JUMPS 175

IX.--SAN DIEGO--ST. LOUIS--NEW YORK 198

X.--NEW YORK TO PARIS 213

PUBLISHER’S NOTE 231

AUTHOR’S NOTE 232

A LITTLE OF WHAT THE WORLD THOUGHT OF LINDBERGH

BY FITZHUGH GREEN

I.--PARIS 233

II.--BRUSSELS 248

III.--LONDON 254

IV.--WASHINGTON 265

V.--NEW YORK 297

VI.--ST. LOUIS 315

ILLUSTRATIONS

FACING PAGE

“WE” _Frontispiece_

FATHER AND SON 20

INSTRUCTOR AND CLASSMATES IN A MID-WESTERN MILITARY SCHOOL 21

SHIPPING “THE SPIRIT OF ST. LOUIS” 32

THE MEN WHO MADE THE PLANE 33

FINANCIAL BACKERS OF THE NON-STOP NEW YORK TO PARIS FLIGHT 50

FUSELAGE FRAME OF THE PLANE 51

WORKING ON NAVIGATION CHARTS FOR FLIGHT 66

INSTRUMENT BOARD OF THE PLANE 67

“WE” MAKE A TEST FLIGHT 82

PATSY, THE MASCOT 83

POLICE GUARDING “THE SPIRIT OF ST. LOUIS” 98

CAPTAIN RENÉ FONCK WISHES ME THE BEST OF LUCK 99

GETTING READY FOR THE TAKE-OFF 114

JUST BEFORE STARTING ON THE BIG ADVENTURE 115

“I DIDN’T USE MY PERISCOPE ALL THE TIME” 118

A SALUTATION FROM M. BLERIOT 119

PAUL PAINLEVÉ EXTENDS HIS WELCOME 126

WITH M. DOUMERQUE AND AMBASSADOR HERRICK 127

CROWDS AT THE CITY HALL 130

GUESTS AT THE LUNCHEON OF M. BLERIOT 131

ON THE STEPS OF THE EMBASSY 146

THE WELCOME AT CROYDEN FIELD 147

WITH CROWN PRINCE LEOPOLD 162

WITH H. R. H. THE PRINCE OF WALES AND LORD LONSDALE 163

CROWDS PRESSING AROUND “THE SPIRIT OF ST. LOUIS” AS THE PLANE LANDED 178

“AT CROYDEN FIELD I ESCAPED TO THE TOP OF THE OBSERVATION TOWER OVERLOOKING THE CROWD” 179

THE U. S. S. “MEMPHIS,” FLAGSHIP, ON WHICH THE AUTHOR RETURNED TO AMERICA 194

COMING DOWN THE GANGPLANK OF THE U. S. S. “MEMPHIS” 195

CHARLES EVANS HUGHES CONFERS THE CROSS OF HONOR 210

AT THE TOMB OF “THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER” 211

SPEECHES AT WASHINGTON MONUMENT 226

FROM THE TOP OF WASHINGTON MONUMENT 227

AT ARLINGTON CEMETERY 234

THE $25,000 CHECK PRESENTED BY RAYMOND ORTEIG 235

RECEIVING THE ORTEIG PRIZE MEDAL 235

WELCOME IN NEW YORK HARBOR 242

RIDING UP BROADWAY 243

NEW YORK CITY’S WELCOME 258

A JUNE SNOWSTORM 259

THE PARADE PASSING THROUGH CENTRAL PARK 274

THE PARADE IN CENTRAL PARK 275

SPEAKING AT THE CEREMONIES IN CENTRAL PARK 290

SPEAKING AT THE CEREMONIES IN PROSPECT PARK 291

“THE SPIRIT OF ST. LOUIS” AFTER HER RETURN 306

AFTER THE FLIGHT TO WASHINGTON 307

ST. LOUIS’ WELCOME 314

MY MOTHER 315

“WE”

BOYHOOD AND EARLY FLIGHTS

I was born in Detroit, Michigan, on February 4, 1902. My father was practicing law in Little Falls, Minnesota, at the time. When I was less than two months old my parents took me to their farm, on the western banks of the Mississippi River two miles south of Little Falls.

My father, Charles A. Lindbergh, was born in Stockholm, Sweden, January 20, 1860, the son of Ola and Louisa Manson. His father (who changed his name to Lindbergh after reaching America) was a member of the Swedish Parliament and had at one time been Secretary to the King.

