THIS week we have a short story by renowned pulp author Frederick C. Davis. Davis is probably best remembered for his work on Operator 5 where he penned the first 20 stories, as well as the Moon Man series for Ten Detective Aces and several other continuing series for various Popular Publications. He also wrote a number of aviation stories that appeared in Aces, Wings and Air Stories.

This week’s story features that crack pilot for World News Reel, the greatest gelatine newspaper that ever flashed on a silver screen—Nick Royce! Davis wrote twenty stories with Nick for Wings magazine from 1928-1931.

Tip-Top, the biggest photoplay production corporation in the world, is still planning to add a news-reel to its releases, and they intended to buy up one of the existing independents. They were almost ready to buy, and their choice had narrowed down to either the Compass outfit or the World News. The reel they bought and gave their name would become the biggest in the world; the others would simply pass out. Compass was hell-bent on landing that deal.

This time Nick is sent out to cover a balloon race in western Pennsylvania that’s back on. Thanks to a bad engine in the Compass plane, Nick and Jim manage to get superior shots of the balloons launching—but when the Compass plane goes down in the wilds of Pennsylvania on the way home, Nick has to stop and aid the stricken crew, putting his own plane in danger!

From the July 1928 Wings, it’s Nick Royce in Frederick C. Davis’ “Flying Fire!”

It was his job! But when the fallen eagles called, Nick Royce, flyer, placed the unwritten law of the air above the demands of reel rivalry!

• Download “Flying Fire” (July 1928, Wings)

IN LOOKING through the September 1929 issue of Flying Aces for last week’s exciting tale of Handley Page bombers by Arch Whitehouse, the letters page had a lengthy letter addressed to the publisher Harold Hersey himself from William E. Barrett titled “Some Inside Dope on the Flying Industry.”

Here is that letter:

Mr. Harold Hersey
Editor: FLYING ACES.

Dear Mr. Hersey:

Back in 1914, a young man who had designed and flown his own plane while still in high school went to call on another young man who had just won considerable attention by designing the first airplane in America to fly with a motorcycle engine.

At that meeting a friendship was born that has endured through all of the years that have intervened since; it was the first contact of two careers that were fated to parallel and interweave through all of the long struggle which resulted in the “flying game” becoming the “aviation industry. The meeting took place in California and today, Richard Hardin, the caller, and Derek White, the young inventor, are together as the moving spirits of the Guardian Aircraft Corporation of St. Louis.

There Is a lot of color and romance In these two careers which have been woven into the strange pattern from which the aviation industry was cut. Pilots, designers, instructors; the two men moved in different localities and lost sight of each other for years And yet continued to climb in the same direction: contributing much to aviation as they climbed.

In 1913, White had become a serious student of aviation while with the Glenn L. Martin Company, government contractors. At that time the field was wide open to the experimenter and there was little public interest except in the “stunts” and the novelty features of flying.

White experimented with a motorcycle motor and a light plane. His experiments were successful and he had the thrill of flying his own ship in a day when very few men had even experienced the thrill of being “aloft.” About the same time, A.V. Roe, who was ultimately to win fame as the designer of the famous Avro plane of war history, was conducting similiar experiments in England. He, too, was successful.

Hardin was still in high school; an adventurous youth who was greatly impressed with the studies of bird flight, conducted by the physics professor, H LaV. Twining, designer of the Twining Ornithopter, a plane that operated with flapping wings. He, too, succeeded in building and flying a ship of his own design and when word of White’s achievement reached him, he waa anxious to meet this other pioneer and compare experiences.

“Right there at that meeting,” says Hardin, “I cemented my decision to make flying my life work. It was hard to see any future in it at that time but after White and I talked it over, I caught a flash of his enthusiasm. I have never regretted it.”

For the next few years the trails of the two experimenters diverged. White started his own airplane plant and operated it under the name of the White Aircraft Works daring the years 1915, and 16. It was a losing venture, in the long run, as the public was not yet ready to accept aviation as a serious factor in the life of the Nation. Hardin, during this time, was a member of the National Guard of California and was continuing his experiments with new designs, many of which he later used. He built and flew several ships of his own In these years, but like White, found very-little profit in the game.

Late in 1916 and in 1917. White temporarily deserted aviation but couldn’t get far away from it. The thrill of speed and motion and adventure was in his blood. He went into the auto racing game and drove a Mercer on all of the big tracks of the West; Los Angeles, Bakersfield, Phoenix, etc. In between races, he designed the first trimotor monoplane in the United States for the proposed trans-Paciflc flight of Lieutenant W.P. Finlay.
It is a good indication of conditions at the time that the plane was never finished because of the lack of financial backing. The attempt, however, started something. Up till that time no one had ever put a tri-motored monoplane on paper. From then on many designers experimented with this type of ship and today the greatest transport planes are of this type.

