PART 1

A Few Pioneers

1898-1916

T he United States Navy's official interest in air-

planes emerged as early as 1898. That year the Navy

assigned officers to sit on an interservice board investi-

gating the military possibilities of Samuel P. Langley's

flying machine. In subsequent years there were naval

observers at air meets here and abroad and at the

public demonstrations staged by Orville and Wilbur

Wright in 1908 and 1909. All were enthusiastic about

the potential of the airplane as a fleet scout. By 1909,

naval officers, including a bureau chief, were urging

the purchase of aircraft.

It was in 1910 that a place was made for aviation in

the organizational structure of the Navy. That was the

year Captain Washington 1. Chambers was designated as

the officer to whom all aviation matters were to be

referred. Although holding no special title, he pulled

together existing threads of aviation interest within the

Navy and gave official recognition to the proposals of

inventors and builders. Before the Navy had either

planes or pilots he arranged a series of tests in which

Glenn Curtiss and Eugene Ely dramatized the airplane's

capability for shipboard operations and showed the

world and a skeptical Navy that aviation could go to sea.

Early in 1911 the first naval officer reported for flight

training. By mid-year, the first money had been appro-

priated, the first aircraft had been purchased, the first

pilot had qualified, and the site of the first aviation

camp had been selected. The idea of a seagoing avia-

tion force was beginning to take form as plans and

enthusiasms were transformed into realities. By the end

of the year a humble beginning had been made.

The need for more science and less rule of thumb

was apparent to Captain Chambers. He collected the

writings and scientific papers of leaders in the new

field, pushed for a national aerodynamics laboratory,

and encouraged naval constructors to work on aerody-

namic and hydrodynamic problems. The Navy built a

wind tunnel, and the National Advisory Committee for

Aeronautics was established. The first real study of

what was needed in aviation was conducted by a

board under Chambers' leadership and included in its

recommendations the establishment of a ground and

flight training center at Pensacola, Fla., the expansion

of research, and the assignment of an airplane to

every major combatant ship of the Navy.

Progress in these early years was marked by an

endurance record of six hours in the air; the first suc-

cessful catapult launch of an airplane from a ship; exer-

cises with the Fleet during winter maneuvers at

Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; and combat sorties at Veracruz,

Mexico. These were but some of the accomplishments

by pioneer pilots. Their activity furthered the importance

of aviation to the Navy. In 1914, Secretary of the Navy

Josephus Daniels announced that the point had been

reached "where aircraft must form a large part of our

naval forces for offensive and defensive operations."

1898

25 March Theodore Roosevelt, Assistant Secretary of

the Navy, recommended to the Secretary that he

appoint two officers "of scientific attainments and

practical ability" who, with representatives from the

War Department, would examine Professor Samuel P.

Langley's flying machine and report upon its practica-

bility and its potentiality for use in war.

29 April The first joint Army-Navy board on aero-

nautics submitted the report of its investigation of the

Langley flying machine. Since the machine was a

model of 12-foot wing span, its value for military pur-

poses was largely theoretical, but the report expressed

a general sentiment in favor of supporting Professor

Langley in further experimentation.

1908

17 September Lieutenant George C. Sweet and

Naval Constructor William McEntee were official Navy

observers at the first Army demonstration trials of the

Wright flying machine at Fort Myer, Va.

2 December Rear Admiral Willliam S. Cowles, Chief

of the Bureau of Equipment, submitted a report on

aviation prepared by Lieutenant George C. Sweet to

the Secretary of the Navy. The report outlined the