Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
US marks 100 years since airmail took flight
IF YOU want to contact friends who live far away, what do you do? Call them on the phone? Send an e-mail or text?
What you probably don’t do is write a letter and drop it in a mailbox.
But 100 years ago, that’s what people did. Trains and trucks delivered the mail long distances. It took days, but people were happy they no longer had to depend on stagecoaches and steamboats.
On May 15, 1918, nearly 5 000 people jammed a field near the Potomac River in Washington DC. US President Woodrow Wilson was there, along with future president Franklin Roosevelt and inventor Alexander Graham Bell. School was cancelled so kids could also witness history: the first airmail service between Washington and New York.
It was a big deal in part because it was just 14 years after Wilbur and Orville Wright made the first successful airplane flight. Now, army pilots would be carrying the mail between the two cities, with a refuelling stop in Philadelphia. It was faster than travelling the 320km or so by land. More important, it cleared the way for the longer routes that soon followed.
The Post Office Department took over from the
Army after a few months, and over the next decade, airmail delivery began to boost the nation’s businesses and new airline industry.
This milestone in communication is being celebrated at the Smithsonian’s National Postal Museum with a year-long exhibit titled “Postmen of the Skies”.
The half-dozen exhibit rooms are packed with information about those early pilots. Lacking instruments, radios and even parachutes, they flew in all kinds of weather, peering out of open cockpits with maps strapped to their legs. LAST WEEK, the
Watershed at V&A Waterfront hosted a funfilled indoor adventure in the form of the SA launch of the PlayDate Superpark and the team-based puzzle game, HintHunt.
Held on May 10, the event showcased all kinds of fun family activities for people of all ages.
On the lower level of the Watershed was the Superpark; a giant family play area that included an obstacle course, a giant maze, a zipline, a mini golf course, and a Nerf gun play area, all of which were monitored by PlayDate staff.
Jonathan Goosen and his wife Chanette are the minds behind PlayDate and were extremely proud of how well-received their attraction was.
“The evening was a great success, we are super proud of our amazing staff and chefs for delivering their best and making it special. We are excited for the future and adding smiles to faces,” said Jonathan.
On the upper level was the
Airmail was a hit with the public. There were card and board games with tiny metal planes that raced around the country like the Scottie dog on a Monopoly board. For $9 (R112 at today’s rate), you could get a kidsize Air Mail Racer pedal plane. When Mickey Mouse starred in the 1933 cartoon The Mail Pilot, little pilot Mickeys flew off the toy shelves.
Many pilots, almost all of whom were men, relished being daredevils. Crashes were common. Of the nearly 200 who flew the mail between 1918 and 1926, more than 30 died while flying. Don’t show off, warned one of those pilots, E Hamilton Lee, who added: “There are old pilots and bold pilots, but no old, bold pilots.” – Washington Post