Lincoln Beachley Info @ 1914AT DUBUQUE AVIATION MEET.
LINCOLN BEACHY AND WIFE SIZING UP THE CROWD BEFORE THE FLIGHT
LINCOLN BEACHEY - A Brief Biography
LINCOLN BEACHY
A Brief Biography
Lincoln Beachy was born in San Francisco, California, on
March 3, 1887, the son of William, a Civil War veteran , and
Amy. Lincoln's older brother, Hillery, spent much of his early
childhood escorting their blind father each day during the course
of William's work. Much of the Beachey Brothers' childhood was
consumed by the necessity of earning money to supplement their
small family's income.
As the 19th century came to a close the San Francisco Bay area
already had a long history of aerial experimentation. The
Beachey Brothers were aware of this local history and had an
active interest in everything aeronautical. By December 1903,
when the Wright Brothers achieved their stunning success... the
first controlled, sustained, heavier-than-air flight... Lincoln was
already engaged in his aerial career, working with balloons.
By 1905, Lincoln and Hillery Beachey were working full time in
avaition, assisting with and operating airships and captive gas
balloons, and by 1907, "The Year of The Airships," Lincoln had
become one of the most well known and most successful airship
aeronauts in the U.S. One of his flights was observed by a small
group which included Wilbur and Orville Wright, whoe he met.
Hillery also worked with airships, rigging as well as operating
them.
The 1910 Los Angeles International Aviation Meet, held on land
owned by the Dominguez Family at Compton, California, near
Los Angeles, was a turning point for Beachey. While he had
attempted, with others, to build a flyby aeroplane, at the 1910
Los Angeles Meet he was still an aeronaut, operating a Beachey
LINCOLN BEACHEY - A Brief Biography
Knabenshue Racing Airship. Hillery had transitioned to heavier-
than-air craft by then, and during the Meet managed to make a
few hops as well as to nearly complete one circular flight in the
Gill-Dosh Curtiss-type Biplane. After the 1910 Los Angeles Meet,
Lincoln never again operated an airship.
By January of 1911 Lincoln was considered a professional
aviator. By mid-1911 he was famous throughout the U.S. as an
aviator, flying over Niagara Falls and then, less than a month
later, breaking the world's record for altitude at the great
Chicago International Aviation Meet. He commanded a
significant fee for his exhibitions of flight. His successes into
1912, as did his fame and status as one of the most
accomplished avaitors in the U.S. Lincoln Beachey was regarded
as one of the greatest of the period's avaitors at the time he
abruptly retired, deeply saddened and feeling trapped by his
success.
Fir Beachy, 1913 was a difficult year, personally and
professionally. Many of his avaitor friends had perished and
some in the press blamed Beachy for the deaths, accusing him of
setting a bad example by flying in a "dangerous" manner. In
truth, Beachy was pursuing the outher edges of what was then
still a very new art. Aviating, as it was termed, was discussed and
debated from two perspecties, that of the "safe and sane"
aviators, those who made large sweeping turns and valued the
perceived safety of low, straight and level flight, and that of those
"flying fools" who made large sweeping turns and valued the
safety of higher flight. One consequence of flight at higher
altitudes was the development of the "volplane," a long glide
without engine power. From that point, the "spiral glide" was
soon developed, which became a hallmark Beachey's
exhibitations and which was at leas attempted by the most daring
LINCOLN BEACHEY - A Brief Biography
Page 3 of 4
and most skilled of the pioneer aviators. Beachey was clearly not
of the "safe and sane" school, although he was hardly foolhardy.
Beachey was, indeed, a very safe aviator who valued safety, well-
built reliable equipment and highly skilled mechanicians, as
mechanics were then called.
The exhibition season of 1914 belonged to Beachey. He was the
first aviator in the U.S. to loop an aeroplane, and he did so over
1,000 times between November 1913 and November 1914. His
races with legendary race car driver Barney Oldfield drew
tremendous crowds, thunderous applause and over $250,000 in
receipts. In the U.S., 1914 and Beachey marked the high point of
exhibition flying, while in Europe, war, on the ground and in the
air, put a temporary end to civilian flying. During the Great War,
World War I, one after another proponent of "safe and sane"
flying would be shot from the sky by aviators utilizing the steeply
banked tight turns and other aerial maneuvers developed by pre-
war aviators such as Adolphe Pegoud, Roland Garros, Walter
Brookins, and Lincoln Beachey.