April of 1917 brought the war, with opportunity for Hardin and disaster for White. The same week that war was declared, White crashed into a fence in a fiercely contested auto race in which he and Roscoe Sarles vied for public favor. The next fourteen months were spent in hospitals and on crutches.

Hardin had joined the French Flying Corps a year and a half before the United States entered the war, with the hope of getting into the famous Lafayette Escadrille. He was disappointed in this ambition but he saw plenty of air action with a French Chasse squadron assigned to the front line.

His office in the Guardian Aircraft Plant today is decorated with pictures drawn by an artistic buddy of his, showing him in action at the front and hailing him as the “greatest trench straffer of them all.” He left the French service with the “Croix de guerre with one palm and with the medal militaire.”

During his convalescence, White turned to his skill with the pen for a living while more active pursuits were denied him. Newspaper and sales promotion work enabled him to carry on during this period and he worked for such accounts as Durant Motor, Pennzoil and the Columbia Tire Corporation. He also scored a newspaper scoop that was notable on the Pacific Coast, obtaining pictures of the take-off in the Navy flight to Hawaii, the P.N.1 and P.N.3, in the face of the official ban on photographers. These were the only pictures obtained.

Hardin, reluctant to abandon a military career that had allowed him a full measure af flying and adventure, went to Morocco with the Sheriffian Escadrille, composed mostly of American adventurers. This was a bombing unit flying under the colors of the Sultan in French bombing planes. It is credited with performing a notable part in the conquering of Abdel Krim.

The interval between his service in the two wars was filled by a year of design work with the Ordinance Engineering Corporation, builders of the Orenco plane. After the Riff excitement he returned to California and entered the employ of the Douglaa Company at Santa Monica, builders of the Douglas torpedo plane. He was instrumental here in the designing of several outstanding special planes built by the Douglaa people.

Meanwhile White was resisting the lure of aviation and building up a successful advertising agency on the basis of his service accounts.

“I did not, however, drop it as a fascinating hobby,” he says, “I continued to design planes and fly them. I could see, however, that at that time, it would take patience and capital to make money out of this new industry. I had the patience and I used it to get the capital.”

In 1926 the chance that he had been waiting for came. He got the opportunity of combining his knowledge of aviation with his sales promotion and business experience. Colonel G.C.R. Mumby, formerly in command of the Western Repair Depot in France and production officer in the British Air Service during the war, went into partnership with Charles A. Warren for the purpose of establishing a school on the West Coast. White was called in to lay out the plans for the school and to handle the advertising and publicity.

Here, for the first time since they met in 1914, the trails of Hardin and White again crossed. Hardin, fresh from an enlistment in the Navy where he had trained flying cadets and won his bars as Engineering officer assigned to the Admiral’s staff, came to the Warren School as Chief engineer and Supervisor of Instruction.

White, however, did not remain long with the Warren School. His success as a pro-motor was so phenomenal that in 1927 he was sought by the Nicholas Beazley Airplane Company of Marshall, Missouri. He accepted the appointment as General Sales Manager of this concern and also established the Marshall Flying School. This school was an immediate success and Destiny prepared to deal a new hand to Derek White.

In the latter part of 1927 Oliver L. Parks and Harry P. Mammen conceived the idea of an Air College, using a field across the river and closer to the City of St. Louis than any field on the Missouri side could posslbly be. They sought a high grade promoter with experience as an instructor and organizer. All trails led to White. In February, 1928, he took charge of the newly organized Parks Air College under terms which led the organizers to bill him as “the highest priced air school executive in the United States.”

Parks Air College was a “natural.” At the end of six months it had signed more students than any school had ever signed in the history of aviation. A whole fleet of planes had been built up to meet the demands of the increasing army of students and the organizers of the College started to look around for new fields to conquer. They decided to build their own plane, and Parks Aircraft Corporation was born.

Once more Destiny tangled the skeins of two careers that had started practically side by side. A wire to California brought Lieutenant “Dick” Hardin on the scene to become Chief engineer of the new Company and Superintendent of all ground school activities.

By October the Parks Air College hud become the largest commercial flying school in the world and White became restless. The job for which he had contracted was done as far as he was concerned and there was no more thrill of the “uphill drag.” With his own capital he established the Guardian Aircraft Corp. and opened an office and small plant in St. Louis.

Hardin joined him in the new venture and in January, at the expiration of his contract with Parks Air College, White moved the Guardian Company to larger querters, at 2500 Texas Ave. He Incorporated, and with Hardin as his Chief engineer, settled down to the designing of a plane which would sell for two thousand dollars.

