Taking Flight with Lady Liberty

Posted on October 28, 2011 by The National Air and Space Museum

What comes to mind when you think of the Statue of Liberty? America, freedom, democracy. Her image is immediately recognized around the world as an ambassador for the United States and icon of the American dream. She has been the focal point of many a celebration over the years and in several cases, the gracious hostess (and waypoint) for aerial races and demonstrations. In celebration of her 125th anniversary, we gathered a few images, objects, and posters that feature inspiring views of Lady Liberty in the context of flight.

Wilbur Wright flies a Wright Type A by the Statue of Liberty during the Hudson-Fulton Celebration in 1909. (Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Archives)

Wilbur Wright was contracted for $15,000 to make a series of flights during the two-week Hudson-Fulton Celebration in 1909, which was commemorating the 300^th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s first entry into what would become New York Harbor, and the centennial of Robert Fulton’s first voyage of his North River Steamboat up the Hudson River in 1809. Wilbur made a seven-minute flight on September 29^th , circling the Statue of Liberty. On October 4^th, he made a long-distance flight of more than 33 minutes and approximately 20 miles from Governor’s Island to Grant’s Tomb and back, again circling the Statue of Liberty. It is estimated that a million people witnessed Wilbur’s flight up the Hudson from Governor’s Island. For these flights, Wilbur attached a red canoe under the airplane as a make-shift pontoon in the event he was forced down in the water. The canoe survives and today is on display in Carillon Historical Park in Dayton, Ohio.

The popular journal "Harper's Weekly" covered Wilbur's circling of the Statue of Liberty. An original is on display in "The Wright Brothers & The Invention of the Aerial Age" exhibition in Washington, DC. (Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Archives)

John Bevins Moisant flew over New York Harbor in 1910 in a Blériot XI monoplane. This flight took place during the Statue of Liberty Flight prize race on October 27, 1910. The race was the final event in one of the first major flying meetings held in the U.S., the International Aviation Tournament at Belmont Park, NY.

Clock from the Lindbergh King Collection ( (Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum)

Lady Liberty appears frequently in memorabilia commemorating Charles Lindbergh’s historic solo transatlantic flight from New York to Paris. On this clock, displayed at the Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, the Statue of Liberty represents New York (America) while the Eiffel Tower represents Paris (Europe) with the Spirit of St. Louis flying between them. Not to scale, of course.

TWA used an inspiring visual of Lady Liberty with one of their Lockheed Constellation aircraft in this advertisement for commercial passenger service to and across the U.S. (Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum)

Bill Bennett demonstrates his tow-kite in a flight around the Statue of Liberty on July 4, 1969. (Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum)

Bill Bennett played a key role in the initial development of hang gliding in the U.S. He was a spectacular promoter of the sport and stirred publicity for his tow-kites when he flew near the Statue of Liberty on July 4, 1969, released his towrope and circled the monument twice, landing at its base. Several of his gliders are in our collection.

In 1986, a major celebration was held for the restoration and 100 year anniversary of the Statue of Liberty. Liberty Weekend included a blimp race and flyover by the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds aerial demonstration team. We don’t have any images from Liberty Weekend handy, but here is a great shot of the Thunderbirds with Lady Liberty in 2005.

Six F-16 Fighting Falcons with the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds aerial demonstration team fly in formation over the Statue of Liberty before an air show May 26, 2005. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Josh Clendenen)

Over the years, the Statue of Liberty has symbolized many things, Freedom, Enlightenment, Compassion, Acceptance to all those arriving in the land of opportunity — what does she mean to you?

Secretary Langley on a Really Good Cup of Coffee

Posted on October 25, 2011 by Allan Janus

Samuel P. Langley, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. Photograph by R. H. Lord

Samuel P. Langley, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. Photograph by R. H. Lord, SI 87-17019.

Blogs across the Smithsonian will give an inside look at the Institution’s archival collections and practices during a month long blogathon in celebration of October’s American Archives Month. See additional posts from our other participating blogs, as well as related events and resources, on the Smithsonian’s Archives Month website.

