Oklahoma Journeys
Week of November 18, 2007
Wiley Post
Today, traveling by airplane doesn’t strike many of us as a spectacular feat. For many people, flying for business or pleasure is just as common, maybe even more so, than traveling by car. At one time, though, the field of aviation represented the ultimate example of our technological advancement. The ringleader of that era was Wiley Post, and his story is the topic of this week’s Oklahoma Journeys from the Oklahoma Historical Society.
From the Oklahoma Historical Society, this is Oklahoma Journeys: Celebrating Our Centennial. I’m Michael Dean.
Today, flying in an airplane, while exciting to first-timers, is something that most people take for granted. We, as a society, are fast losing the memory that at one time the field of aviation was equal to space flight, and that what we today would call ordinary pilots were heroes of their era. One of the greatest of these aeronautical pioneers was Wiley Post. This week we’re celebrating the anniversary of his birth, taking place on this week in 1898.
Although he was born in Texas, it didn’t take the Post family long to see the light and head north to Oklahoma. The Post family called Maysville home, and Wiley Post always considered himself to be an Oklahoman. Post lost his left eye in an oilfield accident in the mid-1920s then used the insurance settlement to purchase his first airplane.
In 1925, Post helped famed Oklahoma humorist Will Rogers make it to a rodeo providing the beginning of a lifelong friendship. Post, along with his favorite and best-known airplane, the Winnie Mae, a Lockheed Vega, began making headlines in 1930 with his victory in the 1930 National Air Race Derby from Los Angeles to Chicago. He made the trip in 9 hours, 9 minutes, and 4 seconds. In 1931, Post, along with navigator Harold Gatty, made the first of two record-setting round-the-world flights. Post repeated that feat again in 1933. This time he not only made the trip solo but shaving almost a full day off his earlier record.
Funded by Bartlesville’s Frank Phillips of Phillips 66 fame, Post began experiments in high altitude flight. He worked with Goodyear to develop several early pressurized space suits, and in 1934, Post was the first human to discover and fly in the jet stream. Reaching an altitude of 50,000 feet, Post cruised in the jet stream, pushing the Winnie Mae, a 179-mile per hour aircraft, to over 340 miles per hour. Following this event, Post began routinely setting speed and flight records as he attempted on at least four occasions to complete a stratospheric transcontinental journey. All of these attempts were cut short, however, due to various mechanical failures.
Wiley Post’s own journey was cut short as well when he and fellow Oklahoman, Will Rogers, died in an airplane crash near Barrow, Alaska, in 1935.
You can see a replica of the Winnie Mae and learn more about the remarkable life and career of Wiley Post at the Oklahoma History Center in Oklahoma City on NE 23rd Street, just east of the state capitol. Oklahoma Journeys is a production of the Oklahoma Historical Society, dedicated to the collection, preservation and sharing of our state’s past. I’m Michael Dean.