Walking on Air (10 page)

The women flew a variety of machines, from light sport planes to high-performance aircraft, from Phoebe's 110 hp Monocoupe to Amelia's giant six-passenger 450 hp Lockheed Vega. Six of the competitors flew 225 hp Travel Airs. Most of the planes had open cockpits, subjecting their occupants to high winds, relentless sun, and needles of rain.
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The planes were divided into two classes based on cubic-inch piston displacement (the sum total volume of all of the engine's cylinders). In the CW class were the lighter sport planes with 510 cubic inches or less.
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The DW class covered planes with up to 800-cubic-inch displacement engines.
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Pilots could either fly alone or carry one other woman who had never soloed in an airplane to act as her mechanic. No male person would be allowed to ride in any ship in the derby.
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They gathered at Clover Field in Santa Monica on 18 August 1929 for the eight-day race that would land them in Cleveland on the twenty-sixth. Phoebe almost didn't make it on time for takeoff. She'd gotten a late start and encountered a headwind on the way west. It was dark when she arrived
in the Los Angeles area, and she couldn't find the airport. They either had no lights or had shut them off. She was low on gas so she picked out a dark spot she hoped was a hayfield and landed. She taxied to a house on the edge of the field where the farmer and his boys helped her stake her plane down. As they were walking to the house, a car arrived with two men who demanded to know who she was and what she was doing there. She explained she had arrived for the Women's Derby set to start the next day, but had been unable to spot the unlighted airport. Being low on gasoline, she had landed in the field. The men, from the sheriff's office, suspected she was “running dope.” They finally consented to drive her to the airport where people there could identify her and verify her story. Mollified, they released her. It turned out she was only about six miles from the airport; she flew in the next morning for the start of the race.
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A crowd estimated at 200,000 and hordes of press greeted the women pilots at Clover Field, many of them enchanted with the very idea of a woman setting off alone across the sky.
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Among them was pilot and humorist Will Rogers, who had been invited to provide commentary. He joined with the many others engaged in trivializing the women's skills and achievements. The women were entering a world reserved for men, rejecting roles women were expected to play. The men regarded them with a mixture of dread and derision and this was reflected in Rogers's remarks. Though he avoided some of the more common sobriquets of the day like Petticoat Pilots and Flying Flappers, as he looked over the field of female pilots, he remarked that it looked like a “powder puff derby” to him. The name stuck.
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Far more interest was shown in the pilots' clothing than the displacement of their engines. Most wore coveralls or jodhpurs, but they would need more feminine garb for the many banquets and public events they would have to attend along the way. Having very little room on board, some of the women sent clothes on ahead. Marvel Crosson told reporters that she would not be sending clothes but would wear a dress beneath her aviation coat and “take a toothbrush. That's all.” Gladys O'Donnell impatiently told reporters that “flying fast will be hard work.” She would wear coveralls “and nothing else,” pointedly adding, “This is no tea party.”
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The race was serious business. Planes were often unreliable and much of the terrain they would cover was remote and potentially hazardous. Limited navigational aids—a road map and a compass—made them vulnerable to losing their way, and poor wind information might force them to use more fuel than they anticipated. It was so risky that all the pilots were required to carry a gallon of water, enough food for three days, and a parachute.
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Nineteen planes lined up at the field. Mary Haizlip's plane had failed to arrive; she would join the race later. The deafening growl of aircraft engines vibrated the air. Louise Thaden described waiting for takeoff with “dry mouths, wild pumping hearts, sweating hands fumbling over maps, controls, adjusting goggles …. [The pilots experienced] hope, determination, a feeling of history in the making … adventure, youth soaring carefree on wings of romance.”
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A pistol shot fired at Cleveland and radioed to Clover Field was the signal for the takeoff. The winner would be the one who completed the race in the shortest elapsed time. This meant that the women in the CW class had little chance against the higher-powered and thus faster planes, but there would be a trophy for the winner in the light planes and lap prizes along the way.