Today, the plane is emerging rapidly from the blue prints and taking on form under the hammer, the saw, the welder and the plane. The skeleton is spreading out and it is planned to have the plane ready for test by the middle of August. Already fifteen orders for Guardian monoplanes have been received unsolicited, sight unseen, from people who know and have confidence in the sponsors. A flood of inquiries and requests for dealerships are also being received daily.

That isn’t the whole story, though. No plant that Derek White is connected with would bo complete without a school; so the Guardian Ground School has been organised on a principle so different from any aviation school now in existence that it has been seized on avidly by the aviation trade publications as a new development within the industry.

“The idea for the school was a logical outgrowth of my own career,” says White. “I have served in every branch of the industry and I have been alarmed at the tendency to emphasize the rewards and the glamour of flying and to paint a picture of aviation as a ‘game.’

“It isn’t anything of the kind; it is an industry, the fastest growing industry in the world. It doesn’t need adventurers nearly as badly as it needs business men. That is what we are going to turn out in our school; men trained in the business of aviation. In addition to the usual ground work—design, engineering, maintenance, meteorology and all that, we are going to teach them selling, advertising, production and finance. We have the best laboratory possible by allowing them to work with us in the solving of the problems which arise in our own plant.”

There you are. Two men who have tasted practically everything that aviation holds maintain that its biggest rewards are going to go to the men who stay on the ground and are building a school to prove it. That is a new thought for the youth who wants to get into the “Air” business.

                                                        Yours truly,
                                                        William E. Barrett
                                                        207 Stroh Bldg.,
                                                        4641 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, Mo.

Here’s an ad for White’s Guardian Ground School from the April 1929 issue of
Popular Aviation and Aeronautics!

THIS week we have another gripping tale from the prolific pen of Arch Whitehouse! Whitehouse had numerous series characters in the various air pulps—Coffin Kirk, Buzz Benson, and The Casket Crew to name a few. Although this week’s story does not feature any of his series characters, it is Whitehouse’s first story about Handley Page Bombers—the very bombers that The Casket Crew would fly!

Here, Whitehouse tells the tale of Air Mechanic Robert Townley who, through the misfortunes of war, works his way from the belly of a great Handley Page dropping bombs to front gunner and eventually to piloting the whole plane when the pilot is killed. From the September 1929 Flying Aces it’s Arch Whitehouse’s “Bombing Eagles!”

Editor’s Note: This gripping story of Handley Page Bombers is the first of its kind ever written. Arch Whitehouse, the author, is an ex-war Ace whom you all know. He holds an enviable fighting record as a flyer overseas from 1914-1920. At present he is our technical editor of SKY BIRDS and Flying Aces, as well as the editor of Plane Dope and Happy Landings, our well known departments of last minute flying news. He has handled all types of fighting planes on hundreds of perilous flights. This is one of the finest stories we have ever published. We hope you will enjoy reading it as much as we have.

• Download “Bombing Eagles” (September/October 1929, Flying Aces)

“HAW-W-W-W-W!” That sound can only mean one thing—that Bachelor of Artifice, Knight of Calamity and an alumnus of Doctor Merlin’s Camelot College for Conjurors is back to vex not only the Germans, but the Americans—the Ninth Pursuit Squadron in particular—as well. Yes it’s the marvel from Boonetown, Iowa himself—Lieutenant Phineas Pinkham!

It was just too bad they hadn’t started the Caterpillar Club away back in 1918. But you can’t blame them—they didn’t know they were cheating Phineas “Carbuncle” Pinkham out of his one and only chance to join!

From the November 1932 number of Flying Aces!

• Download “Good to the First Drop” (November 1932, Flying Aces)

THIS week we have story by John Scott Douglas. Douglas was a prolific pulp author who generally wrote aviation and adventure fiction. His stories appearing frequently in the pages of Sky Birds, Flying Aces, and Sky Fighters.

“The Zep Buster” tells the story of young Bud Talbot—a crack shot on the training planes at Spike Center, Arizona. He has a record so good, it’s held up as an example to all the would-be pilots that have been slacking off; this includes a childhood tormentor of his who just happens to be training there as well, Milt Laramy. Unable accept his own shortcomings, Milt cuts Bud down verbally saying he’s a coward and a mama’s boy every chance he gets. And when they are both assigned to the same squadron in Isoudon, Milt only ramps it up. But War proves who has what it takes and who’s the shrinking coward.

From the July 1929 Sky Birds, it’s John Scott Douglas’ “The Zep Buster!”

If you want to be thrilled to the marrow; if you like blazing air stories; if you have any sympathy for the under dog—read this gripping yarn. Hot action! What more could you want?

