Jacob Earl Fickel Major General Jacob Earl " Jake " Fickel ( 31 January 1883 – 7 August 1956 ) had a prominent career in the United States Air Force usually associated with being an instructor of aviation . He is credited with firing the first recorded gunshot ever from an airplane showing that a plane would not break up due to the gun ' s recoil . Biography . Fickel enlisted in the Regular Army when he was twenty one years of age . He served as a private , corporal , sergeant , and first sergeant of Company K , 27th Infantry . He was stationed at Fort Hayes , Fort Sheridan and Fort Leavenworth . In 1907 Fickel was commissioned as a second lieutenant of Infantry . He then joined the 29th Infantry at Fort Douglas . In August of that year he went with that regiment for the Philippine Islands and served at Fort William McKinley with 2d Lt . Henry H . Arnold . In 1909 Fickel returned to the United States for station at Fort Jay . He was there through 1911 . He then went to Fort Niagara until November 1913 . Fickel then went for a second tour of duty in the Philippine Islands with the 13th Infantry . He served at Fort William McKinley again and at Camp McGrath until March 1917 . He was then assigned to duty as an instructor at the Officers Training Camp at Fort Benjamin Harrison . There he remained until November of that year . Fickel was then ordered to Washington , D . C . , for duty with the Headquarters of the Aviation Section of the Signal Corps . He served in that capacity until May 1918 . Fickel was next ordered to Rockwell Field in California as a student officer at the flying school . Upon completion of his course in November 1918 he assumed command of Carruthers Field in Texas where he remained until January 1919 . Fickel was then ordered back to Washington , D . C . There he served in the Office of the Chief of Air Service until March 1921 . His next duty was with the Spruce Production Corporation Portland , Oregon . There he served until the summer of 1922 . He then returned to Washington for a two - year tour of duty as Chief of the Supply Division of the Air Service . In June 1925 Fickel graduated from the Air Corps Technical School at Langley Field . In June 1926 he also graduated with honors from the Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth . His next tour of duty was to serve as executive officer of the Materiel Division at McCook Field until April 1927 . He then attended the Air Corps Advanced Flying School at Kelly Field in Texas for three months . Fickel then returned to McCook Field where he reassumed his duties as executive officer , Materiel Division , for a period of three years . Fickel then attended the Army War College in Washington , D . C . He graduated in June 1931 . His next duty was as Chief of the Buildings and Grounds Division in the Office of the Chief of Air Corps , Washington , D . C . He was there until January 1935 . From February 1935 to June 1936 , Fickel was Commandant of the Air Corps Advanced Flying School at Kelly Field . His next tour of duty was as Air Officer of the Ninth Corps Area , with Headquarters at the Presidio of San Francisco , California . He was there until March 1939 . He was then assigned to command the 1st Wing , General Headquarters Air Force at March Field in California . In February 1940 , he was appointed Assistant Chief of Air Corps in Washington , D . C . He was later assigned to Riverside , California , in 1940 , as Air District Commander , becoming the first Commanding General of the Fourth Air Force on December 18 , 1940 . After an inordinately high rate of accidents involving Lockheed P - 38 Lightning s in his command , he was relieved of command on April 2 , 1942 , on the orders of his friend Hap Arnold , now commanding the Army Air Forces , and reassigned to command the District No . 3 ( Western ) Technical Training Command , Oklahoma , on March 5 , 1942 . Fickel retired in 1946 . Notability . Fickel is credited with firing the first recorded gunshot ever from an airplane on August 20 , 1910 . From his passenger seat he fired a rifle twice at a target from an altitude of 100 feet with Glenn H . Curtiss flying the airplane . It was done at Sheepshead Bay Race Track near New York City . This proved that a gun could be fired from an airplane without the plane breaking up into pieces due to the gun ’ s recoil . He repeated the feat at an air show in the summer of 1911 at Nassau Boulevard airfield on Long Island with Arnold at the controls . Competing against a team of Britons , Thomas Sopwith and Malcolm Campbell , the Americans won easily when Fickel displayed a skill that enabled him to put six bullets through a dinner plate from an aircraft flying off the ground . Fickel became the first aerial gunner in America . These experiments led to low recoil machine guns . Soon thereafter machine guns were added to planes for air - to - ground attack or air - to - air fighting . The first airplane machine guns were patented by Samuel Neal McClean . He sold his rights to the Automatic Arms Company in late 1910 . Issac N . Lewis working for the company later improved the technology on this airplane machine gun system . The first use of an airplane machine gun in combat was in August 1914 with the first recorded airplane shot down in air - to - air fighting in October of that year . By 1915 air combat was an integral part of World War I fighting . Gen . Fickel was the brother - in - law of glider pioneer , Lawrence Malcolm Allison , of Lawrence , Kansas .