Beachey's death at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition
in San Francisco on March 14, 1915, eleven days after his 28th
birthday, marked the effective end of exhibition flying in the U.S.,
although aeroplane exhibitions, usually by individual aviators,
would continue well into 1916. Beachey's death came at a time
when his life held the promise of happiness and security and his
loss was keenly felt by those concerned with the military potential
of aviation.
Beachey was unique to his time, just as the exhibition era was
unique to its time and place. The barnstorming of the 1920's and
the great air races and air shows of the 1930's were different in
many respects from the great aviation meets and exhibitions of
the pre- WWI period. The exhibition era was a time of great
experimentation and purposeful risk, and it has become a time
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LINCOLN BEACHEY - A Brief Biography
Page 4 of 4
almost lost to memory.
Beachey's life and career were so striking that, almost inevitably,
many myths, misunderstandings, tall tales and outright
fabrications have become firmly fIXed to his story. Several recent
publications, including at least one book, have fallen victim to
many of these tall tales, as well as adding newly minted ones.
Sadly, what ought to be Beachey's proper place in the
aeronautical scheme of things has thus been denied him, in large
part because of those very myths and fabrications. The truthful
rendering of Beachey's life and career is a wondrous story in its
own right and Beachey certainly requires no invention,
fabrication or mythology to enhance the story of his life.
Hopefully, the facts of Beachey's life and career will permit
Beachey to fmally assume his proper place in the story of ffight.
Home
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First American to "Ioop-the-loop"
References
Frank Marrero; Lincoln Beachey: The
Man Who Owned the Sky
External links
Lincoln Beachy
Amacord: Lincoln Beachy
Selected references in the
New Yark Times
New York Times; June 3,1906; pg. 1.
Falls with his airship. Propeller Cuts the
Gas Bag. Aeronaut Narrowly Escapes
Death. Cleveland, Ohio; June 3, 1906.
Lincoln J. Beachey, a Toledo aeronaut,
lost control of his airship to-day while
1,000 feet from the ground, and when the
disabled machine fell heavily he was
under it. He was unconscious when
dragged out, but revived soon and was
found to be uninjured.
New York Times; July 24, 1908; pg. 2;
Airship beats auto. Lincoln Beachey
Claims New Record, Flying 14 Miles In
33 Minutes. White House and Capitol
upset by an airship; Executive mansion
staff and Congressmen run to the show.
Loeb sternly calls police but aeronaut
calmly makes repairs on White lot and
resumes flight, while all Washington
stares. Washington, District of Columbia;
June 14, 1906. Executive and legislative
Washington abandoned business for an
hour or more this morning and gave itself
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up to joyous, neckcraning contemplation
of a young man sailing around in an
airship and making passing inspections
of the top of the monument and the tip of
the Capitol dome.
New York Times; Baltimore, Maryland;
July 23, 1908. Lincoln Beachey, who is
making daily and nightly flights in his
airship from a suburban amusement
resort, asserts that he made new records
both for distance and speed in a flight
this morning from Arlington to and around
the City Hall. The distance, fourteen
miles, was made without a stop in 33
minutes.
New York Times; October 5, 1911.
Beachey's Brother Hurt. Flier Falls Fifty
Feet at St. Louis and Wrecks His
Aeroplane. St. Louis, Missouri, October
4, 1911 -- Twenty-five thousand
spectators saw Hillary Beachey, brother
of Lincoln Beachey, the aviator pilot, fall
fifty feet from an aeroplane today at Fair
Ground. It is the second serious fall he
has had in a month.
New York Times; May 13, 1913; pg. 6;
Beachey will fly no more. Aviator Feels
That He Has Led Others to Death and So
He Quits. San Francisco, California; May
12, 1913. Lincoln Beachey the aviator,
will never fly again, according to what he
himself said last night at the Olympic
Club.
New York Times; Nov 19,1913; pg. 1;
San Diego, California. Beachey Loops
the Loop.
New York Times; October 14, 1914; pg.
3; Not Attempting a Feat When Young
Woman Was Killed, He Says.
