To mark the 100th anniversary of Travel Air Manufacturing Company’s formation in Wichita, Ed Phillips will give two days of talks about the pioneering airplane manufacturer this month.
“Here’s the thing,” Phillips said. “You could do ten, but I’m going to be reasonable about it.”
Phillips, an author and expert on general aviation, will speak as part of the Wichita-Sedgwick County Historical Museum’s Charles and Joanne McIwaine Speaker Series. His talks start at 2 p.m. on July 12 and 13. Admission is free.
No doubt many Wichita aviation enthusiasts share Phillips’ interest in Travel Air due to the people involved in its establishment — Clyde Cessna, Walter Beech and Lloyd Stearman — and its role in early general aviation.
“They were one of the largest aircraft manufacturers in the United States in the late 1920s,” Phillips said. “After Lindbergh, aviation just boomed.”
“They weren’t the only ones, but they built very good airplanes.”
Phillips, who now lives in Prattville, Ala., went to work for Beech out of college in 1978 training customer-pilots and mechanics. He’s gone on to write nine books and over 1,000 articles on aviation and aerospace topics.
His July 12 presentation is built around three topics: how Travel Air came to be started; a 1927 California-to-Hawaii race won by its Woolaroc plane; and its Speedwing innovation that increased cruising speed.
His July 13 talk will cover the first women-only air race, in 1929; Travel Air’s revolutionary Scarlet Marvel plane; and the evolution of Travel Air factories in Wichita.
One thing he won’t cover
“I think there’s been a lot of what I call hearsay history that has sprung up about Travel Air. My research, over 40-plus years, (shows) they got along just fine.”
In particular, Phillips said, “There was no disagreement between Clyde Cessna and Walter Beech about biplanes and monoplanes. It’s a long-standing myth. Mr. Beech was okay with bi-planes. Cessna was a monoplane guy and that was okay, too.”
Beech, he said, “didn’t care if it had one or two wings. He was just interested in what the market wanted.”
Stearman left Travel Air to start Stearman Aircraft (later merged with Boeing) in 1926; Cessna left the next year to start Cessna Aircraft Corp.; Beech and his wife, Olive Ann, founded the Beech Aircraft Co. (now Beechcraft) in 1932.
“They learned the business at Travel Air,” Phillips said. “When they started Beechcraft in 1932, they knew what they were doing.”
Phillips said the original partners in Travel Air “were all friends and they remained friends throughout their lifetime.”
“It’s a very rich history.”