• Download “The Zep Buster” (July 1929, Sky Birds)

AS A bonus, here’s a brief bio of sorts from the back book jacket cover of The Secret of the Undersea Bell, winner of the Boys’ Life-Dodd, Mead Prize Competition!

JOHN SCOTT DOUGLAS tells us: “It was more to keep my hand in at typing than because of any literary aspirations that in my early years I published scores of brief items in a country newspaper and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, a column in my high-school paper, and contributed to the University of Washington Columns. Not until I entered the Graduate School at Harvard, however, did I attempt to write for national magazines. Of the many scripts written during my two years at Harvard but few sold. Nevertheless, at twenty-one, when my first substantial check for a story reached me the day I received my master’s degree, I went to New York, determined to write for a living. Since then I’ve published somewhat over a thousand scripts—fiction from short-shorts to novels, and non-fiction in both article and book lengths.

“Much of this output was based on material gathered in travel through many of our states and three trips to Alaska and seventeen foreign countries of Europe, the West Indies, Central and South America. I am convinced that no amount of research an author can do will give him material as vital as that picked up first hand.

“My hobbies of mountain and desert camping, fresh and salt-water fishing, bee-keeping and photography have a way of creeping into my stories and nonfiction pieces. However, my most interesting personal experiences have been the many months I’ve spent at sea on all manner of ships and boats ranging from freighters to Indian dugouts. 1 was the first writer permitted to make the Westward Cruise on America’s largest lighthouse tender, the Coast Guard cutter Cedar. Some of my most fascinating experiences have been on California fishing boats—purse-seiners, tuna, swordfishing and abalone boats. I’ve spent several months with the deep-sea divers who pry shellfish known as abalones from undersea ledges. When resting after several turns below, the abalone fishermen have been kind enough to put me down in their diving dresses.” The Secret of the Undersea Bell, winner of the Boys’ Life-Dodd, Mead Prize Competition, is based on these first-hand experiences.

And look for more stories by JOHN SCOTT DOUGLAS this year!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

We’ve reached Buck Barton’s final adventure. From the December 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil is “Lost In Hunland!”

When this adventure ran in The Lone Eagle, it carried a tag that there would be another Buck Barton War-Air Adventure in Pictures in the next issue titled “Spandau Treachery”—

But that adventure never saw the light of day if it was ever even written.

Gilkison would revisit Buck Barton in a way when he created the character of Rex Darrell, The Flying Fox, for More Fun Comics in 1938. Darrell’s Flying Fox was a modern day version of Barton’s Flying Devil. The stories were present day rather than set during the Great War; Darrell was fighting international air pirates rather than Barton’s battles against the Germans; and Darrell worked with a copilot, “Buzz” Blair, while Barton was solo. The one thing that links the two most is their choice of headgear. Darrell wore an aviator’s cap with rather pronounced fox ears much like Barton’s devil horned helmet he sported in the first few episodes.

Gilkison’s The Flying Fox debuted in More Fun Comics 37 (Nov 38). He flew his plane, the Dawn Streak, one of the fastest ever built, through 13 adventures. His final appearance in the magazine was in issue 51 (Jan 40) in the story whose last panel indicates the action was to be continued, but it sadly never was.

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the November 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “The Sinister Zeppelin!”

Next Time: Lost in Hunland!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the October 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “The U-Boat Menace!”

Next Time: The Sinister Zeppelin!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the September 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “The Mystery Drome!”

Next Time: The U-Boat Menace!

And as a special Christmas Bonus, we give you a holiday themed Pinky Dinky strip from 1929!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the August 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “The Lost Squadron!”

Next Time: The Mystery Drome!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the July 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “The Dog-Fight Treachery!”

Next Time: The Lost Squadron!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the June 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “A Sinister Boche Plot!”

Next Time: The Dog-Fight Treachery!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the May 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “Sky Doom!”

Next Time: A Sinister Boche Plot!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the April 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “The Ghost Gotha!”

Next Time: Sky Doom!

THIS holiday season we’re going all in on The Flying Devil! The Flying Devil was a regular feature of the first fifteen issues of The Lone Eagle and, more importantly, as they announced beneath each month’s story—“the Only War-Air Cartoon Story to Appear in Any Magazine!” The strip was drawn by Terry Gilkison and features the exploits of Buck Barton, a.k.a. The Flying Devil, as he wages a one man war against the Germans in his Spad with the devil on the fuselage.

From the March 1934 issue of The Lone Eagle, it’s Terry Gilkison’s The Flying Devil in “The Death-Ray Tubes!”

Next Time: The Ghost Gotha!