The six CW entries went out first, at one-minute intervals. Then after a ten-minute pause, the DW planes left at one-minute intervals. Their first leg was deliberately short, a sixty-six-mile hop to San Bernardino, a chance to shake down the planes before the longer laps and to enjoy the first of many chicken dinners. The flight path followed the pass between the San Bernardino Mountains to the north and the San Jacinto Mountains to the south. Here the cool, moist coastal air met the hot dry desert air, fueling violent updrafts and downdrafts that tested the strength of the planes and the resolve of the pilots.
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This first stop set the stage for the others to follow. Three things were immediately clear: the pilots could count on mechanical failures, challenging landing fields choked with dust, and over-scheduling of their time. Engine trouble and forced landings began immediately; crack-ups they called them, as though they were minor inconveniences: broken propellers, shattered undercarriages, smashed landing gear. Repair crews on the ground and accompanying the race in chase planes usually had the planes back in the air overnight. Dust was a major hazard at every airport along the route. Runways were graded dirt. Most planes did not have brakes. Instead they had tail skids, flat metal shoes that dug into the ground to slow their speed upon landing. These were perfect for grass landings but a big problem when dozens of planes were landing on a dirt runway. The tail skids stirred up dust that rose dozens of feet into the air, as impenetrable as thick fog, obscuring vision and camouflaging the runway.

With their schedules at the whim of dignitaries, chambers of commerce, exchange club coordinators, and aggressive reporters, the women had little choice but to be available and gracious for an endless stream of events, speeches, luncheons, banquets, autographs, and interviews, many of which
lasted late into the night. All this activity left the women with little time to take care of their planes, plan for the next day's flight, or sleep.

Phoebe, first out, was the first to arrive in San Bernardino, thirty-two minutes and fifteen seconds later.
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Amelia Earhart and Mary Von Mach arrived late, having turned back to Santa Monica with engine trouble, before resuming the race. Thousands of spectators, eager to see the women, had parked along the graded runway, narrowing the field and allowing no margin for error. This was particularly treacherous for the large planes. The landing gear consisted of two wheels in front and a small wheel or skid on the tail; this nose-high posture meant that visibility was blocked during takeoff and landing. The pilot had to lean out the side to see the runway, plan the landing, then land essentially blind.

The women were landing dangerously close together in the swirling dust. Von Mack, upon seeing how crowded the field was, elected to land elsewhere and try to catch up the next day. Amelia came in hot, overshot the runway, and scattered the crowd. Opal Kunz ground-looped off the short landing strip and collapsed one side of her landing gear.
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At San Bernardino, a mechanic mistakenly poured oil in “Chubby” Keith-Miller's gas tank; the same thing had happened to Ruth Elder in Santa Monica. Fortunately, the mistakes were caught in time.
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The race almost halted at San Bernardino when a protest developed over the next stop. The women balked at continuing the flight because of their objections to a recent change in the route that required them to land at Calexico on the Mexican border. The field, they argued, was too small to permit fast planes to land safely. After long and contentious debate, a compromise was reached at midnight: the pilots would fly low over Calexico to permit checkers to register their numbers. The next landing would be at Yuma.
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Because of the distance, the morning takeoff time was changed from 8
AM
to 6
AM
. To bed by 2, up at 4, ready to take off at 6.
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Coming across the trackless desert of southern California, Mary Haizlip got lost and wandered into Mexico. Haizlip, who had started the race a day late while awaiting a new plane after having mechanical problems with the first one, approached Calexico after dark. After landing where she saw lights, Haizlip learned she was on the wrong side of the border. It took her several hours to work her way through the red tape to get clearance from Mexican authorities and get out of there.
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Three women were forced down in the desert with mechanical difficulties. Bobbi Trout ran out of fuel just short of Yuma, landed in a plowed field, cart-wheeling her Golden Eagle and doing serious damage. She was out of the race for three days while her plane
was repaired.
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Thea Rasche damaged her landing gear in a forced landing in the desert after a clogged carburetor stopped her motor; her fuel line was full of contaminants, including scraps of fiber and rubber. Rasche had been handed a telegram while still in Santa Monica warning her to watch out for sabotage. This, she said, was proof.
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Further proof seemed to come from Claire Fahy, who had been forced down at Calexico with broken wing struts on her Travel Air. She claimed foul play; she charged that someone had deliberately poured acid over her wire wing braces. Following a hastily called press conference, Fahy withdrew from the race.
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Yuma was “ten degrees hotter than blazes.”
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Wind had drifted sand over the runway, making it difficult to distinguish the landing strip from the surrounding desert. Phoebe landed okay, leading the way in the small plane class. Amelia ran off the edge, nosed over, and broke her propeller. She immediately called to have a propeller flown in from Los Angeles. The other pilots elected to delay the race long enough for Amelia to get back in the race.
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As a consequence of their late start for Phoenix, they took off in the hot afternoon. One-hundred-twenty-degree temperatures bred heat thermals, violent updrafts followed by equally violent downdrafts that pitched the pilots about in their seats. The struggle to maintain control and the desolation of the terrain stirred their fevered imaginations. Thaden described her experience:

