Chapter 1: ►

“_A Modern-Day Lindbergh_”

A misty rain, typical of Seattle in the spring, fell across the lush green campus of the University of Washington that afternoon. It was 1947. I don’t recall the exact date because that whole period of my life remains fixed in my mind as a steady, uninterrupted blur of work and study. I do remember that as I drove through the narrow streets setting apart the ivy-smothered Tudor-Gothic buildings, I proceeded with caution. My car was a veteran of many campaigns in Seattle weather and traffic. It was barely hanging together.

When I pulled into my special parking place behind the University’s wind tunnel, I was quietly angry. I had just come from an advanced class in aeronautical engineering under Professor Frank K. Kirsten, a brilliant but crotchety old martinet. He had devoted the lecture to a discourse on the jet engine, which, he held, had no future because its fuel consumption was too great. I had challenged his assertions and argued forcibly, concluding, with some heat, that other experts in aviation had made such dogmatic statements, only to have them later completely disproved. “Take Monteith,” I had said (actually quoting Kirsten). “He predicted the cantilever wing would not be practicable. Yet almost every airplane flying today has a cantilever wing.” In the aviation world, as anywhere, I concluded, everything is subject to change. We must believe this.

I walked through the power room to a door marked: “Chief Wind Tunnel Operator,” stashed my textbook and notes in a desk drawer, and then scanned the bulletin board. Posted over the tunnel’s Schedule-of-Operations sheet was a photograph of a smashed-up automobile, with “Guess Who?” scrawled underneath. It was an earlier car I owned, a veteran of several brief but devastating engagements. It occurred to me then, for the first time, that both my problem cars had been painted green. I recalled an old race-track superstition against green cars. That was the trouble, I was sure. Overdriving my car and its brakes in Seattle streets couldn’t be the reason, of course.

The wind tunnel of the University of Washington was one of the first--and finest--modern wind tunnels built in the United States. Many major aircraft companies, such as Boeing and McDonnell, contracted work to the tunnel. The tunnel tests and analyses were carried out by students under faculty supervision. I had worked in the tunnel part-time since returning to the University in the spring of 1946. We were then engaged in tests on the Boeing B-47 bomber. Many years later the plane, bought in vast quantity, would become the backbone of the Strategic Air Command, and a direct descendant, the Boeing 707, would become the first U. S. commercial jet airliner. In 1947 the plane’s concept--sharply swept cantilever wings, six jet engines slung on pods beneath the wing--was controversial and exciting.

I joined a fellow student, Joe Tymczyszyn, near the tunnel control panel and greeted him above the noise, the great rushing of wind, and the steady humming of electric generators. Through a glass port mounted on the bottom of the big wind tube, I could see a silvery model of the B-47 rigidly fixed on a pylon. Sensitive force-measuring devices supporting the pylon below the chamber showed the effects of the blast on a row of meters on the control panel. Tym photographed the meter readings every few moments on a special recorder. The panel was marked “Secret” since Boeing and the Air Force considered the data classified.

I plopped into a chair and lighted a cigarette. Then Tym and I fell into avid conversation on the topic that bound us as friends and co-workers: aviation. Tym had a wide acquaintance in aviation. He always had some bit of gossip or vital news to impart.

“Did you hear about Slick Goodlin?” he began. “They say he’s reluctant to fly the X-1.” Slick was a Bell Aircraft test pilot. The X-1 was then the sensation of the aviation world--a tiny, bullet-shaped craft fitted with a rocket engine. It was built for research purposes, to provide high-speed flight data so that we, and others in aviation, could get information we then could not get from wind tunnels. In those days, when we pumped air through a tunnel close to the speed of sound, strange things happened. The air “choked” and the flow was distorted. As a result, most wind-tunnel data near the speed of sound were suspect at a time when they were vitally needed. The X-1 had sufficient power to fly faster than the speed of sound.

“He’s reluctant to fly it?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Tym said. “They say he wants a lot more money.”

Few could blame him. The rocket engine of the X-1, a complex device which burned a fuel combination almost as explosive as dynamite, had never been flown wide open. Engineers were split about fifty-fifty over what would happen structurally when the X-1 reached the speed of sound. Some said the plane would disintegrate; others, especially engineers at Bell, said it would not. In any case, it might be a risky flight. But the rewards, other than money, would be great.

“Hell,” I said. “The man who flies that plane through the sonic barrier will be a modern-day Lindbergh.” Tym nodded agreement and returned to his log.