Hammondsport, New York; October 12,
1913. Lincoln Beachey, the aeroplanist,
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whose aeroplane in a flight last Tuesday
caught several persons, killing one, a
young woman, was able to get up to-day.
He has been confined to his bed since
the accident, recovering slowly from the
nervous shock and from the bruises and
strains sustained in his fall.
New York Times; March 15, 1915; pg. 1;
Beachey killed in a Taubel drop; Air
Pressure Crumples Monoplane's Wings
as Airman Tries to Resume Glide. Crowd
of 50,000 horrified. Machine and
Aeroplanist Fall Into San Francisco Bay.
Recovered by Navy Diver. Brother saw
his plunge. Fatal Perpendicular Drop
from 3,000 Feet Like Feat Beachey Often
Had Executed in Biplane. San Francisco,
California; March 14, 1915. Lincoln
Beachey, noted as an aviator the world
over and perhaps the greatest rival of the
Frenchman, Pegoud, in the execution of
hair-raising aerial feats, fell to his death
here today in the new German Taube
monoplane in which he had been
attempting to duplicate the spectacular
performances of which, in the biplane, he
was the acknowledged master.
Timeline
1887 Birth of Lincoln Beachey on March
3rd
19001900 census Beachey.gif
1906 Dirigible crash in Cleveland on
June 3rd
1906 Lands on White House lawn in
dirigible on June 14th
1908 Sets dirigible speed record on July
4th
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1910 1910 census Beachey.gif
1910 Pilot's license
1911 Flight over Niagara Falls on June
27th
1913 Anounces he will fly no more on
May 12th
1913 Robbed of $6,000 on October 8th
1913 Kills a spectator in a crash on
October 13th
1913 Loops the Loop in San Diego on
Nov 19th
1914 Start of 126-city tour on May 12th
1914 End of 126-city tour on December
31st
1915 Death of Lincoln Beachey on March
14th
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Lincoln Beachey
Lincoln Beachey
Encyclopedia
Lincoln
Lincoln J. Beachey (March 3, 1887-
March 14, 1915), was a pioneer American
aviator. He was known as The Man Who
Owns the Sky.
Birth
He was born in San Francisco. California,
on March 3, 1887. He had a bother:
Hillery Beachey (1885-1964).
Aviator
He started his career as a dirigible pilot in
Thomas Baldwin's balloon troupe.
Beachey helped build the dirigible
"California Arrow" and made his first
dirigible flight in 1905. He then bought his
own dirigible, and as a publicity stunt flew
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it around the Washington Monument and
landed it on the lawn of the White House.
He learned to pilot airplanes from Glenn
Curtiss and crashed during each of his
first three flights. He joined the Curtiss
exhibition team on tour in 1910, and by
the end of 1911, Beachey was aviation's
single greatest moneymaker. At the
height of his career, Beachey would earn
more money in a single day of touring
with his airplane than the average
American could earn in a year.
Stunt flying
On June 27, 1911, he flew over Niagara
Falls and under the "Honeymoon Bridge."
In Chicago, he raced a train and let his
wheels touch the top of the moving train
as it passed underneath. His stunt
specialty was the "Dip-of-Death," where
he would dive straight for the ground at
full speed and then pull up at the last
second, barely averting a crash. Orville
Wriqht said: "An aeroplane in the hands
of Lincoln Beachey is poetry. His mastery
is a thing of beauty to watch. He is the
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most wonderful flyer of all." Thomas Alva
Edison wrote: "I was startled and
amazed, when I saw that youngster take
to the sky and send his aeroplane
through the loop and then follow that feat
with an upside-down flight. I could not
believe my own eyes, and my nerves
were a tingle for many minutes."
Solo career
Beachey left the Curtiss team and toured
at exhibition races with the popular
automobile racer, Barney Oldfield.
Beachey and Oldfield traded wins every
other day to keep fans interested. In their
first year of exhibiting together, Beachey
and Oldfield earned more than $250,000.
Death
Beachey died in an air crash on March
14, 1915. He was demonstrating a new
monoplane at the Panama-Pacific
International Exposition when the plane's
wings sheared off and It crashed into San
Francisco Bay.
Monikers
The Man Who Owns the Sky
Alexander great of the Air
The Genius of Aviation
Master Birdman
The Divine Flyer
Achievements
First to fly upside-down
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