The Flight

by Dan Hampton

  Failing English, Lindbergh also ended the first semester on probation in mathematics and chemistry, yet he performed well enough in his other subjects. Surprisingly, given his social aloofness, he excelled in the Reserve Officer Training Corps as a field artillery cadet. Charles also ended the academic year as the top marksman on the nation’s university rifle team. He was known for consistently perfect scores and for shooting silver Liberty quarters out of a teammate’s fingers. Though he returned to school in the fall of 1921, Lindbergh was again considering life as a farmer if his scholastic situation didn’t improve. It did not.

  Recalling those times, he later stated, “Why should I continue studying to pass examinations to get into a life I didn’t want to lead—a life of factories, and drawing boards, and desks. . . . I know that civilized progress depends on education. Without it, I’d have had no motorcycle to ride, no tractor to run on our farm . . . why learn mathematics of the planets if we lose appreciation of the earth?”

  Already planning his escape from the drudgery of school, he’d been learning all he could about flying and flight schools. With his aptitude for drawing, Charles might have tried to formally study aeronautics, but he was realistic enough to dismiss the thought. Instead, throughout the fall of 1921 he applied to various flying programs hoping for a break and an optimistic end to a generally unhappy year. Academic woes aside, Charles’s family issues had not improved; C.A. and Evangeline were still estranged and his father was nearly broke.

  SINCE HIS SON entered college, the elder Lindbergh had lost thousands of dollars through bad decisions, poor investments, and unsecured loans. He’d lost his final bid for Congress in April 1920. The following year, as Charles was failing a second semester, C.A.’s redoubtable mother, by then called Louisa, who had survived immigration, the Sioux uprising of 1862, and more than thirty years of August Lindbergh, passed away. Combating deepening depression and trying desperately to recoup his financial losses, C.A. departed for Florida.

  Nearly a decade earlier, foreseeing the radical changes the automobile would have on America, an entrepreneur named Carl Graham Fisher had developed the Lincoln Highway, a 3,389-mile permanent, paved road connecting San Francisco to New York City. Based on that success he proposed building a “Dixie” Highway from Chicago to Miami, though it eventually extended as far north as Sault Saint Marie, on Michigan’s Canadian border. After it opened, Fisher decided to create a sun-drenched paradise at its southern terminus, which he named Miami Beach.*

  Thanks to the automobile and the Dixie Highway, Florida was no longer just an escape for the wealthy. Land prices shot up and there were rumors the state’s income and inheritance taxes would soon be repealed. An opportunistic C. A. Lindbergh sought to capitalize on Florida’s impending boom. Having little success he deeded land in Little Falls over to his wife and managed a fifty-dollars-a-month sustainment for his son. With no income and no credit from the banks, sixty-two-year-old C.A. had little else to offer to his family.

  In the wake of all this, Charles realized that his own future, for better or worse, would not be won at a university. After he failed three of five courses in the fall 1921 semester, his academic career officially ended. He’d been corresponding with several aviation schools during the fall semester and decided on the Lincoln Flying School, part of the Lincoln Standard Aircraft Company in Nebraska.† For five hundred dollars, Charles could spend a month in their factory learning aircraft design, maintenance, and the basics of flight. Arriving by motorcycle on April 1, 1922, he moved into the Hotel Savoy and spent the first week tearing down engines, modifying cockpits, and “doping” fuselages.*

  Eight days later, on April 9, the young man stood on the airfield, excited and focused. Fresh from the factory, a plane was being carefully assembled; wings were attached and riggers connected the rudder and ailerons. Mechanics tuned the 150-horsepower Hispano-Suiza engine, straining the fuel, then adding oil. It was a Lincoln Standard Tourabout, a 2,900-pound aircraft with wings a bit over 44 feet long. Left over from the war, the plane was ungainly and slow, but to Charles it looked beautiful.

  And why not? On that day, the company’s chief pilot, Otto Timm, was taking him up for his first flight, an adventure that would change his life forever. But that was all still far ahead and this fine Nebraska spring day was simply about a young man discovering his love of flying. Like almost all pilots he would never forget that thrilling first experience, and decades later it was still sharp in his memory.

