Posted inAviation Daily News Travelers' Tales

World Flight Flagship Wins Place as Smithsonian Exhibit

Douglas World Cruiser "Chicago" (Photo: Smithsonian Air & Space Museum)
Douglas World Cruiser “Chicago”, (A19250008000), on display in the Barron Hilton Pioneers of Flight Gallery, National Air and Space Museum, Washington, DC. (Smithsonian Photo by Eric Long) [_T8A3778] [NASM2020-07130]

The Douglas world cruiser Chicago, flagship of the Army Air Service world flight, which has been sitting in a hangar at McCook Field. Dayton, Ohio, since last November, awaiting final disposition, will be placed in the aircraft building of the Smithsonian Institution in a short time, it was announced today by the War Department.

The decision to bring the Chicago here was made final by Acting Secretary of War Dwight F. Davis, who wrote Dr. Charles D. Walcott, secretary of the institution, yesterday that he had instructed the chief of Air Service “to take the necessary steps to have the Chicago brought to Washington and turned over to you. for the purpose of placing it in the exhibit of the Smithsonian Institution.”

At the Army Air Service it was said the Supply Division already had received instructions to prepare the Chicago for shipment to Washington by rail. The suggestion had been made that Capt. Lowell H. Smith, leader of the flight and pilot of the plane, fly it to Washington, but the Air Service did not wish to take the risk with such a historic and famous plane. Its exposure to all sorts of weather and salt water on the globe flight may have caused a structural weakness in some isolated place, which, it was argued, might fall when the plane was off the ground.

Posted inAviation Daily News

New York — Chicago Air Mail On Dawn-To-Dark Schedule Is Reality

East and Westbound Mails Delivered This Morning by Planes Arriving In Nation’s Largest Cities.

1924 postal service map showing the air mail route across the US, starting in New York City, to Chicago, Cheyenne, and ending in San Francisco.

NEW YORK, July 2.—(Associated Press.)—Dark-to-dawn air mail service between America’s two greatest cities became a reality today. Cleaving the night along a beacon lighted highway the government’s mail planes transferred letters to and from New York and Chicago between the close of one business day and the opening of the next. Two eastbound air couriers, aided by a stiff wind bettered their schedule of 8 hours and 15 minutes—in one case by two hours. The same wind held back the westbound planes. One completed its assignment in a little more than the allotted time. Accidents to the other emphasized the differences the airmen nightly must overcome.

Posted inAviation Maritime & Naval History

Navy Perfects New Gun For Air Defense

WASHINGTON—Announcement that the navy had perfected a five inch anti-aircraft gun which, in practice, has proved far superior to the three-inch guns now in use, was made at the navy department. No battleships have yet been equipped with the new arm, but plans are under way for installing the new guns together with improved fire control on the battleship Maryland this summer, when she is docked for overhaul.

Posted inAviation Daily News

Seeking U. S. Help for Graf Pole Hop

Dr. Walter Bleistein Coming Here to Enlist Aid of Federal Government.

Co-operation of the United States Government and American scientific organizations in a proposed Arctic expedition of the German dirigible Graf Zeppelin will be sought here this week by Dr. Walter Bleistein. secretary and treasurer of the Aero-Arctic Society, who arrived In this country from Europe recently. Dr. Bleistein probably will arrive in this city tomorrow and will remain here two or three weeks, it is expected.

Dr. Bleistein will request the assistance of the War Department, Navy Department and Weather Bureau in arranging the details of the expedition, in setting up fueling and servicing depots and in maintaining communications and weather forecasting services while the big dirigible is in flight over the areas mapped for exploration. The scientific party aboard the Graf Zeppelin probably will be headed by Fridtjof Nansen, noted Arctic explorer. The Graf Zeppelin is to leave Friedrichshafen, Germany, its home base, some time in April, according to present plans, and proceed to Tromsoe, Norway, where a mooring mast has been erected.

Posted inAviation Daily News Maritime & Naval History

Frisco People Get Glimpse of Ship Shenandoah

The Shenandoah over the California coast at San Francisco.

San Francisco, Oct. 20—The dirigible Shenandoah arrived over San Francisco at 3:05 P. M., today and sailed over the business section for a half hour. As far as the city was concerned, she was first spoken off Point Bonita, six miles to the north, at 2:40 P. M., for an hour before the great envelope, steel grey against the sky, could be seen by thousands of eager watchers on the roofs of buildings and in the streets.

Posted inAviation Daily News

ZR-3 Changes Course to Head for Newfoundland

Zeppelin landing at Lakehurst, NJ

Giant Dirigible Takes Northerly Path to Avoid Storms—Speeds Along at 75-Mile Rate

By United Press

WASHINGTON, Oct. 14.—Her wireless crackling out cheering that all aboard are well, at least three of her four motors roaring rymthically and speeding her towards her goal, the Zeppelin ZR-3 with four Americans and twenty-eight Germans, officers and men, was drawing near the United States today.

“We are headed directly for Newfoundland, making seventy-five nautical miles per hour. All our crew are well and the engines are in perfect condition.”

Shortly after 1 p. m. today the above message was relayed to the United Press from the Zeppelin ZR-3 by the Radio Corporation of America’s station at Chatham, Mass.