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| B-24 Liberator |
It started for me at the age of three with my first "flight". My uncles bought a big toy airplane, with pedals and large enough for me to sit in. The "flight" was high up above their heads as they lifted me and the plane. I decided, right there and then, to learn to fly as soon as my legs were long enough to reach the pedals.
I soon learned to read about flying in the comics and related to my namesake, Smiling Jack. Growing up in Brooklyn, Floyd Bennett Field became the first for real life experiences, as I had lots of thrills observing both flying model and real life airplanes. At the age of 13, my best friend and I went by subway train to the opening of LaGuardia. Wow, what an amazing event with airliners and formations of Army aircraft, directly over our heads, descending to the runway.
Then, in 1939, I saw a great air show at Newark Airport. The precision, daring and expertise truly found a lasting place in my psyche. I later tried to duplicate their eight point rolls, octagon loops and other expert maneuvers when training as an Aviation Cadet. That's when I truly learned, not how to do it, but to realize how very great those pilots were.
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| With my sister, Lillian |
A year later, I had my very first real life opportunity to fly. My brother had just started taking lessons and he asked his instructor to take me up in his biplane. Well that was it! Flying was to be my life. The very first thing that followed was improvement in my schoolwork. I knew that learning was important. My family was not wealthy and I could not plan on costly lessons. So I began to think of the military services. A college degree was a requisite. That too looked so difficult. Well, my brother sponsored the first semester tuition and I started with Aeronautical Engineering at NYU. But four years was seen as so far into the future and others joined me in actively considering the Canadian Air Force. But Pearl Harbor changed that. Seeking to get my parent's approval, I agreed to complete the first full year and then join the U.S. Army Air Corp.
My first book, Memories of the Jing Bao and Beyond, describes my participation in the war years and the airline we created immediately after -- Veterans Airlines. Needless to say, aviation heritage progressed significantly during those turbulent years. We had to press every dimension of aviation capability and grow our capabilities around the world to save the world.
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| Veterans Airlines Globe Trotter |
Once again, realizing the need to learn more, I went back to school to earn my engineering degree. My aviation background, coupled with the new knowledge led me towards concentration in aeronautics and defense. I joined Minneapolis Honeywell as a Service Engineer, located in the field with assignments in New York City, Long Island and the New York State region. The title of Service Engineer strongly influenced my actions in that I went out with the primary intent to be of service to the airlines and defense contractors. Fortunately, I had a reasonably free hand to exercise my own judgment. Having just completed four months of added training at the company's Aeronautical Division field service school, I became highly familiar with their flight control, fuel gage, air data and other products. Hence, I was in a good position to be of service.
Since my first love was aviation, I started with the airlines located at Idlewild (now Kennedy) and LaGuardia. As a direct extension, also with key executives located in the headquarters in Manhattan, a few key things developed. For example, the Honeywell fuel gage system employed new technology. The first such systems were on Pan American DC-6B aircraft, replacing the old float gages, which were inaccurate and highly unreliable. I had little difficulty conducting classes for the Pan Am mechanics at Idlewild and they had virtually no problem keeping them maintained. But, as it worked out, that in and of itself created a problem. The mechanics tended to the DC-6B systems so infrequently that they soon forgot most of what I had taught them. (I called that the Maytag problem.) So I went back and refreshed their expertise. When the new technology system was put in their DC 7s, everything went very well and I continued to offer refresher help.
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| Pan Am Douglas DC-6 |
Then when Pan Am was planning to buy 707 and DC-8 jet aircraft, my role at the executive level was expanded. I was in the Chrysler Building (Pan Am's) when John Borger and his assistant asked if I could help them. They said, "Come with us" and led me to an open area of the building where a few rows of airline seats were positioned. John asked me to just sit in one of the seats, then another, and asked how they felt beneath the knees, back, etc. I didn't know what was going on. But then learned that I was helping them decide on the seating for the new jet age. Another aviation heritage milestone. Similar experiences occurred with American Airlines when I helped them decide on new inlet temperature sensor for their Lockheed Electra aircraft. Also with Eastern Airlines and others. My expertise was not really that broad but the confidence from my earlier service actions was genuine.
