Monday, August 26, 2019

Lex Anteinternet: August 25, 1919. Ely to Pinto House, Nevada with ...

Lex Anteinternet: August 25, 1919. Ely to Pinto House, Nevada with ...Other soldiers, much further south, had come back across the border.  The most significant US incursion into Mexico since the Punitive Expedition had come to an end.





As with the last, this incursion had featured the use of aircraft fairly extensively.  In this case, the press was reporting that aircraft had proven decisive by resulting in the deaths from a strafing run by U.S. planes.  The expedition had also started, of course, due to aircraft when U.S. airmen had been held hostage by Mexican bandits.



Also occurring on this day was another significant aircraft related event.  The predecessor to British Airways, Aircraft Transport & Travel Ltd., commenced the first regularly scheduled commercial channel hopping flight.  That early ride between London and Paris must have been a bit frightening to the passengers, but clearly pointed the direction of the future.





The flight was made in an Airco DH16, an plane that was converted from the wartime DH9.  It could hold four passengers.

Monday, August 19, 2019

Lex Anteinternet: August 19, 1919. Trouble on the road and a big we...

Lex Anteinternet: August 19, 1919. Trouble on the road and a big we...:



August 19, 1919. Trouble on the road and a big welcome in Salt Lake City, Trouble on the Border.

Salt Lake City in 1908.

While plagued with mechanical troubles, the Motor Transport Convoy made good time, doing 73 miles from Ogden to Salt Lake City in 8.25 hours.  Upon arrival, the command was treated to a parade attended by dignitaries.



The large celebratory nature of the arrival reflects the fact that upon arriving in Salt Lake the command had arrived at the first substantial city since leaving Cheyenne in eastern Wyoming, or perhaps even since leaving Omaha in eastern Nebraska.  They were arriving toward the end of their trek and while perhaps the worst was yet to come, getting to Salt Lake was a major accomplishment.

While the arrival of the Motor Transport Convoy was obviously a big even in Salt Lake and elsewhere, the big news on that day is that American troops were back in Mexico.


The occasion had been the holding for ransom of two American military aviators. A portion of the ransom had been paid and then the 8th Cavalry crossed the border at Marfa in pursuit of the Mexican bandits.




Perhaps somewhat ironically, on the same day the U.S. re-adopted the briefly adopted star roundel for its aircraft.  It had done this early in World War One but abandoned it in favor of one more closely resembling the device used by the British and the French, which made sense at the time.  Now it re-adopted its earlier insignia, just in time for the aviators to join the pursuit of their own captors in support of the 8th Cavalry, although the insignia used by those aircraft is unknown to us.



Wednesday, July 24, 2019

Lex Anteinternet: Thursday, July 24, 1919. A "Quiet and uneventful ...

Lex Anteinternet: Thursday, July 24, 1919. A "Quiet and uneventful ...:

Thursday, July 24, 1919. A "Quiet and uneventful day" on the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy, Cedar Rapids to Marshallltown, Iowa. 75 miles in 9.5 hours. The Round The Rim flight takes off from Washington D.C. National Association of Negro Musicians meets in Chicago..

A typical day for the Motor Transport Convoy.

Breakdowns, rescues by the Militor, lunch and with the Red Cross.  The Knights of Columbus, in this instance, provided refreshments and dinner at Marshalltown, Iowa.



A "Quiet and uneventful day".



The Knights of Columbus were one of the many U.S. service organizations that responded to World War One.  As we addressed earlier, an organization like the USO didn't exist during the Great War, and service organizations filled that roll instead.  The war was now over, of course, but many of them were still acting in that role as mobilization wound down, and of course they would have responded to events like this in any event.  The KoC is a Catholic service organization.


It wasn't as quiet at Bolling Field at Washington D.C. where the U.S. Army commenced a second transcontinental expedition, this time by air.





A single Martin GMB bomber with five crewmen took off to circumnavigate the rim of the U.S. border, counter clockwise in what was billed the Round the Rim Flight.



The country had been crossed by air before, as indeed the country had been driven across before, but a giant flight around the periphery of the country was new.  That the air branch of the Army would commences this while the Army was driving across the center of the country is a bit of an odd coincidence, if it is.



