Roaring Twenties

Aviation in the 1920s: From Barnstorming to Lindbergh

The 1920s were the decade in which aviation — that unlikely offspring of bicycles and canvas — went from a postwar curiosity to a tool of commerce, a symbol of national pride, and a new field of human possibility. The decade opened with barnstormers performing stunts in surplus Curtiss JN-4 “Jenny” trainers, and closed with Charles Lindbergh as the most famous man on the planet. In between came the birth of the commercial airline industry, the first airmail routes, the founding of the air corps, the first female pilots, and the establishment of the federal regulatory framework that would govern the field for decades.

For the barnstormers and the air-show culture, For the defining moment of the decade, For the women who broke the gender barrier in the sky,

The Postwar Surplus and the Barnstormers

When World War I ended in November 1918, the United States military had thousands of training aircraft on hand, mostly the Curtiss JN-4 “Jenny” — a two-seat biplane that had been used to train the American pilot corps. The government sold the surplus planes at fire-sale prices (sometimes as low as $200) and discharged the pilots, many of whom were eager to keep flying. The result was a wave of barnstormers — civilian pilots who flew from town to town, performing stunts, offering rides, selling rides, and giving Americans their first close-up look at the airplane.

The barnstormers were the 1920s’ most colorful technological figures. They performed at county fairs, set up “flying circuses,” did wing-walking, parachute jumps, and airplane-to-airplane transfers. Some of the most famous included “Lucky Bob” (one of many pilots so called), De Lloyd Thompson, and Clyde “Upside-Down” Pangborn. The most spectacular stunt was the plane change — a transfer from one airplane to another, mid-flight, often at low altitude. The 1920s also saw the first skywriting, the first aerial refueling, and the first aerial crop-dusting (in 1921, the first known aerial application of an insecticide was made in Ohio).

The barnstormers were also the aviation industry’s first salesmen. The $5 joyride gave ordinary Americans a chance to experience flight, and the romance of the air attracted millions of young people to the new field. The “air-minded” 1920s saw a wave of airplane clubs, air meets, and airmail stamp collecting. For the wildest years of the barnstorming era,

Airmail: The First Practical Use of Aviation

The first practical peacetime use of aviation was airmail. The U.S. Post Office began experimenting with airmail service in 1911, but the first regular scheduled airmail service began on May 15, 1918, between New York and Washington, with Army Lieutenant George Boyle piloting the first northbound flight. The service was operated by the Army until 1924, when the Post Office took over.

The establishment of transcontinental airmail was the major milestone of the early 1920s. The route was completed in stages: New York to Chicago (1918), Chicago to Cheyenne (1920), Cheyenne to Salt Lake City (1921), and the full transcontinental route on September 8, 1920. The full coast-to-coast service operated regularly by 1924. Airmail was a significant improvement over the railroad mail, cutting coast-to-coast delivery time from days to about 30 hours, and the routes served as the operational backbone for the new airline industry.

The Air Mail Act of 1925 (also called the Kelly Act, after its sponsor, Representative Clyde Kelly) was the legislative turning point. It authorized the Postmaster General to contract with private airlines to carry the mail, providing a revenue stream that made commercial aviation financially viable. The first contract airmail carriers were Varney Air Lines (1926, the first scheduled airline in the United States), Western Air Express (1925, which merged into later carriers), and Boeing Air Transport (1927). The major American airlines of the late 1920s all started as airmail contractors.

The full story of airmail and the early airlines is told in barnstorming and air shows and the related cluster pages.

The Birth of the Airlines

The 1920s saw the founding of the major American airlines, all of them growing out of airmail contracts:

The other major airline of the interwar period, American Airlines, was formed in 1930 by the consolidation of more than 80 small carriers under the Aviation Corporation (AVCO), with C.R. Smith eventually becoming its president in 1934.

The first decade of the airline industry saw enormous expansion. From 1926 to 1930, the number of passengers carried by U.S. airlines grew from a few thousand to more than 400,000 per year. The number of miles flown commercially grew even faster. The industry was small in absolute terms, but it was growing rapidly and was laying the foundations for the post-World War II boom.

The Auto Industry Enters Aviation

The automobile industry saw the potential of aviation early and entered the field. The most important entry was the Ford Motor Company, which acquired the Stout Metal Airplane Company in 1925 and began production of the Ford Trimotor (the famous “Tin Goose”) in 1926. The Trimotor was a high-wing, three-engine, all-metal monoplane, the first successful American airliner, and the standard of the early airline industry. American Airways, Pan American, and many smaller carriers used Trimotors in the late 1920s and 1930s. The Trimotor’s corrugated metal skin and distinctive appearance made it the most recognizable airliner of the era.

