On This Day in History

1927: Charles A. Lindbergh, a Captain in the Missouri National Guard’s 110th Observation Squadron, lands his Ryan Monoplane, the “Spirit of St. Louis,” in Paris on 21 May after the first nonstop solo flight across […]

  1908:    Lt Thomas E. Selfridge, the first US Army officer to fly an airplane, flies the White Wing at Hammondsport. It was Dr. Alexander Graham Bell’s second Aerial Experiment Association plane, and it had

1980:    After Mount St. Helens erupts, a C-141 from the 63 MAW at Norton AFB, CA and a C-130 from the 62 MAW at McChord AFB WA fly above the stricken area to provide communications

1948: Air Materiel Command asks Boeing to develop an American aerial fueling system, the flying boom, to overcome problems with the British hose system used on B-29s.

  1973: From Kennedy Space Center, a two-stage Saturn V launches Skylab 1 into orbit, where its two Solar Array System wings fail to deploy. These were partially repaired on subsequent missions. Skylab was America’s

1976:   TYPHOON OLGA. Through 1 June air rescue and recovery squadron helicop­ters save 734 flood victims.

1968: MEDAL OF HONOR. Lt Col Joe M. Jackson volunteers to rescue a three-man Air Force combat control team at Kham Duc. Before the rescue, enemy forces set the camp afire, overrun the forward outpost,

1918: The U.S. Army Air Service, American Expeditionary Forces, receives its first American-made DH-4, with a Liberty engine. It makes its first flight six days later.

1970:    MACKAY TROPHY. An AC-119K gunship attacks a heavily defended road section in SEA. Despite losing 15 feet of the aircraft’s right wing and an aileron, the crew destroys three enemy supply trucks and then

1949:    Henry H. Arnold is named General of the Air Force.  He had been made a five-star general of the Army in December 1944 and is thus the only person to hold the rank in two services.