Part 2

To return to Pilot Vance, who in December, 1923, was caught in a snowstorm between Reno and San Francisco: The flakes, large and fluffy like the breast feathers of a Canada goose, floated lazily to earth, entirely cutting off his view of the country below. Flying by compass and resorting to the tactics taught him by experience, Vance endeavored to climb above the storm. At 13,000 feet—two and a half miles—the tempest still was raging. Snow was falling thicker than ever. Vance realized that it would be pitch dark before he could reach Reno. With the chances ten to one that he would become lost in the snowstorm, and realizing that his gasoline supply was running low, Vance decided to come down.

Gliding earthward at a sharp angle until he was within a few hundred feet of the ground, the pilot discovered that he was in the vicinity of the Last Chance mine. Picking out as a landing place what he thought was a patch of low brush, the pilot steered his ship in that direction. As he flew low over this area, Vance congratulated himself on having such a level spot on which to land.

Skimming along the tops of the brush at sixty miles an hour, the ordinary landing speed of a De Haviland, Vance’s wheels finally touched the tips of the brush, cutting down the momentum of the big machine. Then, as Vance settled lower and lower, the plane was tripped like a roped steer. Brought up short in this way, the ship, with the heavy engine in the forward part of the fuselage, now turned on its back, and unceremoniously dumped Vance out on his head.

The pilot, entirely unhurt, found that he had landed in a big patch of manzanita brush, six feet high and heavy in proportion. Here he was, almost sixty miles from the nearest town—and the nights are cold along the Nevada-California line.

After learning that his landing gear, upper wings, and propeller had been damaged and that he could not hope to cut a path to freedom in the darkness, Vance decided to build a fire and camp near the machine. When he finally got the fire started, the pilot had only two matches left. This one fact indicates the close escape he had from freezing to death in the blizzard, or worst still, of becoming lost while fighting his way out of the manzanita brush in the darkness.

A less resourceful aviator might have wandered about until he died of exhaustion.

Vance lay awake all night feeding the fire with manzanita brush. He had landed about half a mile from the edge of the brush nearest the mine, instead of in the center of the patch. With the first ray of dawn Vance struck off toward the nearest edge of the brush, and within an hour had covered the half mile that separated him from freedom. At the mine, the surprised superintendent loaned him two mules, one to ride and the other to carry the 350 pounds of mail. One of the miners volunteered to ride out with him to bring back the mules. It was eighteen miles from the Last Chance mine to Michigan Bluff. This was covered on mule-back. There Vance caught a stage to Colfax, California—forty miles—where he put his mail aboard the eastbound Limited.

* * * * *

Returning from San Francisco, I stopped at Salt Lake, where Ellis and Bishop were stationed. Theirs is a story stranger than fiction, and it exemplifies the best traditions of the Air Mail Service.

Late in October, 1923, Bishop, one of the oldest pilots, in point of service, was caught in a blizzard forty-five miles south of Rock Springs, Wyoming, and forced down twenty-five miles from the nearest point of civilization and communication. The sky above the Sierra Nevada Mountains was thick and overcast, with the wind blowing at forty miles an hour. The thermometer registered 18°. Snow of the dry and powdery sort was falling heavily. Bishop could see less than a hundred yards, and could make no headway whatever against this typical Utah blizzard.

Concluding that it would be best to land on the route between Rock Springs and Salt Lake City, with which he was familiar, rather than to try to find his way through the storm, Bishop finally “sat down” on a comparatively smooth and—at that time—bare plateau, known as Bridger’s Bench. He landed without accident, and for approximately an hour kept his motor turning over slowly, in the hope that the storm would subside. By that time at least a foot of snow had fallen. Realizing that he must get out of his predicament immediately, if he expected to get out at all, Bishop began charging backward and forward with his powerful machine, in an attempt to clear a runway with the “backwash” from the propeller. For an hour he sent his plane at full speed over the top of the plateau, backward and forward for two hundred yards at a time, in an effort to clear a path ten feet wide. But each time he had finished digging a runway long enough, and turned around, the snow had drifted in, and the process had to be repeated all over again.