  “Behind every movement, word, and detail,” he recalled fondly, “one felt the strength of life, the presence of death. There was pride in man’s conquest of the air. There was the realization that he took life in hand to fly.”

  THREE

  HOUR FIVE

  THE SUN BATHED the cockpit in bright white light, washing out the black instrument panel to gray and making the gauges difficult to see. It was also very warm. Slim unzipped his flying suit and pulled the halves apart, letting cooler air flow onto his chest. Made by A. G. Spalding, the heavy brown flight suit had faded to a khaki color but was still sturdy and intact. Built for warmth and utility, it was insulated with wool, and had a fur-lined collar and two big pockets handy for maps and food. Underneath he wore a light jacket over a white shirt and Army officer’s riding breeches. Teitzel-Jones & Dehner boots completed his ensemble and the only bit of color was Slim’s red-and-blue-striped regimental tie, purchased at the Scruggs-Vandervoort-Barney department store in St. Louis.

  Straightening his legs against the rudder pedals, Lindbergh yawned and tried to stretch out the cramps. I’m a little tired, he admitted. It would be pleasant to doze off for a few seconds. This was always the worst part, around the four- or five-hour point, before his muscles became accustomed to their unnatural, enforced positions. In a few more hours they’d conform to the seat and the aches would fade. Of course, he’d never flown a forty-hour flight before—so would he reach a point where his body began protesting again? Were there worse hours ahead?

  Too far off to worry about.

  Nearly two hundred miles past Cape Cod into the Gulf of Maine, Slim was truly out to sea for the first time in his life. He marveled at that since his previous over-water record flight had been thirty miles between Long Island and the Connecticut coast. That was an amusing thought, and no doubt after he reached Ireland the distance he was now flying would seem trivial. That was how to look at it, though; each piece of land was just another stepping-stone across the Atlantic. Despite the noise and blowing air the warm cockpit was making him drowsy. The constant humming vibration didn’t help and as his mind wandered Slim peered outside, hoping to see land.

  No land.

  He noticed mud splattered under the right wing. Hunching a bit to see from the other window he spotted another clump beneath the other wing. How much did the mud weigh? A few ounces, no more than that, yet those ounces would cost how much in fuel? It was more than 3,600 miles to Paris, so if the extra weight was, say, half a pound, then how much more gasoline would it cost to land New York mud in France? When he extended the periscope, how much drag did that generate and how much extra fuel to overcome it? The airspeed indicator showed no difference yet he knew there was. Even slight resistance was still resistance; everything cost something in fuel and distance. Why should he tear leaves from a notebook to save weight and then be weighed down by mud? Higher power settings to overcome these things meant more fuel burned. Was there enough?

  I’m half-asleep!

  Stop it.

  Slim stuck his hand out the left window, cupping the fingers and letting fresh air hit him in the face. Blinking hard and shaking his head Lindbergh knew he couldn’t afford this now, only a few hours into the flight. He should have slept during the past thirty-six hours but hadn’t been able to do it. Too many details, too many interruptions, and, to be honest, too much apprehension. I’ve let myself be caught off guard at a critical moment . . . a pilot must be fresh for the start of a record-breaking transoceanic flight.


  Well, this is one of the emergencies that fill a flying life. Wriggling in the seat, Lindbergh forces himself to look from the instruments, to the gauges, and then the horizon. Then back again. He retracts the periscope by sliding the lever sideways and then concentrates on the black panel. The throttle is set at 1,725 revolutions per minute which holds 104 miles per hour. Fuel is feeding from the right wing tank and Slim figures he’s burned about sixteen gallons after four hours of flying. So at 6.1 pounds per gallon the sixty-four consumed from the 450 at takeoff leaves Spirit . . . 391 pounds lighter.