As the Museum’s Archives Division packs up and continues with our epic move to the Stephen F. Udvar-Hazy Center, we’re occasionally featuring highlights from our collections. When I was working on a collection of the aeronautical papers of Samuel Pierpont Langley (1834-1906), the third Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, I was struck by the wealth of detail in his research and the meticulousness of his note-taking. And as a man whose interests ranged from astronomy, astrophysics, aeronautics, and bird flight, mathematics, and the reckoning of standard time, Langley enjoyed observing and describing all sorts of processes — and then suggesting improvements. Take this undated memo in which Langley describes in minute detail the preparation of of a really good cup of coffee at the Posthof café in the spa town of Carlsbad in Bohemia, then part of Austria-Hungary (now Karlovy Vary in the Czech Republic) to his niece Mary:

Dear Mary,

I hope this will interest you.

Affectionately,

Your Uncle Samuel

The best coffee in Carlsbad is at the Posthof, and is as good as I know of anywhere. I have been looking into the kitchen this morning and seeing it prepared. The statement that figs or anything of the kind are employed is legendary. There is absolutely nothing but coffee, and it owes its superior excellence to the freshness and the pains taken in its making.

1. The coffee in the berry.

There are four kinds of coffee bean employed: the Menado, Ceylon, Java and Preanger. I do not know the English equivalents for the first and last. They are of very different sizes indeed, and this difference in size of the berry must make it difficult to burn them equally.

2. Roasting.

The roasting is done in a rotary wire mesh over a slow fire. The coffee is renewed three times daily. Each time 10 to 20 pounds of coffee is roasted, a girl turning the handle, and the process occupying in each case nearly an hour. In spite of this care, when the beans come out some of them are very dark and these are picked out.

3. Grinding.

The coffee is then ground to a very uniform fineness, something between the head of a small pin and a coarse sand. It is in no ways ground into a snuff-like powder, but is always clearly perceptible as particles between the fingers. The color of the ground coffee is a light chestnut.

4. Mixing with water.

Somewhat over one-quarter of a pound of the ground coffee is measured in a tin and this is emptied into a tin pail holding, I suppose, four to six gallons. Into this is poured, actually boiling soft water, enough to make 10 portions of the coffee. This softness is considered so important, that if the water be at all hard, a little soda is first added to soften it. The coffee and water are then well stirred with a spoon, and the lid put on and allowed to remain two minutes, when it is poured onto a thick straining cloth placed in a tin vessel with large holes at the bottom through which it drains into a white stone pitcher, which is itself set in boiling water. From this pitcher it is poured into the little ones in which it is served on the table.

5. Serving.

The amount of coffee and water just described will, as I have said, make 10 portions, each of which will be, with the addition of the milk, two of the little cups here, or hardly one good breakfast cup as we have it at home. It is served ordinarily with milk which has been boiled, and which has a little whipped cream on top.

6. Comment.

The one criticism I can make is that the coffee with the above proportion of water, is served too diluted for a café au lait. It would be better made half as strong again and diluted with a larger proportion of hot milk.

(From the Samuel P. Langley Collection (Accession XXXX-0494), box 38, folder 58. Another collection of Langley’s papers is held by the Smithsonian Institution Archives.)

Very interesting — who actually uses figs in coffee-making? But if Secretary Langley were still with us today, I think that I would rather not be the barista at his local coffee shop.

Allan Janus is a museum specialist in the Archives Division of the National Air and Space Museum.

The Tomboy of the Air

Posted on October 23, 2011 by Elizabeth Borja

Blogs across the Smithsonian will give an inside look at the Institution’s archival collections and practices during a month long blogathon in celebration of October’s American Archives Month. See additional posts from our other participating blogs, as well as related events and resources, on the Smithsonian’s Archives Month website .

One hundred and one years ago, on October 23, 1910, Blanche Stuart Scott made her first public flight with the Glenn Curtiss Exhibition Team in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Scott, billed as the “Tomboy of the Air,” is one of America’s earliest female aviators. There is conflicting evidence regarding the exact date of Blanche Stuart Scott’s first solo flight, so we may never determine which of Scott or Bessica Raiche was, indeed, America’s first female to fly solo.

Blanche Stuart Scott seated at the controls of a Curtiss Model D, circa early 1910s. SI-72-4803-A

There are also conflicting reports on Scott’s appearance in Fort Wayne. The Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette reported that Scott flew across the field and landed immediately, though she had wished to make a few circles. In later years, Scott remembered making eight circles of the field. In most reports, Scott’s flew at a height of approximately twelve feet, ostensibly because show promoters did not want outside spectators to get a free show.

