Walking on Air (2 page)

Aviatrix Ruth Law had been front-page news since she executed thirty-five consecutive loop-the-loops in her open Curtiss Headless Pusher aeroplane over Lake Michigan in September 1916. Law made this plane famous, and it became the most widely used exhibition plane between 1909 and World War I. The pilot sat on a seat in the open-air forward of the wings, feet planted on rudders and gripping two “sticks”; the engine was mounted behind the wings. Built of wood and bamboo with flight surfaces of varnished linen, the plane was stable and maneuverable but expensive: in 1911 a complete Pusher delivered from the factory in Hammondsport, New York, cost between $4,500 and $6,000 (the equivalent of over $100,000 today).
¹⁷

In 1916, Law set distance and speed records in a flight from Chicago to New York, landing at Hornell, New York, 590 miles nonstop from Chicago. She took on minimal fuel to complete her journey to New York City. As her engine faltered from lack of gas over Harlem, she rocked the plane to splash fuel into the carburetor, and landed completely dry in a precision dead-stick landing on Governor's Island.
¹⁸
Her spectacular show in New York that December captured the front pages again. As President Wilson, aboard his yacht
Mayflower
in New York harbor, touched a button to light up the Statue of Liberty, Ruth Law flew out of the darkness carrying magnesium flares on her wingtips and an electric sign spelling “Liberty” on her plane's lower wing.
¹⁹
By 1917, she had established herself as America's premier female flier, holding records for flying continuous loops, cart-wheeling her plane wing over wing, flying upside down for a mile and a half, and flying to an altitude of 11,200 feet.
²⁰

Before the United States was officially involved in the war, Law went to Europe, flew with French aviators, reported back about the front, and demonstrated “the latest flying tactics in the great war” at county fairs.
²¹
She enlisted in the U.S. Aviation Corps, eager to fly combat missions; the military authorized her to wear a uniform but denied her permission to fly in combat. Instead she served as a recruiting officer, dressed in the smart khaki uniform they permitted: a visored cap, regulation breeches and puttees, with her khaki collar ornamented with bronze eagles. She predicted that sooner or later Uncle Sam would come to his senses and make use of women in the army aviation service before the war ended.
²²
Failing to go to battle, Law engaged in “bombing” the midwestern states with pleas to buy liberty bonds.
²³
Her frustrated cry to “Let Women Fly!” was published in
Air Travel
and repeated in many newspapers. Her achievements reflected glory on all American women, noted an article entitled “Ruth Law, Hailed as New Superwoman, Destined to Lead Her Sex to Achievement.” She was proving to all the world that “being a woman is not a handicap, that, after all, women can do anything.”
²⁴

Before the war was over, Law had established a flying circus and began signing state fair contracts for shows throughout the Midwest. These featured all her tricks including automobile-to-plane transfers, aerobatic stunts, flying through fireworks, wing-walking, and illuminated night flying. Her shows were well-staged extravaganzas and enormously popular.
²⁵
Indeed, on the very eve of President Wilson's visit, the
St. Paul Pioneer Press
described an event at nearby White Bear, where Lt. Ray Miller, flying
a Curtiss Flying Boat called the “Sea Gull,” took a number of young women, described as “embryo Ruth Laws … for trips in the clouds.” Much to their apparent delight, Miller treated them to a full complement of stunts: loop-the-loop, the “falling leaf,” and Immelman spirals. The falling leaf required the aircraft to be stalled and forced into a spin; as soon as the spin began, the controls were reversed to force the spin in the opposite direction. The Immelman, also known as roll-off-the-top, is an ascending half-loop followed by a half-roll. These maneuvers were almost certain to inspire nausea in inexperienced fliers. Although none of them as yet had attempted to follow Law's career path, wrote the reporter, many were hoping for an airplane in their future.
²⁶

Phoebe clearly had the same dreams. The Saturday following the president's visit, she determined to go have a closer look at these marvelous machines. She took the trolley to the end of the line, then hiked a mile along a gravel road to reach the fence at the Curtiss Northwest Flying Field. There she beheld two JN4D biplanes, affectionately called “Jennys.” “What a joy they were to behold,” she later recalled, “so beautiful, so magnificent and so utterly unafraid.” Visiting this airfield became a ritual as the final year of her high school career unfolded. To her, “those two Jennys became living, breathing creatures, as animate as any pet I've ever owned.”
²⁷