At the end of two hours snow covered the plateau to a depth of two feet. It now became more and more difficult to charge with his machine up and down the runway; but Bishop carried on. Perhaps the wind would cease, so that he could shovel a runway two hundred yards long and ten feet wide. Finally, however, after he had tried unsuccessfully for three hours to extricate his machine from the drifts; when snow had fallen to a depth of three feet and the powerful Liberty motor could not force the plane through the snow, Bishop climbed stiffly out of the cockpit, shook himself free of snow, drained off the water from the radiator, covered up the mail in the cockpit, and started walking in the general direction of the nearest settlement—Lyman, Wyoming.

Bishop was familiar with the country, having flown over it dozens of times, yet, being a careful and methodical pilot, he took the compass from the machine. He had no emergency rations. He had neither snowshoes nor rifle. He saw no game. There was no shelter within twenty miles that he knew of. If worst came to worst, however, he could still return to his machine and start a fire with his batteries and some gasoline.

The pilot was strongly tempted to lay aside his heavy fur-lined flying suit, but, as it seemed likely that he might have to use it for a blanket that night, he threw the legs of the suit over his shoulders, strapped them there in order to walk more freely, and floundered forth into the snow, now three feet deep.

Soon Bishop was wallowing in drifts higher than his waist. For hours he continued on, overheated by his exertions, and rapidly growing weaker with each stride. There was nothing from which to make snowshoes for his feet, even if he had had the tools and the time before darkness fell. The storm still howled about his ears and shut off the view ahead. But with his compass he kept a course toward a farmhouse which he knew nestled at the foot of a mountain some twenty miles to the westward.

For more than six hours Bishop, who was born on an Iowa farm and is sturdily built, staggered wearily along through the snowdrifts, traveling in that time about ten miles. At this critical juncture, half way between the ship, where he could at least have built a fire, and the farmhouse where he was sure to find warmth, food, and shelter, Bishop realized that his fast waning strength was not equal to the task of reaching the one or retreating to the other. He was becoming drowsy by this time, but he struggled onward, still carrying his heavy flying suit, for it seemed certain that he would be compelled to spend the night in the open. No one could possibly have seen him land, and certainly he, a mere speck against the spotless white, could not be discerned from the farmhouse, even with the aid of glasses. Besides, no one would expect even an Air Mail pilot to venture out in such a blizzard.

By resting at frequent intervals, this husky Iowan accomplished two more miles in as many hours. But now, after an eight-hour battle with the elements, the pilot had arrived at the stage where he was absolutely exhausted and almost in despair. How simple a solution of the problem, he thought, merely to lie down and go to sleep. Just then, however, he heard above the whistling of the wind the familiar drone of a Liberty motor. Glancing up, and almost unwilling to believe his eyes, the weary flier saw a plane directly above him. A miracle had happened. One of the boys, Bishop concluded, had learned by wireless that he was missing, and was now in search of him. The “shipwrecked” pilot frantically waved his heavy flying suit, but, despite his efforts, the plane passed a thousand feet above him, flying eastward, without even a signal. Within a few minutes it was out of sight.

Bishop now gave up hope. Was he to die almost within sight of a haven? By this time it had stopped snowing, but a moderate gale still howled out of the southwest. Bishop sat down to rest and think things over. He was now on a “hogback,” perfectly level and almost free of snow. As he sat there, another miracle happened; a miracle to stir one’s blood. It was this: Bob Ellis, Bishop’s companion, flying from Salt Lake City to Rock Springs, had seen his machine on the ground, but had noticed that the engine was running. Ellis, anxious to keep to the schedule, and believing Bishop was not in difficulty, continued on. But soon after his arrival at Rock Springs, Salt Lake reported by wireless that Bishop was missing. Ellis thereupon asked permission of the Division Superintendent to retrace his flight to the spot where he had seen Bishop’s plane on the ground. This was a splendid thing for Ellis to do. He was weary from his four-hour flight. The wind was still blowing at forty miles an hour. Nevertheless, this fearless pilot waited only long enough for a ship to be fueled.

Taking along a mechanic in case of accident to his own motor, and food and coffee for Bishop, Ellis set out in the face of the gale to find among a thousand hills a stalled machine and its helpless pilot.

When I remarked to Ellis, a few weeks ago, in a conversation at Salt Lake City, that this was a “mighty fine thing” for him to do, he replied: “Oh, that’s nothing; Bishop or any other pilot would do the same thing for me. We realize that any one of us may get into a jam at any time. And then it’s up to his fellow pilots to get him out of it.” This is the code of those who go down to the sea in ships.

