Letters from Heaven. A relay of airplanes and pilots carries…
By: Richard J. Goodrich
Tags: Mail, American History, Aviation History, Aviation, History

Letters from Heaven

One hundred years ago a relay of airplanes and pilots carried the first mail from New York to San Francisco

DeHavilland DH4. Public Domain, courtesy of the San Diego Air & Space Museum Archive / Wikimedia.org

New York, Sept. 8, 1920. A solitary airplane, piloted by Rudolph G. Page, lifted off from Curtis Field’s grass runway just before sunrise this morning. As dawn silvered the sky, Page’s biplane, loaded with four hundred pounds of mail, turned west, pointing its propeller at Cleveland.

This historic departure inaugurated America’s first transcontinental airmail service. From this date, airplanes would leave New York every morning, moving mail in a series of stages across the country at a speed that had never been achieved before the aerial revolution.

Promoters of the service estimated that it would take three days for an airmail letter to reach San Francisco, twice as fast as mail moved on transcontinental trains. The Air Mail Service planned to cover the 2,650 miles between New York and San Francisco in fifty-seven hours in the winter, fifty-four in the summer. The airplanes would easily beat the ninety-one hours it took a train to move mail across the country.

“Not only will the service be a success from a speed standpoint,” said Otto Praeger, Assistant U.S. Postmaster and head of the Air Mail Service, “but at the end of the year earnings large enough to cover all expenses and leave a surplus will be shown.”

Airmail Route Map, Chicago Times, Sept. 8, 1920. Public Domain via Newspapers.com

Ten hours after his departure from New York, at 4:45 PM, Rudolph Page flew over the southern rim of Lake Michigan and set down at the airport in Maywood, a Chicago suburb. A headwind had slowed Page’s flight, forcing him to make an unplanned fuel stop in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania. The chipper pilot popped out of his airplane as his propeller circled to a stop and asked for a sandwich.

Post Office mechanics quickly transferred the 400 pounds of mail to a waiting aircraft. When the Chicago plane was loaded, a fresh pilot, J. P. Murray, shook hands with Page and climbed aboard his ship.

“I’ll be in Iowa City in an hour and a half,” he told reporters. “Tomorrow I’ll take this mail to Salt Lake City, and Friday morning, another pilot will fly it into San Francisco. You can’t beat that for speed, can you?”

Through the Midwest

Murray arrived in Iowa City that night. The next morning, at 10:15, he set off for Omaha, which he reached at 12:55 PM. After a “hearty lunch,” the pilot climbed back into his cockpit and continued on to Cheyenne, Wyoming.

Although the flight went smoothly, his final hours were a bit rough: bad weather was moving into the region. The mountain weather would prove the most challenging aspect of the transcontinental mail service.

“Intense cold weather will be encountered,” said Colonel John Jordan, who had overseen the construction of the air mail facilities, “as well as snow, and against these contingencies all advance preparations have been made. Powerful radio stations for communication with the planes in the mountain sections have been installed in Reno, Salt Lake City, Cheyenne and Omaha, and every precaution is being taken for the safety and comfort of the pilots in the difficult mountain flying in the coming winter.”

Late summer weather could also prove problematic. After a good night’s sleep in Cheyenne, Pilot Murray took off at 5:18, heading for Rock Springs Wyoming. Forced to detour around a weather system in Utah, he was two hours and twenty minutes behind schedule when his wheels kissed the runway in Salt Lake City.

The service planned to use trains when bad weather delayed an airplane; by the time Murray reached Salt Lake City, westbound mail for San Francisco had already been consigned to the train. There were only two new letters waiting at the Utah airport.

The Final Leg

Once again the bags were transferred between planes, and a new pilot, Stanhope Boggs took off for Reno, Nevada. Boggs, a native of Oakland, California, had significant experience flying mail; he would be one of the regular pilots on the Salt Lake to San Francisco run.

Although the flight was relatively straightforward, it was clear that logistical problems required a solution. A large crowd of Reno businessmen, the local postmaster, and Mayor Stewart watched, puzzled, as Boggs made several passes down the runway in his large DeHavilland DH-4. Each time he approached the ground, he fed in throttle just before touchdown and climbed back into the air.

Finally, he landed and taxied to the waiting dignitaries. He explained that he had been unable to judge the wind direction when landing. The flag on the aerodrome was too small for a pilot to see from the air; the city needed to invest in a much larger indicator.

Apart from this problem, the flight had been smooth. Boggs handed a mail sack to Postmaster White, and “less than fifteen minutes after the plane had landed at the aviation field, special delivery letters were being sent from the post office by the delivery boys.”

The Reno businessmen laid on a warm reception for Boggs. They drove him into town and fed him a lovely lunch. An hour later, the aviator was returned to the airport. Mechanics loaded a bag of mail, destined for San Francisco, to the plane’s load. At 1:30, the DeHavilland’s radial engine snarled, the biplane leaped forward, and Boggs soared west for San Francisco.

Headwinds again slowed the flight. Boggs made brief stops at Elko, Nevada and Sacramento, California before arriving at San Francisco at 5:03 PM. A large crowd awaited his arrival, and when they saw the biplane crossing the Piedmont hills, they raised a shout. Boggs circled the field and then planted his airplane on the strip.

He handed six sacks — 240 pounds — of airmail to Colonel Jordan and the postmaster, before posing for a newspaper photo with fellow pilot Ray Little, who was scheduled to leave San Francisco at 6:00 the following morning, carrying 16,000 letters destined for eastern cities.

Stanhope Boggs delivers mail to Colonel Jordan in San Francisco. San Francisco Examiner, Sept. 12, 1920. Public domain image via Newspapers.com

With the success of the first transcontinental air mail run, Colonel Jordan was already contemplating future improvements.

“Preparations are already being made for night flying over the plains next spring between Chicago and Cheyenne, and this will reduce the time of transit of the air mail to forty-five hours, against ninety-one hours by train,” Jordan said.

The age of airmail had begun. Despite mechanical problems and the complication of bad weather, air transport would quickly supplant ground-based vehicles as the preferred means of moving letters and parcels across the country. The idea of a country-girding airmail service, introduced by visionaries and made to work by a handful of brave aviators, is still used today when the Postal Service speeds missives via priority mail and Federal Express fulfills its promise of overnight delivery.

Sources: New York Daily News, Sept. 8–9, 1920; Chicago Tribune, Sept. 8–9, 1920; Iowa City Press Citizen, Sept. 9, 1920; Deseret News, Sept. 9, 1920; Reno Gazette-Journal, Sept. 9, 1920; San Francisco Chronicle, Sept. 9–10, 1920; San Francisco Examiner, Sept. 10, 1920