Throughout the summer after graduation, she worked at a series of unsatisfying jobs, trying to earn money so she could “break into flying.” She worked as secretary at the Noiseless Typewriter Company, manager of the candy counter at the Emporium Department Store, stenographer at an insurance company. Daydreaming about flying was distracting so none of the jobs lasted very long. She lived for Sunday afternoons and her trips to the field. Every weekend she positioned herself closer and closer to the hangar, until by and by she stood by the gate, where she could see and hear the mechanics working. And once in awhile, she would thrill to “the heavenly call from the office to ‘roll her out.'” She stood there with her face pressed against the perimeter fence, watching pilots come out, trim the plane, twirl the prop, and take off. Despite her position close by, the men ignored her.
²⁸

After several months, Phoebe decided to venture inside. She had come to realize that the only way she could get the men to pay attention to her was to propose to buy an airplane.
²⁹
She entered the hangar, asked to see the president, and said she wanted to buy a Jenny. She thought such a declaration would, at the least, earn her a test flight, much like someone buying a car would take it for a test drive. At the most, it might afford her an opportunity to learn to fly. The manager, William Kidder, told her that they did
not teach flying, only sold airplanes. Their completely overhauled and refurbished war surplus Jennys cost $3,500 (the equivalent of $38,152 today).
³⁰
When she didn't flinch at the price, Kidder introduced her to a salesman. He took her out on the line, walked her around the huge machine, even let her climb in the cockpit for a look at the instrument panel. But when she asked for a demonstration flight, he told her that if she was interested in buying, he would take her up for $15, which would be deducted from the purchase price if she bought the plane. She didn't have the $15 but vowed to return.
³¹

After this close encounter with a Jenny, Phoebe was more determined than ever to find a way to own one. She had been reading all she could find about aviation. A few popular magazines carried stories about exhibition flying and the daring young men who did it. She followed the exploits of wing-walker Ormer Locklear, the first man to change planes in midair, who had been lured to Hollywood to perform the first car-to-plane transfer on film in
The Great Air Robbery
(1919).
³²
She read about Ruth Law and her spectacular exhibitions, and she read about Charles Hardin, who had invented a new kind of parachute he called the “Lifepack.”
³³
It was this last story that particularly caught her attention. Hardin lived just across the river in Minneapolis, and she vowed to investigate his invention further.
³⁴
Phoebe was a big fan of the Saturday serial,
The Perils of Pauline
, that featured a consistently victimized, but always triumphant, young woman.
³⁵
Thinking about it, she believed that about the only escape from peril that Pearl White, who played Pauline, had not yet employed was by parachute. So Phoebe hatched a plan. She would go to the film company, sell them on the idea of using her as a double for Pearl White in a parachute stunt, and earn enough money to buy that Jenny.
³⁶

Fox produced
The Perils of Pauline
, and Fox Film Corporation had an office in Minneapolis.
³⁷
Phoebe dropped by and proposed her bold plan for doing aviation stunts for the movies. What she did not know at the time was that the local manager, Mr. Weisfeldt, was simply a distributor and had neither clout nor contact with Hollywood. Nonetheless, apparently charmed by the young woman, he treated her kindly, asking if she could fly. No, but she was going to learn. Did she have a plane? No, but she was going to buy one. Had she ever jumped with a parachute? No, but she was going to. He told her that he thought she had a good idea and that when she was ready, she should come back and see him. To her, his remark was tantamount to a signed contract.
³⁸

Next she arranged to meet Charley Hardin at the airport. He arrived with a large canvas bag carrying what to her looked like soiled sheets. She
helped him spread the parachute on the grass to air and then refold. She talked with Hardin and his wife, Kathryn, whom Phoebe was pleased to find was not much larger than she. Kathryn had made numerous jumps at local fairs and carnivals. The Hardins provided some rudimentary instructions about how to use the shroud lines to spill a little air out of the canopy in order to control the parachute's direction of drift, and warned that spilling too much air would cause the canopy to collapse sending her plummeting to earth. Nonetheless, the Hardins assured her that parachute jumping was not at all dangerous if she was careful about packing her own chute.
³⁹