About 1860 my grandfather with his family embarked on a ship bound for America, and settled near Sauk Center, Minnesota, where he took up a homestead and built his first home in America--a log cabin. It was here that my father spent his early life.

The Rev. C. S. Harrison, writing for the Minnesota Historical Society, gives an account of the activities of my grandfather during the early days in Minnesota.

There were very few schools in Minnesota at that time, and my father’s boyhood days were spent mostly in hunting and fishing. His education consisted largely of home study with an occasional short term at country schools.

He was educated at Grove Lake Academy, Minnesota, and graduated from the law school at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, with an LL.B. degree.

He began his law practice in Little Falls where he served as County Attorney. He later became interested in politics, and was elected to the 60th Congress in 1906 to represent the Sixth District of Minnesota at Washington, a capacity in which he served for ten years.

FATHER AND SON]

MADISON, WISC.--INSTRUCTOR AND CLASSMATES IN A MID-WESTERN MILITARY SCHOOL]

My mother was born in Detroit, Michigan, daughter of Charles and Evangeline Land. She is of English, Irish and French extraction. As a graduate of the University of Michigan, she holds a B.S. degree from that institution, also an A.M. degree from Columbia University, New York City. Her father, Dr. Charles H. Land, a Detroit dentist, was born in Simcoe, Norfolk County, Canada, and his father, Colonel John Scott Land, came from England, and was one of the founders of the present city of Hamilton.

My grandfather was constantly experimenting in his laboratory. He held a number of patents on incandescent grates and furnaces, in addition to several on gold and enamel inlays and other dental processes. He was one of the first to foresee the possibilities of porcelain in dentistry, and later became known as “the father of porcelain dental art.”

During the first four years of my life, I lived in our Minnesota home with the exception of a few trips to Detroit. Then my father was elected to Congress and thereafter I seldom spent more than a few months in the same place. Our winters were passed in Washington, and our summers in Minnesota, with intermediate visits to Detroit.

When I was eight years of age I entered the Force School in Washington. My schooling was very irregular due to our constant moving from place to place. Up to the time I entered the University of Wisconsin I had never attended for one full school year, and I had received instruction from over a dozen institutions, both public and private, from Washington to California.

Through these years I crossed and recrossed the United States, made one trip to Panama, and had thoroughly developed a desire for travel, which has never been overcome.

My chief interest in school lay along mechanical and scientific lines. Consequently, after graduating from the Little Falls High School, I decided to take a course in Mechanical Engineering, and two years later entered the College of Engineering of the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

While I was attending the University I became intensely interested in aviation. Since I saw my first airplane near Washington, D. C., in 1912, I had been fascinated with flying, although up to the time I enrolled in a flying school in 1922 I had never been near enough a plane to touch it.

The long hours of study at college were very trying for me. I had spent most of my life outdoors and had never before found it necessary to spend more than a part of my time in study.

At Wisconsin my chief recreation consisted of shooting-matches with the rifle and pistol teams of rival Universities, and in running around on my motorcycle which I had ridden down from Minnesota when I entered the University.

I had been raised with a gun on our Minnesota home, and found a place on the R.O.T.C. teams at the beginning of my freshman year at Wisconsin. From then on I spent every minute I could steal from my studies in the shooting gallery and on the range.

The first six weeks of vacation after my freshman year were spent in an Artillery School at Camp Knox, Kentucky. When that was over I headed my motorcycle south and with forty-eight dollars in my pocket, set out for Florida. After arriving at Jacksonville I started back the same day, but over a different route leading farther west than the first. Seventeen days after leaving Camp Knox I arrived back in Madison with a motorcycle badly in need of repair and nine dollars left in my pocket. After stopping in Madison long enough to overhaul the engine I went to Little Falls to spend the remainder of my vacation.

Soon after the start of my third semester at Wisconsin I decided to study aeronautics in earnest, and if, after becoming better acquainted with the subject, and it appeared to have a good future, I intended to take it up as a life work.

I remained at the University of Wisconsin long enough to finish the first half of my sophomore year. Then about the end of March, 1922, I left Madison on my motorcycle en route to Lincoln, Nebraska, where I had enrolled as a flying student with the Nebraska Aircraft Corporation.

The roads in Wisconsin in March, 1922, were not all surfaced and when, after leaving the well-paved highway, I had progressed only about four miles in as many hours, I put my motorcycle on the first farm wagon that passed and shipped it to Lincoln by rail at the next town.