For the rest of the afternoon I was busy putting together the data from the wind-tunnel meters. But my mind was fixed on the X-1 and I let my imagination soar. For a test pilot, the X-1 was the absolute ultimate. There was nothing like it in the past; it would be years before anything else surpassed it. I was still thinking about the plane when I got home that evening. Before dinner, when my wife, Alice, and I sat down for our usual martini, I was lost in thought.

“What’s eating you?” she asked. Alice is a native of Seattle. Like many people from that part of the country, typical of Norwegian descent, she is usually quiet and straight to the point. After four years of marriage she had come to terms with my obsession for aviation and rarely questioned either my progress or my mood. I didn’t encourage it.

“Oh, nothing,” I said.

I was mentally composing a letter I intended to write to Bell Aircraft proposing that I be named the new test pilot of the X-1. After dinner, while Alice was washing the dishes, I sat down to my battered portable typewriter and carefully pecked out the letter, stressing my qualifications:

Age: 26. Flying time: 2500 hours, single-engine, World War II Navy instructor and fighter pilot. Special flying: lead pilot, Seattle Naval Reserve stunt team (which could be matched against any stunt team in the country, I added). Education--prewar: three quarters, University of Washington, basic freshman engineering. Postwar: five semesters, aeronautical engineering (aimed at a Master’s degree). Practical experience: prewar, production expediter, Boeing plant, Seattle; postwar, partner in aircraft accessories firm (ash trays; serving tables); University of Washington wind tunnel. Temperament: reliable, family-man type; even disposition, cool in emergencies. Salary? I would fly the X-1 for nothing, if necessary.

It occurred to me, as I reflected over this letter, that anyone outside the aviation world would have viewed this brief summary of my life as the work of a single-minded zealot. This was not precisely so. My interests ranged wide enough--from philosophy to farming. Yet it was a fact that, since boyhood, almost every waking moment had been devoted, directly or indirectly, to the single purpose of scoring a mark in the aviation world. It was not a spectacular record I sought--a round-the-world flight, a speed dash, or a new altitude. Mine was a more serious bent. I wanted to follow in the footsteps of the aviation giants: Boeing’s Edward (“Eddie”) Allen and the Air Force’s James H. (“Jimmy”) Doolittle, and the like. They were both serious scientists and superb pilots, a rare combination and, in these days of specialization, a rapidly disappearing breed. More specifically, my goal was to participate in the design and construction of the most advanced craft man could conceive and then take it into the air and fly it.

This may strike many as a heady ambition for so young a man. It never seemed that way to me. On this earth, at least, I believe man is master of his own fate. Within his God-given physical and mental limitations, he can do what he wants to do. I believe the secret is to work intelligently, economically, and steadily toward a set goal. I must have been about six years old when I made up my mind what I wanted. Shortly after that, I was struck by a disease that kept me bed-ridden, off and on, for almost five years. As a result, I was told I would never fly. My mind shut out these predictions and stubbornly plotted the future. There are many hurdles along the way. I am scaling them, one way or another. Anyone with determination can do the same, I think.

That night when I drafted the letter to Bell I was still far from completing what I believed to be an adequate foundation. For one thing, my education, interrupted by the war, was considerably short of my design. Yet I must admit that at heart I am also a gambler. If I were lucky enough, I knew, the X-1 could catapult me directly toward the very position I sought. The advanced education could come later, with experience. Besides, who could resist the temptation to fly the X-1, if there was a chance?

Bell must have received many such letters from adventurous pilots. I imagine they were all passed on to the public relations department and from there to a handy waste-paper basket. I never received a reply. Unknown to me, and to others who may have written, the Air Force had already picked Goodlin’s replacement. Shortly after I mailed my application, I read in the papers that Air Force Captain Charles Yeager was assigned the job. In October, 1947, he flew the X-1 through the sonic barrier with ease--and overnight became the new Lindbergh of the aviation world.

I felt not the slightest tinge of envy over Yeager’s feat. On reflection I considered it just as well that my letter had not been answered. My time had obviously not come. Not for one minute, however, did I doubt that it would. I buckled down at the University, working doggedly toward my Master’s degree. I supplemented my meager G.I. stipend with the small returns from the aircraft accessories business and my work in the wind tunnel, where, in time, I was named student boss of operations. I kept my flying sharply honed in exercises with my Naval Reserve unit. So as not to tempt fate further on the streets, I painted my battered car bright blue with gratifying results.