Surreptitiously you strain to the side, searching out possible spots where a landing might be made, analyzing swiftly, working out a plan of possible procedure. Would it be better to pancake in, or go in on a wing to absorb shock? Through your mind's eye flashes a picture of a twisted mass of tangled wreckage, lying in a small crumpled heap far off the beaten track. You see yourself painfully crawling from between broken logerons and telescoped cowling, to lie gasping under the pitiless glare of the desert sun, helpless and alone.
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Phoenix was like an oasis, a big well-maintained airport with experienced mechanics, hot showers, and another chicken dinner. Pancho Barnes was late into Phoenix. She had apparently followed the wrong set of railroad tracks coming out of Yuma and wandered over the border. She realized her mistake when locals told her “hola” instead of “hello.” Pancho hurriedly took off, avoiding a confrontation with authorities that had delayed Haizlip. Upon arrival, Pancho painted “Mexico or Bust” on the side of her plane.
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Phoebe was still leading in the light plane division, running about two hours behind Thaden, who had been consistently ahead in the heavy plane class.

Everyone arrived safely at Phoenix except Marvel Crosson. She had not been seen since the group took off from Yuma. Rumor had it that she had crashed in the desert, but search parties had found nothing. The women met to comfort one another and reassure one another that Marvel, no matter what happened, would want them to go on. Thaden was philosophical.

If your time has come to go, it is a glorious way in which to pass over. Smell of burning oil, the feel of strength and power beneath our hands. So quick has been the transition from life to death there must still linger in your mind's eye the everlasting beauty and joy of flight …. We women pilots were blazing a new trail. Each pioneering effort must bow to death. There has never been nor will there ever be progress without sacrifice of human life. … To us the successful completion of the derby was of more import than life or death.
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The women took off for Douglas, Arizona, the next day. The news of Crosson waited for them. Following the directions of witnesses who said they had seen the plane go into a tailspin, diving earthward from about 1,000 feet, and plunge into heavy cottonwood growth along the Gila River, searchers found Marvel's body in a boulder-strewn ravine at daybreak. They carried the body out of the remote area north of Wellton, Arizona, on horseback. The badly broken body was found about 300 feet from her smashed plane, around her was draped a parachute that had not opened.
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The news of Crosson's death, along with charges of sabotage by Fahy and Rasche, and the two incidents of oil being put in fuel tanks early in the race, prompted a series of investigations, focused mainly on the security of the planes at San Bernardino and to a lesser extent, Clover Field. The report issued by the district attorney at San Bernardino two days later said that the investigations failed to disclose any foundation for the sabotage charges. They found that the planes had been adequately guarded from suspicious characters or overly curious crowds and that Rasche's telegram had been proven spurious. Someone from Moth Aircraft, the maker of Rasche's ship, found no evidence of tampering and attributed the contaminants to a recently replaced fuel line.
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J. W. Noel, an inspector for the Federal Department of Commerce who investigated Crosson's crash, also found no evidence of tampering. It was his opinion that she fell ill due to the desert
heat and lost control of her ship. She may have tried to jump but had insufficient altitude to open her parachute.
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