Charles Lindbergh's transatlantic flight from New York to Paris in 1927 was hailed as one of the most heroic feats of the era. It paled in comparison to the flight Wiley Post made around the globe in 1933. Yet Lucky Lindy is remembered and Wiley Post is a trivia answer. Lindbergh's fame came during the height of the Roaring Twenties, and Post’s achievement came in the midst of the Great Depression. Lindbergh was tall, svelte, blonde, and handsome. Post was short, doughy, bushy haired, and wore a patch over one eye. Lindbergh was in the military. Post was employed by a wealthy oil man. Lindbergh was from the Eastern United States, while Post was from Oklahoma.
Born to a farming family, young Wiley saw his first airplane as a teenager and dreamed of a career in aviation. But there was no money in it at that time, so he began working as a mechanic in the Oklahoma oilfields.
Barnstormers came through town one day, and their parachutist was too incapacitated to make his performance. Post begged the barnstormers to let him make the parachute jump, even though he had no experience whatsoever. After that was successful, he made nearly 100 more jumps. But Wiley kept his job in the oilfields, too.
That was how he lost his vision. A chip from an oil rig caught his left eye. An infection set in, and doctors had to remove the eyeball. His depth perception was thrown off, but he adapted over time.
The one good thing that came of the accident was worker's compensation. Wiley received a handsome check and bought his own airplane. He earned income by teaching people how to fly and by barnstorming.
For those who could afford it, Post also operated his biplane like an airborne taxi. He once flew Will Rogers to the rodeo that had come to town. The two men, both from Oklahoma, became life-long friends.
Then a rich oilman hired Wiley Post. FC Hall owned a Lockheed aircraft that was ahead of its time. He christened it the Winnie Mae, named after his daughter. Wiley Post became Hall's personal pilot. In time, Post and the Winnie Mae would make history together. Hall permitted Post to fly the airplane whenever it was available, so he clocked hundreds of hours in the air. By 1930, he was ready for the spotlight.
He entered the Winnie Mae in a race across the United States from Los Angeles to Chicago. In record-setting time of just over nine hours, Post beat the competition by over an hour and a half. That made an impression on Hall, and he encouraged Post to participate in other races.
There was only one record that mattered, and that was a flight around the world. To that point, the only aircraft to achieve the feat was a zeppelin. Post couldn't let that stand. He and a navigator, Harold Gatty, prepared the Winnie Mae for its greatest test.
In June 1931, they hopscotched the globe and returned to America after 8 days and 16 hours. Post and Gatty were feted with a ticker tape parade and a White House reception. In honor of the record-setting achievement, FC Hall turned over ownership of the Winnie Mae to Wiley Post.
Post wasn't finished. He wanted to fly around the world solo. No navigator, just a single pilot. No man had ever done so before. In 1933, Wiley Post became the first.
He modified his aircraft with a new technologies. Among them was a new invention: an autopilot. Despite the technology aboard the Winnie Mae, Post devised a ridiculously simple solution to keep himself awake. He tied a wrench to his finger and held the tool in his hand. If he dozed off and the wrench fell, it would tug at his finger and awaken him.
Post took off from Brooklyn, aimed east across Europe, then into Russia, and across the Bering Straits into Alaska. From there, he flew across Canada and the US back to Brooklyn. The flight time was 7 days and 19 hours, breaking his previous record by nearly a full day.
After his arrival, New York City gave the one-eyed pilot another ticker tape parade. Even then, he wasn't satisfied.
One year later, Post developed a pressurized suit for flying in high altitudes. It was similar to a diver's suit, complete with a domed helmet. He then flew a record-breaking 50,000 feet into the sky over Chicago, and he discovered thecontinental jet stream.
In 1935, Wiley Post contacted his friend Will Rogers to join him for adventures in Alaska. Together, the two intrepid pals flew out of Seattle in a newly modified seaplane. Post knew the pontoons weren't quite right for the aircraft, but they set out anyway.
It proved fatal. Wiley Post and Will Rogers died in a crash near Point Barrow, Alaska on August 15, 1935.
Aside from an airport named after him in Oklahoma City (a few miles due north of Will Rogers Airport), history has shown little regard for Wiley Post. But the one-eyed aviator achieved greater aeronautic feats than most of the heroes of his era.
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