  Reaching Nova Scotia on course is his first true test of navigation, so he focuses on the Mercator chart across his knees. The true course was 058 degrees, but that had been plotted on paper over a nice, flat desk back in San Diego, not on an aircraft compass. The problem was the earth itself; a solid iron core surrounded by molten metal, it acts as a giant magnet. A free-floating magnetized needle like the one in Lindbergh’s conventional compass theoretically points toward the magnetic concentration near the earth’s poles. Unfortunately, the metallic surfaces in and around the aircraft, like the steel tubing and engine block, interfere with the magnetic field. This “needle error,” or deviation, might be a degree or two, negligible for a quick jaunt, but potentially disastrous in the cumulative effects over the distance from New York to Paris.

  And since the Spirit had no line of sight to the pole, every piece of interference between the aircraft’s compass and magnetic north added error. The needle’s horizontal mounting also reacted inaccurately to the planet’s spherical shape and the lines of magnetism curving around it. This induced more error since the earth’s magnetic field isn’t horizontal except near the equator. Last, and most significant, the magnetic pole itself isn’t stationary. Like water in a bucket, the molten area around earth’s core “sloshes” as we spin, so the magnetic pole is usually at least 200 miles from the planet’s geographic pole.*

  The geographic pole, physically the “top of the world” on maps, is true north. At this point all geographical meridians, or lines of longitude, converge. This “true north” is used for cartography and charting, but magnetic north was essential for real-time navigation in 1927. Both must be understood for the plotting of accurate courses. Meridians, the vertical lines of longitude read on charts, are drawn between both poles. The angular difference between both parallel sets of lines is declination, and is expressed in degrees east or west on maps. This value is then added or subtracted to a magnetic course, and the result is a “true” heading corrected for magnetic errors.

  As Lindbergh approached Nova Scotia in May 1927, the declination was 20 degrees west, which he added to his plotted map course of 058 for a compass course of 078 degrees. This had to be corrected for the wind, which was blowing steadily from the northwest at 15 miles per hour and pushing the Spirit right, or southeast. Countering by crabbing left 10 degrees into the wind, Slim was able to hold the true compass heading of 068 degrees that would put him on course. More or less. At best, magnetic navigation could get a pilot, explorer, or ship captain fairly close, and then the destination could be pinpointed by landmarks—hopefully. A better method was needed and with this in mind the earth inductor compass was developed.

  Switching hands on the stick, Slim reaches down to the earth inductor compass dial mounted horizontally near his right thigh. The very latest in navigation technology, it had been installed personally by Pioneer Instrument’s Brice Goldsborough, and this 236-mile leg between Provincetown and Nova Scotia would reveal whether it truly worked. It looked like a conventional compass face: a controller dial marked at 10-degree increments with a large white numeral at each 30-degree point. A permanent line was etched from the middle of the dial to the top, where it met a small white triangle. Twiddling a little burled knob, Slim rotates the controller dial until his map course of 058 degrees is set beneath the triangle.

  Of course, this is uncorrected for deviation, inclination, or declination, but that is precisely the point. The earth inductor compass is independent of anything magnetic and derives its directional information by electricity. As the earth is a giant magnet, its lines of force run from pole to pole; that is, north to south. Whenever those lines are intersected an electric voltage is produced, and this can be indicated on a display. For the Spirit, a small generator mounted in the fuselage behind the pilot’s seat contains a coil and a pair of armature brushes. When the dial next to his thigh is rotated the brushes contact the coil at the desired angle, in this case 058 degrees, and voltage is produced.

  Now, when the coil is at a right angle to the pole it is not cutting magnetic lines of force at a measurable rate so no voltage is produced. The angle off the pole is displayed by an inner ring painted with gold numbers, zero through ninety, which indicate the aircraft’s offset from magnetic north. So if 90 degrees is directly off the pilot’s shoulder then the angle will decrease as the plane angles inward, and this is what Slim does. After dialing in 058, he continues banking slightly left until the zero on the inner yellow ring is firmly at the top of the dial. This tells him that he is holding the correct heading to remain perpendicular to the earth’s magnetic pole. With this and the magnetic compass he should be very close to his plotted course.

  And at 11:52 A.M., New York time, there it was–land!