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| Entering the jet age -- a Boeing 707 |
Another matter had to do with safety. American Airlines, among others, became very concerned about the many aircraft in the skies both en route and around the airports, all traveling at increasingly greater speeds. A Northwest Airlines pilot had designed a new technology system of strobe lights with both high visibility and means to indicate relative direction of flight. My company licensed the "Atkins" light technology and it was my job to introduce it to the airline management and convince them of its merits verses the older swinging red lights system. The FAA also had to be convinced, as they couldn't seem to be drawn from the color red and what had been the traditional method. I worked primarily with Dan beard, VP for safety at American. He was fully convinced and was more concerned about the possible imminence of a midair collision than was apparent with bureaucracy.
We jointly decided that the best and fastest way to resolve the issue was to view both systems at night from an observer aircraft. American donated a DC-6 for the occasion and invited key people from the other airlines to join us aboard the observer aircraft. Grimes and Honeywell agreed to the competitive exercise, each with their own "target" aircraft. The net result was that American adopted the new, safer system and equipped their entire fleet of aircraft. United and others stayed with the older type for which they were already equipped. The FAA proved to remain a problem. They maintained that red means danger and resisted American's intent to use blue-white flashing strobe lighting. We showed them actual data to prove how much more visible the strobe lights were and how well their pilots could locate and determine actions which would ensure safe distance and follow up action to avoid possible emergencies in the air. When we stressed that red lighting was actually used inside the aircraft to reduce distracting pilot observation, the FAA ultimately gave in after American had actually started to equip their aircraft.
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| Lockheed Constellation |
Another milestone of aviation occurred in the mid to late fifties, when the threat of ICBM attack dictated rapid emplacement of DEW line radars across the continent. A friend, who know of my contact, called and asked if I could help him to locate and buy all kinds of aircraft: C-47s at $125,000/each; C54-Gs at $650,000, Lockheed Constellations at $1.2 million, etc. He said there was urgent national need for expanded air transport to quickly get the equipment and workers to the many distant locations and money was at hand. Time was of the essence. He said we could each take a reasonable finder's fee for each aircraft bought and sold.
Wow, that sounded very exciting and it was so very important. I told a friend in our office and we both set out (on the office phones) to look around. This went on intensively, with each of us counting in a great commission and our wives dreaming of furs and all kinds of goodies. Finally, we did in fact locate an airplane, a Constellation. The only problem was that the purchase price of $1..35 million was too much. I decided to reduce my take and finally got the price within $50,000 -- however, still in the wrong direction. It was thus decided that we would all arrange letter contracts with our contacts and quickly bring the buyer and seller together to agree on an equitable price with provisions for a modest $2,000 finder's fee for each of us.
We subsequently met at my house, started to read each other's letter contract, when one of the guys said: "Wait a minute. The phone number on this letterhead is the same as on mine." Well, it turned out that we had so many middlemen, each looking for a piece of the action and there really was no plane. Someone put hope into the action and we all bid to reduce the difference. But in the end, hope was all there was. But it was great fun.
The end nevertheless was successful. Aviation transport capacity was rapidly increased to meet the nation's urgent demands. The ICBMs stayed in their silos. The DEW line went up. And hope, in the broader sense, survived.
Old Pilots, New Pilots
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| My son, Al, with a PT-19 -- my former training plane |
More than thirty years after my last mission, I flew in the right seat next to another Stettner pilot. My son, Al, lad recently gotten his pilot's license and was taking me up in his Pip Cherokee. Woefully underpowered at only 140 horsepower and carrying the maximum load of two adult men, this was quite a different experience than flying in my B-24 with a full crew and a load of bombs. With the summer temperature at about 95 degrees, the little Cherokee used the entire length of the 1,800-foot runway just to lift off. However, getting airborne wasn't enough -- there were trees in our path and climbing with two people on board on such a hot day was a real challenge for the meek 140 horsepower engine. Full flaps, full power and wishful thinking enabled us to just barely clear the trees. In fact, I think we took a few leaves with us in the undercarriage. But we were flying.
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| Piper Cherokee |
"I would be much more comfortable if this plan had three more engines", I told him. But my genes must have passed on to the next generation because my son flew a beautiful approach and landed right on the numbers. The next generation of Stettner pilots had arrived.
