Military and commercial aviation memorabilia

When it comes to aviation memorabilia, commercial aviation is often overlooked in favor of military aviation. After all, there's something very special about war birds that none of us can resist. Nevertheless, the history of commercial aviation, AKA the transport of human beings and/or goods, certainly deserves interest all of its own. We've sure come a long and interesting way, since the early days of "paid" aviation.

In the United States, passengers were already transported in 1913 by Silas Christofferson via hydroplane from San Francisco to Oakland harbors, while a Benoist flying boat flew passengers from Tampa to St. Petersburg, Florida in 1914. The Lawson C-2 (1919) was the first multiengine airplane designed for commercial air travel, but it was too expensive. Lawson then built his more efficient L-4, which crashed on its test flight and discouraged the development of large planes. In 1920 Inglis Uppercu began scheduled international passenger flights from Key West, Florida to Havana. Then there was “Aeromarine Airways” which had 15 flying boats and made 2,000+ flights with 10,000 passengers.

The real birth of U.S. commercial air transportation was when Walter T. Varney began contract airmail services from Pasco, Washington, and Elko, Nevada, through Boise, Idaho. Seven years after the first official airmail flight, 1925, U.S. Post Office airplanes sent 14 million letters, packages a year. The 1926 Air Commerce Act authorized the Secretary of Commerce to plan air routes, build up air navigation systems, license pilots and aircraft, and investigate accidents. Enter: a national aviation policy!

In the 1920s Harry Guggenheim started a foundation for teaching aeronautical engineers and developing flight instruments. He funded Western Air Express to check if airlines could exist on passenger fares without airmail, which it couldn't yet. Fortunately investments in aviation stocks significantly rose between 1927 and 1929, brought about by Charles A. Lindbergh’s flight to Paris.

By the end of the 1920s travelers could still cross the country faster by train than by air. In spite of this, airline passengers in the U.S. grew in number from 6,000 to 173,000 in the span of 1926 to 1929. U.S. Airlines flew the corrugated Ford Trimotor with capacity for 15 passengers.

In the 1920s aeronautical schools were founded that taught airplane engineering, design, and operation. New technologies encouraged commercial aviation expansion. Harry Guggenheim set up a full flight laboratory, which developed very helpful navigational tools like the barometer, artificial horizon and gyroscope and radio direction beacon for landing. Huge progress as it may seem, up to the 1930s it remained unprofitable for airlines to rely solely on passenger travel.

The history of commercial aviation between 1920 and 1930 is sufficiently rich and varied to warrant collecting its period aviation memorabilia.

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