  How accurately have I held my course? When flying low one sees only individual landmarks, gaining intimacy but losing perspective. Altitude will help locate his exact position, Slim knows, so he nudges the throttle forward and climbs to 1,000 feet. Walking the rudder pedals he yaws the Spirit from side to side to see from both windows. The charcoal-colored coastline up ahead is low and just flattens out gradually into the Gulf of Maine’s waters. Inland the land slopes upward, rising up into pine- and spruce-covered hills. He’s over the mouth of a medium-sized, north–south oriented bay. To his right is a small cape, with little gray houses dotting a curving, scalloped shoreline.* Under the left wing is a long, narrow spit of land forming the western edge of the bay. Peering through the open window, Slim realizes the end of the peninsula is actually an island, like the tip of a finger.†

  Squinting at the map, he matches printed lines against the land below and knows by its shape this can only be St. Mary’s Bay. His plotted course ran up the west side of the bay to the town of Digby, just six miles northwest of his landfall. Six miles! Slim leans back and stares out the window again. Relief envelops him, warm and relaxing. The relief only pilots and mariners feel when they find themselves exactly where they’d planned to be. Well, almost exactly. But six miles . . . it was close enough.

  Back in San Diego Slim had figured he could live with a 5 percent navigation error, say five miles off during each 100-mile segment. It was correctable. But six miles in the 230 or so since Massachusetts was about a 2 percent error. It was more than 2,000 miles from St. John’s in Newfoundland to Ireland, and with this level of navigational accuracy he’d be no more than 50 miles off course when he reached Ireland. Was it luck, or had he learned to navigate?

  Optimistic, Lindbergh wriggled down in the wicker seat and shifted his inflatable cushion a bit. This landfall had proven that penciled courses could bring him safely to land after hours over water. It proved that earth inductor and magnetic compasses could be used together with a higher degree of accuracy than previously believed. His instruments had worked; a course plotted in the California sun had brought him safely to Nova Scotia. Taking a swallow of water to celebrate, the pilot knew he’d also passed his second self-imposed line. The first had been actually making it off the ground alive at Roosevelt Field and the second was this, a successful landfall after two hours of open water. He had one more, the point of no return: halfway across the Atlantic, when Europe became closer than North America.

  But this was Nova Scotia!

  Below, the harsh terrain unrolled beneath the wings and he knew that the whole peninsula, plus Sable and Cape Breton islands, measured just 21,300 square miles, smaller than West Virginia. Named “New
Scotland,” the land had been colonized by the French in 1605 and they’d called it “Acadia.” The British conquered the land a century later and it became a shipbuilding center to serve the Royal Navy’s endless requirements for timber. The vast stretches of trees and lakes remind him of home. Like pieces of blue glass, thousands of ponds mirror the sky and hills rise ahead toward a mountain range. What amazing magic is carried in an airplane’s wings, he muses, looking out over the desolate, tree-covered landscape. New York at breakfast; Nova Scotia for lunch. There hasn’t been time enough between to prepare my mind and body for the difference, he realizes. Flying has torn apart the relationship between space and time; it uses our old clock but with new yardsticks.

  Adding more power, Slim angles toward a saddle along the ridgeline and switches to the nose fuel tank. He’d flown up the middle of the peninsula with the Bay of Fundy on his left and the Atlantic on the right. After an hour, the Spirit is in the center of the peninsula over Mount Uniacke. Halifax lay beyond the mountains under his right wing, and another hour northeast lay the Strait of Canso, separating Nova Scotia from Cape Breton Island. Beyond that was a 200-mile leg to Newfoundland. Strange how a few hundred miles over the ocean seems normal now.

  As Slim hangs up his canteen, wind suddenly catches his chart, lifting and fluttering it toward the open window. Startled, he jerks it back then tucks the chart firmly under his leg. What would he say to that? “On course, plenty of fuel, all readings normal, but the chart blew out the window.” That would truly be an embarrassing calamity, to be forced back in failure because of a sheet of paper. It had happened before, though. He’d lost a flight data card through the very same window during one of his California test flights. If the detachable windows were in place there would be no breeze in the cockpit. No, I’ll leave the windows in their rack, Slim decides. They’ll form a barrier between me and elements outside my plane. They’d interfere with the crystal clarity of communion with water, land, and sky.