Hot-air balloonists commonly carried parachutes but the contraption was not popular with pilots. Chutes were bulky affairs, packed into large duffle bags that were affixed to the landing brace. Those wishing to use one, then, had to climb out of the plane, crawl beneath the fuselage and hang with one arm on the running gear as they fastened the chute onto their harness, jump free of the plane, and hope the pull of their falling bodies would open the chute. Given this state of the art, most pilots preferred to trust their ability to land a crippled plane rather than rely upon “a hunk of rag.”
⁴⁰
But Phoebe was enchanted with the idea of jumping and convinced by the Hardins that it was safe and fun. They agreed to make her a special chute trimmed with blue ribbon to reflect the Mechanic Arts High School colors.
⁴¹

Now, about the airplane. To date she had managed to save only $300. She needed $3,500 for the plane and $500 for the parachute. She tried to borrow money on the strength of her “contract” with Fox, despite the fact that it was, at best, a verbal expression of interest. Finally, she approached the bank of “Mom,” extolling the wonders of flying and the potential for huge profits from movie work and exhibition flying. Her mother agreed to loan her the money, but suggested they keep the deal secret from Dad, who might not be so receptive to the idea. The money had been painstakingly saved in anticipation of opening a new saloon.
⁴²
Mrs. Fairgrave's one stipulation, besides a strict repayment schedule, was that Phoebe interest her brother, Paul, in her endeavors. She would not allow her daughter to engage in such activity unchaperoned. This apparently was not an obstacle, as Paul immediately began learning to fly.
⁴³

On a cold January day in 1921, Phoebe took her stack of $20 and $50 travelers' checks to the Curtiss Northwest Company to purchase her plane. She was finally entitled to a ride. Excited and scared, bundled up in a borrowed fur-lined flying suit, sheepskin-lined boots, helmet, and goggles, she was boosted into “MY great big beautiful Jenny!” The pilot, Ray Miller, lifted
his thumb to a man standing in front of the propeller, and called, “contact.” “Contact,” the man replied, giving the propeller a couple of turns, then pulling it through. The engine started with a loud roar, the plane vibrating fiercely, making the needles in the instruments in front of her dance. Now that her dream of flight was finally happening, Phoebe's stomach lurched. Anyone who says “that he or she flew for the first time without fiddle-taut nerves” is lying, she later wrote. But once she left the ground, her nerves gave way to wonder. “The tiny toy farm buildings, their roofs bare against the frosted earth, looked like decorations on a giant wedding cake … It was such an exalted experience that I felt a bit overcome and lay my head back against the cowling. As I did my eyes were raised into the blue infinity of heaven. The sublimity and grandeur of the sky as seen far above the earth's dust and haze remains overpowering to behold, and I still find it difficult to breathe in the rapture of it all.”
⁴⁴

Her poetic reverie was soon shaken by Miller's aggressive, even sadistic, approach to flying. He startled her with a “quick, violent shake” of the controls, then signaled her with a circular motion of his hand. Not comprehending his message, she simply nodded and smiled to indicate that she was enjoying the ride. She soon learned what he meant. He dropped the nose into a steep power dive, then hauled back on the stick, going straight up. For a heart-stopping moment, the huge biplane hung in the air, then fell off to the left, spinning toward the earth. At the last moment, Miller pulled out of the spin, turned, and grinned at her. Then he suddenly flipped the plane upside down, flooding the carburetor and causing the engine to cough ominously. Once they were again right side up, Miller shouted to ask how she liked it. Not wanting to appear as frightened as she felt, she nodded vigorously, which he justly took as encouragement. He then proceeded to take her through a series of snap rolls, wingovers, and loops in rapid succession followed by a long tailspin. Her stomach pitched in time with the maneuvers, but she was determined not to show the slightest weakness. Once the plane was finally safely on the ground, Miller asked her how she liked the ride. She responded that it was great and that she'd be back for more.
⁴⁵