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Early Contributions to Aviation
Oral History Research Office
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| Seminar Introduction |
 | | Culver Pictures | | American aviator, James H. Doolittle. |
The US Postal Service's first regularly scheduled airmail service began in the spring of 1918, but mail delivery was unreliable because the flights were dependent on weather conditions and daytime visibility. As a result, the Postal Service began to install beacon lights along the transcontinental routes. Regular night service began in 1924, but pilots were still unable to navigate through inclement weather, so the Full Flight Laboratory was established to solve the problem of "fog flying." Aviation engineer Preston R. Basset, worked with famed aviator James H. Doolittle to develop blind-flying instruments that would allow both night-time and all-weather air travel, instruments that revolutionized the airmail and travel routes of the twentieth century. In this seminar, aviation expert Randy Johnson, explains why navigational instruments were necessary for the advancement of commercial aviation and describes the first successful blind flight, made by Doolittle just 11 years after airmail service began. Selected excerpts from interviews housed in the Aviation Project collection at Columbia University's Oral History Research Office offer first-hand accounts of this formative period for the aviation industry. These include Doolittle's reminiscences of the first blind flight; Basset's detailed account of the early beacon light system; and British aviator Sir Thomas Sopwith's description of the early military aircrafts and designs developed by the Sopwith Aviation Company throughout the first half of the twentieth century.
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| Learning Objectives |
- Define "flying blind" and identify its importance for airmail and travel routes.
- Identify several of the main contributions made by the American Full Flight Laboratory.
- Explore some of the early aviation designs developed by the British Sopwith Aviation Company during the first half of the twentieth century.
- Recognize the impact that beacon lights had on the early airmail system, and how navigational instruments resulted in all-weather travel along the transcontinental US airmail route.
- Explore Sopwith, Doolittle and Basset's intimate oral-history accounts of their contributions to the aviation industry.
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| Sessions |
| Session 1 | Flying Blind: A Brief History of Aviation Advancements, 1918-1930 |
| Session 2 | James Doolittle on "Flying Blind" |
| Session 3 | Beacon Lights: Preston R. Bassett and the US Airmail Route |
| Session 4 | Sir Thomas Sopwith on Britain's Early Aviation Models |
| Contributors |
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| Credits |
Copyright 2001 by The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York. Unabridged transcripts of the oral-history interviews with Preston R. Bassett, Sir Thomas Sopwith and James H. Doolittle, can be found in the Aviation Project collection of the Columbia University Oral History Research Office (http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/indiv/oral/).
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| Technical Requirements |
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