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"Wiley Post"
by Robert Carlin
Wiley Post wings the Lockheed Vega 5C Winnie Mae over an unknown landscape in this painting of one of the most recognizable aircraft and names of the golden age of aviation.
Lockheed Vega 5C Winnie MaeThe Winnie Mae, was a special Lockheed Model 5C Vega in which Post completed two around-the-world record flights and a series of special high-altitude sub-stratospheric research flights. It was named for the daughter of its original owner, F. C. Hall, who hired Post to pilot the plane, which had been purchased in June, 1930. With the consent of his employer, Post entered the Winnie Mae in the National Air Races and piloted the plane to the first of its records, inscribed on the side of its fuselage:
‘LOS ANGELES TO CHICAGO - 9 HRS. 9 MIN. 4 SEC. - AUG. 27, 1930.’
On 23 June, 1931, Post, accompanied by Harold Gatty as navigator, took off from New York to make a world circuit in record time. The first stop was Harbor Grace, Newfoundland. From there, the fourteen-stop course included England, Germany, Russia, Siberia, Alaska, Canada, thence to Cleveland, and finally to New York on 1 July, 1931. The circuit was completed in 8 days, 15 hours, and 51 minutes. Halls admiration for his pilot manifested itself in the gift of the Winnie Mae to Post.
Wiley Post spent the following year exhibiting the plane and conducting various flight tests. The airplane was groomed with an overhaul of the engine, and a radio compass and an auto pilot were installed. Both these instruments were at the time in their final stages of development by the Army and Sperry Gyroscope Company.
On 15 July, 1933, Post left New York. Closely following his former route but making only eleven stops, he made a 15,596-mile circuit of the earth in 7 days, 18 hours, and 49 minutes.
Post next modified the Winnie Mae for long-distance, high-altitude operation. He recognized the need to develop some means of enabling the pilot to operate in a cabin atmosphere of greater density than the outside atmospheric environment. Because of its design, the Winnie Mae could not be equipped with a pressure cabin. Post therefore asked the B. F. Goodrich Company to assist him in developing a full pressure suit for the pilot. Post hoped that by equipping the plane with an engine supercharger and a special jettisonable landing gear, and himself with a pressure suit, he could cruise for long distances at high altitude in the jetstream. On 15 March, 1935, Post flew from Burbank, California, to Cleveland, Ohio, a distance of 2,035 miles, in 7 hours, 19 minutes. At times, the Winnie Mae attained a ground speed of 340 mph, indicating that the airplane was indeed operating in the jetstream.Wiley Post died shortly afterward in the crash of a hybrid Lockheed Orion-Sirius floatplane near Point Barrow, Alaska, on 15 August, 1935. His companion, humorist Will Rogers, also perished in the accident.
Still Around...
The Smithsonian Institution acquired the Winnie Mae from Mrs. Post in 1936. Today, this famous Lockheed Vega can be seen in the new Stephen Udvar-Hazy Air Museum (a NASM extension center) near Dulles, Virginia.
2002 Wings Publishing
