MANAGEMENT IN AVIATION HISTORY BENCH MARKS


I attended AirVenture as a speaker and participant in the Author’s Corner in 2003 and 2005. Between my appearances I drove my rental car to the Sea Base. I was immediately impressed with the slower pace, fewer people, and a local atmosphere. I smelled fresh corn boiling in a huge pot – sold by local kids. The leafy trees provided cooling shadows and the lap of the lake waters could be heard thumping against the buoys, pontoons and water skis. I was invited to take a ride in a small skiff to get closer to some of the aircraſt floating in their assigned space. Those who had long ago watched Powers, Schwister and others fly their hydro-aeroplanes over the Great Lakes most probably sat beneath a shady tree and treated themselves to corn on the cob. In 2005 I took time to sketch the scene. On the opposite shore was a picturesque farm with a tall silo. I knew that fields of harvested corn and rolls of giant hay lay out of sight. This was timeless Wisconsin.


veteran, was exceptionally pretty.”On July 22, Powers traveled 400 miles to northern Michigan and flew at Hancock, situated on Copper Island.By early August he was back at Cicero Field where he became friends with experienced airman, Otto Brodie.That September, Powers damaged his Curtiss on take-off at the El Paso Fair in Illinois, but he wasn’t badly hurt.The cold Chicago winter of 1911 chased Brodie and Powers to the warm climate of Florida.There, Brodie offered flying lessons with his Farman, at St. Augustine . Whether Powers was still with Brodie at the time is not clear, but the school quickly failed.Powers was back in Chicago by April 1912. In July he returned to Oshkosh, with “Tony” Stadlman as his mechanic.


HOME TOWN HERO Powers contracted to make several flights in Wisconsin between July 4 and July 20, 1912.The local press coverage of the first flight best describes when Oshkosh’s home- town hero made daily headlines. July 4, 1912.The event organizers


had arranged for Powers to take off, fly and land at Electric Park, south of the city on the shore of Lake Winnebago. Additional “interurban” street cars were put into service from downtown Oshkosh to the park, and the Oshkosh Steamboat


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Company booked a special morning trip for hundreds of lucky spectators to watch from the lake.Powers, accompanied by Agnes, set up his “hangar tent” near the shore where he, his father, and Stadlman, readied the aircraft to be pushed down the “runway” to the shallow water. The next day the Northwestern reported, “It required perhaps ten minutes to get the machine safely down to the water. And during this operation and while Mr. Powers prepared to fly, dozens of cameras were busy. Mrs. Powers, wife of the aviator, was one of the most interested persons on the scene. She stood on the runway while her husband soared. It was the first time, she said, that she had witnessed one of his flights from start to finish, although she has been with him in the different places where he has flown.The aviator’s wife also manipulated a camera.”Powers climbed onboard and started the 50hp Roberts engine which could be heard for miles as he taxied past the buoys in a blurry splash then rose above the cheering crowds below.The Northwestern continued: “Tony” Stadlman was one of the happiest of men when Mr. Powers was safely in the air.Mr. Stadlman has worked for months on the machine, helping to strengthen and improve various parts, and he is indispensable to Mr. Powers.Once the aviator was


in the air, his assistant seemed to relax, and as he waded quietly to shore, his shoulders were dropped, and all the nervous energy which characterizes his well-directed movements was lacking.“I am glad Harry is up safely,” he said.” Always within sight of the park,


Powers’ flight lasted only six minutes at an altitude under 500 feet but it caused a sensation.A few years later the residents of Oshkosh learned first-hand how dangerous exhibition flying could be. In 1916, Powers returned to visit


his family and watch an air show on July 25 at Oshkosh. The featured aviator was Charles Franklin Niles who had graduated from the Curtiss school in 1913 and had made exhibition flights in China and Japan in 1915.In 1916, after appearing in the Philippines, he returned by ship to the US. Onboard he met the woman he would soon marry.Before Niles stepped into his biplane, Powers shook his hand and wished him luck. Known as “Charles Do-Anything Niles, for his dangerous stunts, he easily ascended to make several loops.As spectators, including Niles’ bride of six weeks watched, Niles’ airplane suddenly crumbled mid-air. He plunged into a field at nearby Nordheim and was fatally injured. The following day the Northwestern reported, “The young woman was


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