page_title: James Henry Carmichael Jr.
section_title: Career
hierarchical_section_title: James Henry Carmichael Jr. / Career
caption_attribution_description: English: 1937 era Wheaties cereal box cover #8 of 8 in the Airmail Flyers' Medal of Honor series.
context_page_description: James Henry Carmichael Jr. "Slim" was a pioneering aviator, crop duster, barnstormer, airmail pilot, airline pilot, airline president, Special Assistant to the Federal Aviation Administration, and one of only ten recipients of the Airmail Flyers' Medal of Honor.
  Born on April 2, 1907 in Newark, New Jersey Carmichael was the second of three children born to James Henry Carmichael and Ida Coe Miner. James H. Carmichael, Jr. died of cancer at his home on December 1, 1983 in Delray Beach, Florida.
context_section_description: Carmichael worked as a miner, a clerk and a farmer before learning to fly in 1926 at the age of 19. After six hours of flying lessons, he became a flight instructor himself. Some of his first flight jobs consisted of crop-dusting, barnstorming and stunt flying before settling in as an Airmail pilot and mechanic for Central Airlines. He received his Limited Commercial Pilot rating, no. 3490, in 1928.
  He married Jessie Northrop, of the famous aviation family, on July 4, 1930.
  He went to work for Pittsburgh Airways in 1931 for a short time and then Newark Air Service from 1931 to 1934.  In 1934 he was a hired by Central Airlines as a mechanic and the company's first pilot.
  In 1935 he was recommended by the President of the Air Line Pilots Association, Dave Behncke, and was awarded the Airmail Flyers Medal of Honor for safely landing an aircraft with six passengers after an engine fell off, smashing one landing wheel and damaging a second engine over Hancock, Maryland. Carmichael, nicknamed "Slim" due to his tall slender build, became one of only 10 pilots to receive the medal and was number 8 in a series of 8 box covers on the popular breakfast cereal Wheaties.
  On November 16, not more than two weeks after receiving his medal, he was taking off from the Allegheny County Airport and made it less than 100 feet above the runway when the engines on the Stinson Model A (NO-15108) Tri-motor began to sputter and then stop completely.  He and co-pilot Edward Gerber along with lone passenger Tracey Baker, of Chicago, were all ok after he made a quick belling landing.  The plane slid some 300 feet at 100 mph across the landing field, over a 30-foot embankment and into thick underbrush before coming to a stop.  The following investigation determined water in the fuel as the cause of the engine failure.
  In 1936 Carmichael moved from Chief Pilot to Operations Manager after Pennsylvania Airlines and Central Airlines merged becoming Pennsylvania Central Airlines (PCA).
  By 1939 Slim was the Director of Operations and went to Santa Monica, California to pilot the first of PCA's new fleet of DC-3s from Douglas Aircraft factory to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
  December 18, 1945 he was elected Vice President in charge of operations for PCA.  He headed the Technical Industrial Intelligence Committee (TIIC) that studied German military and commercial aviation (APO 413).  The TIIC was created as an agency of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on September 14, 1945, but transferred to the Department of Commerce in January 1946.  The TIIC was the search group mechanism, composed of 380 civilians representing seventeen American Industries with direct links to major American manufacturing concerns.
  The worst air disaster for Capital Airways during his career occurred on the evening of June 13, 1947.  The following day Carmichael was one of the first to arrive on site of the crash along with Red Cross Official Gordon O Stone, and Capital's Maintenance Director James Franklin.  Franklin had spotted the crash site from a small search plane.  The three had to abandon their jeep and hike 3 miles to the crash site due to the rain soaked ground.  The wreckage covered more than 100 yards of the forest and would require a bulldozer to clear a path for recovery vehicles.  The DC-4, a converted Army C-54, which went missing the night before, had flow at full speed and level flight strait into the side of the mountain just 200 feet below the summit.  It was the third major airline crash in 15 days.  With this being the third crash of a former Army C-54 the military grounded all remaining C-54s pending an investigation.
  He eventually rose to Executive Vice President of the Airlines and in 1947 he was named President.  He remained the president when PCA became Capital Airlines.  During his time as president of the company the airline was in financial trouble.  He introduced the "Nighthawk" service providing fairs on evening flights at a reduced rate to compete with the railroad ticket prices.   This became the nation's first coach fair and boosted nighttime flying during a tim
caption: 1937 era Wheaties cereal box cover #8 of 8 in the Airmail Flyers' Medal of Honor series.
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