The flight by a single aircraft was about 10,000 miles in length, and it took until November to complete.  Completion, we'd note, was a returning to Bolling Field.



Stealing thunder?  The Round The Rim Flight made the front page of the Casper paper.

The National Association of Negro Musicians commenced its first meeting in Chicago.  It's the nation's oldest organization of black musicians and had formed that prior May.



African Americans had a strong presence in American music since it became a thing of its own.  The Great Migration had brought, and was very much then bringing, African American musicians and forms of music north, and into the American mainstream at the time, with jazz and blues influenced musical forms very much on the rise.  That the conference was held in Chicago, a northern city, cannot be regarded as an accident.

Sunday, June 9, 2019

Ford Tri Motor, Natrona County International Airport





<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sdHayx1u-Lg" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>


<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ciD3__thTI4" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>


Friday, June 7, 2019

Civil Air Patrol Cessna 182T, Natrona County International Airport


This is a Cessna 182T that belongs to the Civil Air Patrol at the Natrona County International Airport.


To date, there's one other post on this blog about the Civil Air Patrol, featuring its aircraft from the 1940s, and noting:

The Civil Air Patrol is the official auxiliary of the United States Air Force.  Created during World War Two, it's original purpose was to harness the nations large fleet of small private aircraft for use in near shore anti submarine patrols.  The light aircraft, repainted in bright colors to allow for them to be easily spotted by other American aircraft, basically flew the Atlantic in patterns to look for surfaced submarines.  As submarines of that era operated on the surface routinely, this proved to be fairly effective and was greatly disruptive to the German naval effort off of the American coast. 
The CAP also flew some patrols along the Mexican border during the same period, although I've forgotten what the exact purpose of them was. Early in the war, there was quite a bit of concern about Mexico, given its problematic history during World War One, and given that the Mexican government was both radical and occasionally hostile to the United States. These fears abated fairly rapidly. 
The CAP still exists, with its post war mission having changed to search and rescue.  It also has a cadet branch that somewhat mirrors JrROTC.  Like JrROTC it has become considerably less martial over time, reflecting the views of boomer parents, who have generally wished, over time, to convert youthful organizations that were organized on military or quasi military lines into ones focusing on "citizenship" and "leadership"..


I didn't note in that earlier entry that eons ago, at the dawn of flight, I was a Civil Air Patrol cadet.  I did post a bit more about that here, on our companion blog:
I was in the Civil Air Patrol in the 1970s and at that time it was in fact very much like Air Force JrROTC.  Drill and Ceremony was a big deal with it, for example.  We wore Air Force uniforms and normally the fatigue version of that.  We focused on aircraft, of course, and on the CAP's mission of search and rescue.  Looking back it seems like I was in it for a long time, but in reality that simply reflects the concept of time possessed by youth.  I was in it while I was in junior high, three years. 
Looking back, and I can recall it only dimly, I probably thought when I joined it in 7th Grade, after learning about it at the junior high, of staying in it until I was in high school and could join JrROTC.  However, I enjoyed it in its own right.  For reasons I can't really recall, once I was of high school age I dropped my membership entirely.  Once I walked in the door of NCHS, I didn't walk back in the door of the CAP Wing's building here.  I couldn't tell you why, I just didn't. 
CAP still has a youth wing but I don't know anything about it.  It appears to be focused on aircraft still, of course, but also on "leadership", something a lot of youth organizations focus on.  If it resembles the old organization much, I wouldn't know.  It's still around, but how popular it is I don't know.  I don't know of any kids that I know being in it, but here the opposite is true as compared to the Scouts.  I'm often quite surprised by how many people I'll run into that were in the CAP as teens.  I know that two of my best friends were in it when was first in it, although they dropped out (just getting there was an ordeal for one who lived out in the country) and I know adults here and there that were.  Just the other day the Byzantine Catholic priest from the Catholic Stuff You Should Know podcast mentioned having been a CAP cadet.
One thing I'd note is, at least appearance wise, the CAP Cessna here is a much nicer looking aircraft that anything the CAP had locally when I was in it as a kid.  Indeed, for the most part the CAP simply relied upon the private aircraft the adult members had.