Ford also built the Ford Airport in Dearborn, Michigan, which opened in 1924 as the first major airport in the country. The airport, which was the model for the modern commercial airport, was the site of the first regularly scheduled airline flights and the testing ground for the Trimotor. Ford’s vision was of a network of small airfields serving the public, with a personal airplane in every garage — a vision that did not materialize in the 1920s but that became the basis for the postwar general aviation industry.

Other automobile and engine companies entered aviation. General Motors produced aircraft engines through its various subsidiaries. Curtiss-Wright, the successor to the Wright brothers’ company, was the dominant American aircraft engine maker. Pratt & Whitney, founded in 1925, would become the leading producer of air-cooled aircraft engines. The aviation industry in the 1920s was, in many ways, an offshoot of the auto industry, and the same people and companies that had motorized America were now mechanizing the sky.

The Lindbergh Boom and the Year 1927

The single most important event of 1920s aviation was Charles Lindbergh’s solo nonstop transatlantic flight on May 20–21, 1927 — the first solo crossing of the Atlantic — which made him the most famous man in the world overnight. The full story is in Lindbergh’s Transatlantic Flight: The 1927 Solo Crossing.

The Pioneers of Women’s Aviation

The 1920s also saw the entry of women into aviation. The most important figures were:

The 1920s women pilots were pioneers in a still-masculine field, and their achievements were widely celebrated, though they remained a small minority in the industry.

The National Air Races

The most important annual aviation event of the 1920s was the National Air Races, held each year from 1920 to 1949 (with some interruptions). The races were organized by the National Aeronautic Association and sponsored by the Pulitzer family (the Pulitzer Trophy was the prize for the fastest race). The races were held in different cities each year, often drawing hundreds of thousands of spectators. The most famous pilots of the 1920s, including Jimmy Doolittle (later the Tokyo raider), Cecil Allan, and Al Williams, competed in the races, and the speed records were tracked obsessively by the press. The races were a major stimulus to the development of faster, more reliable aircraft.

Regulation: The Air Commerce Act of 1926

The federal government began regulating aviation in 1926 with the passage of the Air Commerce Act, which gave the Department of Commerce the authority to license pilots, certify aircraft, establish air routes, and provide navigational aids. The act was, in effect, the federal government’s recognition that aviation was now a major industry requiring federal regulation. The Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Aeronautics, William P. MacCracken Jr., was the chief federal regulator; his office would become the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) in 1940. The 1926 act set the framework for the federal regulation of aviation for decades.

The 1926 act was followed by a series of more specific regulations. The Air Traffic Rules were established in 1927. The federal government built the first airway beacons (the rotating beacons that defined the lighted airway system) in 1923, and the network grew rapidly. By 1930, the lighted airway system covered the major transcontinental routes.

The Army Air Corps

The 1920s saw the evolution of American military aviation. The Army Air Service, the immediate postwar successor to the World War I air arm, was reorganized in 1926 as the U.S. Army Air Corps, the predecessor of the U.S. Army Air Forces and eventually the U.S. Air Force (founded 1947). The Army Air Corps was led by General Mason Patrick and later by General James Fechet and General Oscar Westover, and its mission in the 1920s was to develop long-range bombers and to maintain a cadre of trained pilots.

The Army Air Corps’s most important test came in 1924, with the first aerial circumnavigation of the globe (actually 26,000 miles in 175 days, with numerous stops). The achievement demonstrated the potential of long-range flight, and the aircraft and techniques developed in the flight became the basis of the Army’s air power in the 1930s.

The 1927–1929 Boom

The Lindbergh flight of May 1927 triggered a wave of public interest, investment, and participation in aviation. The number of licensed pilots in the United States grew from about 6,000 in 1927 to about 18,000 in 1929. The number of aircraft manufacturers grew from about 50 to about 220. The number of airports grew from about 600 to about 1,500. The airlines’ passenger counts grew from a few thousand per year to several hundred thousand. The “aviation craze” of 1927–29 was, in some ways, the 1920s’ last great boom — and it was cut short, like everything else, by the Wall Street Crash of October 1929 and the Great Depression that followed.

The Aviation Industry in 1930

By 1930, aviation was a real industry and a real technology. The airlines were operating scheduled service on the major routes. The military had a significant air arm. The federal government regulated the field. Air shows and races drew hundreds of thousands. Women were flying. The passenger plane of the future was in design. And Charles Lindbergh, who had been a poor airmail pilot six years earlier, was the most famous man in the world. Aviation had come of age in the 1920s, and the foundation laid in the decade would support the field for the rest of the century.

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