I arrived at Lincoln on the first of April. On April 9, 1922, I had my first flight as a passenger in a Lincoln Standard with Otto Timm, piloting.

N. B. In the following account of flying during the post-war period of aviation, before flying laws and the Aeronautical Branch of the Department of Commerce came into existence, it should be borne in mind by the reader that the experiences and incidents related in this book in no way describe modern commercial flying conditions. Even in this account it will be noticed that the more spectacular events took place in such a manner that all risk was taken by the pilots and by members of the aeronautical profession; also that exhibition and test flying were responsible for most of these.

In the four emergency parachute jumps described herein, it is apparent that in each case the plane would never have been flown with passengers under the conditions which necessitated the jump.

Commercial air transport has developed rapidly during the last few years, until today it has reached a stage where the safety of properly operated airlines compares favorably with other means of travel.

I received my first instruction in the same plane a few days later under I. O. Biffle, who was known at the Nebraska Aircraft Corporation as the most “hard boiled” instructor the army ever had during the war.

The next two months were spent in obtaining, in one way or another, my flying instruction, and in learning what I could around the factory, as there was no ground school in connection with the flying course at that time.

We did most of our flying in the early morning or late evening on account of the strong Nebraska winds in midday with their corresponding rough air which makes flying so difficult for a student.

I believe that I got more than my share of rough weather flying, however, because my instructor, or “Biff” as we used to call him, had certain very definite views on life, one of which was that early morning was not made as a time for instructors to arise. So as I was the only student and Biff my only instructor, I did very little early morning flying.

By the end of May I had received about eight hours of instruction which (in addition to the $500 cost of my flying course) had required about $150 for train fare and personal expenses.

One morning Biff announced that I was ready to solo, but the president of the company required a bond to cover possible breakage of the plane, which I was not able to furnish. As a result I did not take a plane up by myself until several months later.

Before I had entirely completed my flying course, the instruction plane was sold to E. G. Bahl, who was planning a barnstorming trip through southeastern Nebraska. I became acquainted with Bahl at Lincoln and offered to pay my own expenses if allowed to accompany him as mechanic and helper. As a result we barnstormed most of the Nebraska towns southeast of Lincoln together, and it is to him that I owe my first practical experience in cross country flying.

“Barnstorming” is the aviator’s term for flying about from one town to another and taking anyone who is sufficiently “airminded” for a short flight over the country. In 1922 the fare usually charged was five dollars for a ride of from five to ten minutes.

It was while I was flying with Bahl that I began to do a little “wing-walking.” We would often attract a crowd to the pasture or stubble field from which we were operating, by flying low over town while I was standing on one of the wing tips.

In June I returned to Lincoln and received a little more instruction, making a total of about eight hours.

About this time Charlie Harden, well known in the aeronautical world for his parachute work, arrived in Lincoln. I had been fascinated by the parachute jumps I had seen, and persuaded Ray Page to let me make a double drop with Harden’s chutes.

A double drop is made by fastening two parachutes together with rope. Both are then packed in a heavy canvas bag; the mouth of the bag is laced together and the lace ends tied in a bow knot. The bag is lashed half-way out on the wing of the plane, with the laced end hanging down. When the plane has reached sufficient altitude the jumper climbs out of the cockpit and along the wing to the chute, fastens the parachute straps to his harness, and swings down under the wing. In this position he is held to the plane by the bow knot holding together the mouth of the bag containing his parachute, the bag itself being tied securely to the wing. When ready to cut loose he pulls the bow knot allowing the bag to open and the parachute to be pulled out by his weight.

In a double jump, after the first parachute has fully opened, the jumper cuts the rope binding the second chute to the first. The first chute upon being relieved of his weight, collapses, and passes him on the way down.

I made my first jump one evening in June from an 1800-foot altitude over the flying field.

My first chute opened quickly, and after floating down for a few seconds I cut it loose from the second, expecting a similar performance. But I did not feel the comfortable tug of the risers which usually follows an exhibition jump. As I had never made a descent before, it did not occur to me that everything was not as it should be, until several seconds had passed and I began to turn over and fall head first. I looked around at the chute just in time to see it string out; then the harness jerked me into an upright position and the chute was open. Afterwards I learned that the vent of the second chute had been tied to the first with grocery string which had broken in packing the parachute, and that instead of stringing out when I cut loose, it had followed me still folded, causing a drop of several hundred feet before opening.