Regardless of these conflicting reports, Blanche Stuart Scott is a pioneer of American aviation. The Blanche Stuart Scott Collection (Acc. No. XXXX-0062) at the National Air and Space Museum Archives Division contains 0.0283 cubic meters (one cubic foot) of material relating to the pioneering aviatrix. It includes correspondence, memorabilia, and a great many newspaper clippings. A finding aid to the collection can be found in both PDF and HTML formats. The Archives Division also has a sizeable file on Scott in its Biographical Technical Files.

Elizabeth C. Borja is a reference services archivist in the National Air and Space Museum’s Archives Division.

Costume Ideas from the Great War

Posted on October 21, 2011 by Allan Janus

An Aeronautical Ballet, 1918. NASM 9A 02153

If you’re still stumped over what your costume will be for next Saturday’s big Air & Scare at the Museum’s Udvar-Hazy Center (October 29 from 2 – 8 pm), the photograph shown above, from the July 1918 issue of Die Luftflotte, might provide some inspiration. The Hamburg Youth Division of the German Airfleet Association (the Deutscher Luftflotten-Verein) performs their “great and patriotic” aeronautical ballet Through Battle to Victory at a rally of the association to benefit injured pilots and their families. The dancers outfitted as monoplanes are a superb touch – the fellow on the right with the hammer must be Thor, but there’s no explanation in the original caption as to what the other characters portray. Maybe the chap with the umbrella is portraying a Morane Parasol fighter?

If you picked an aircraft-themed costume for Halloween, what would you choose? I’d like to go trick-or-treating as a sleek SPAD XIII or an Albatros D.Va. But sadly, I’d be more realistic as a blimp… Add your choice to the comments.

Allan Janus is a museum specialist in the Museum’s Archives Division.

Packing up Our Secret Decoder Ring

Posted on October 16, 2011 by Allan Janus

Flat box containing "Aircraft Recognition Training Materials" collection, Accession XXXX-0158.

You know when you’re packing up for a move to a new house — boxes everywhere — frantic activity to get everything stored away before the movers arrive, and you still have to clean out the fridge. Suddenly you come across an old family treasure — a photo album, your old baseball cards, or maybe your raygun collection — and everything stops while you rummage nostalgically for a few minutes. That’s what’s been going on from time to time in the Museum’s Archives Division offices, as we prepared for our move to the Stephen F. Udvar-Hazy Center this month. We would pause from time to time to appreciate some of our favorite things — our chief photo archivist Melissa Keiser tells the story of one such artifact:

One day I was in the Archives storage box at the Paul E. Garber Restoration and Storage Facility in Silver Hill, Maryland looking for something in the Basil Lee Rowe Collection (NASM Accession XXXX-0019). The large 20 x 24 inch flat box I needed to check was under another big box; when I moved the top box, something inside the flat box slid heavily and went “Clunk!” Fearing some damage might have occurred to the contents, I opened the box to check.

The box, labeled Aircraft Recognition Training Materials, NASM Accession XXXX-0158, seemed to be full of a variety of manila envelopes, but on top of everything was this great big colorful circular thing with a World War II vintage P-39 screaming through the clouds — wow!

World War II Aircraft Identification Wheel Chart (Volvelle), NASM 9A-07661.

(It’s a wheel chart, also known as a volvelle, a device with a rich history, still used for pilots’ flight computers like the famous E6B “Whiz Wheel”.)

I’ve seen lots of aircraft recognition training aids in our collections, but they’re usually black and white silhouettes, or sober halftone photographs. This thing was more like a giant cereal box prize or a secret decoder ring! Obviously intended to appeal to a more general audience, I could picture Dad coming home from work one day with this spiffy doodad to share with the kids. Now we can ALL have fun watching the skies for enemy aircraft!

Reverse of Aircraft Identification Wheel Chart, NASM 9A-07662.

And on the back, there’s a selection of colorful US Army Air Forces squadron insignias. Melissa passed it around, and we all admired it for a minute or two, and then we got packing once again. Because the moving van is already at the door.