After a flight of less than an hour, Ellis and his mechanic sighted Bishop’s machine, half buried in the snow; a dead thing. There was no sign of Bishop. Moreover, his trail had been blotted out by the drifting snow. Ellis, flying low and in wide circles about the stalled machine, asked himself what he would do in similar circumstances. Immediately he concluded that he would make for the farmhouse, twenty miles away. With an Air Mail pilot, to decide is to act and within fifteen minutes, Ellis, flying a hundred feet above the snow, had “picked up” a floundering figure half way between the stalled machine and the farmhouse. Settling gradually, in order not to break the undercarriage of his plane and thus leave all three at the mercy of the blizzard, Ellis and his mechanic landed near their exhausted comrade.

After a meal and some hot coffee, Bishop was able to “sit in” at a council of war. Ellis’s machine, they agreed, could carry the three of them, provided it could get into the air. But ground conditions were so unfavorable—the drifts were so deep—that this seemed impossible. It was then agreed that they would “taxi” the machine to a clear spot six miles to the westward, from which to take off.

For four miles, with each mile rapidly eating up their fuel supply, they churned their way through the powdery drifts, with Bishop huddled in the cockpit and the mechanic, comparatively fresh and warmly clothed, clinging to a precarious position on one of the wings. Finally, Ellis, realizing that his gasoline supply was becoming dangerously reduced, suggested that Bishop, with the aid of the mechanic, try to reach the farmhouse, now some four miles distant, while he flew back to Hock Springs to report Bishop’s safety—and get more gasoline. This they attempted, but Ellis, watching Bishop’s faltering footsteps from the air, realized that his exhausted comrade would be unable to accomplish the four miles. Swooping downward, Ellis again landed near the struggling pair, helped them to climb aboard, and swore that he would get the ship off the ground with the three of them on board, or “bust her up.”

Finding a ridge comparatively free from snow, Ellis, with his motor racing at full speed, and his plane reeling drunkenly amid the entangling sagebrush and snowdrifts, succeeded, after swaying and dipping for two hundred yards, in getting into the air. Little by little, an inch at a time, then a foot, with his propeller racing faster than it had ever gone before, Ellis finally climbed twenty-five feet into the air. By facing directly into the wind, the pilot utilized its velocity to attain an altitude of a thousand feet. Then he turned, and with the wind at his back, he flew with his passengers to Hock Springs—and safety—in half an hour.

Within a week Bishop’s machine had been recovered entirely whole, flown back to the field, and the pilot himself had recuperated. But he freely admitted to me in Salt Lake recently that if Ellis had not shown exceptional courage and excellent flying judgment, he, Bishop, would have perished almost within sight of aid.

These are tales of Bishop, Ellis, Blanchfield, Boonstra, Huking, and Vance.

Meager reports of other experiences are filed away, usually on single sheets of paper, in the office of the Superintendent of the Air Mail Service. For, with an Air Mail pilot, modesty amounts to an obsession. Those with whom I am acquainted would be the first to deny that flying is a dangerous game. Haven’t they been flying “crates” and “coffins” for ten years? Nevertheless, every day these pilots take grave risks, and in time of storm they undergo hazards comparable only to those which aviators at the front underwent during the war. For the pilot, once in the air, has nothing between the earth and himself but his Liberty motor.

What sort of men are these sky-riders? They are a quiet, modest, efficient, hardy, intrepid, expert, and likeable group of young men. Many of them are in the Army Air Service Reserve. Most of them received their training before or during the war. They fly every day in the year, in darkness and fog, through snow, hail, “twisters,” lightning, sleet, and rain. The dangers of flying they accept as a matter of course. Even forced landings such as I have described, in a rocky and uninhabited country, are smilingly accepted as part of the day’s work. They fly at great altitudes, barely skimming the backbone of the continent. On every side they see only dense forests, turbulent streams, jagged peaks, and precipitous canyon walls. Yet they continue on, day after day, year after year.

These pathfinders of the West have reduced the United States, in terms of transportation, to one-fourth its size. One can appreciate the value of the service they render only if he realizes that the prosperity of the United States depends mainly on doing business with ourselves on a bigger scale, and that business is carried on chiefly by correspondence. And no branch of the Post Office Department takes greater pride than the Air Mail Service in the motto from Herodotus that is carved above the portal of the New York Post Office:

“Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”

[Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in the July 1925 issue of McClure’s Magazine.]