1926 - Transportation

Transportation

Lufthansa has its beginnings in the Deutsche Luft Hansa Aktiegesellschaft created January 6 by a merger between Deutsche Aero Lloyd (DAL) and Junkers Luftverkehr that gives it a fleet of 162 aircraft comprised of 18 different types. Scheduled flights begin April 6 in planes bearing a flying crane logo designed in 1919 for a predecessor to DAL. The new German national airline acquires the 5-year-old German-Russian Dereluft airline and will be influential in the next few years in establishing Spain's Iberia, Brazil's Syndicato Condor, and China's Eurasia airlines. Lufthansa (it will adopt that name in 1933) gives Berlin's Tempelhof Airport new importance (see 1919); by 1936 Tempelhof will be Europe's busiest air-travel center.

The six-seat Stinson SM-1 Detroiter that takes off January 25 is the first airplane with a heated, soundproof cabin, an electric starter, and wheel brakes (see 1925). Inherently stable in flight, it enables Stinson Aircraft Co. founder Edward Stinson to raise $150,000, incorporate May 4, and give up his work as a stunt pilot (which has been paying him $100,000 per year). By year's end the company has sold 10 SM-1 Detroiters and begun developing three- and four-seat high-wing cabin monoplanes for business and personal flights (see 1929).

The first contract airmail flight takes off February 15 from Dearborn, Mich. (see Kelly Act, 1925). The all-metal Ford Pullman monoplane lands at Cleveland. Aviation pioneer William Bushnell Stout starts the first passenger airline, linking Detroit with Grand Rapids, Mich. (see 1925); he will sell it to United Aircraft and Transport in 1929. Scheduled airline service begins April 6: a Varney Air Lines two-seat Laird Swallow biplane piloted by Leon D. Cuddeback, 28, flies 244 miles on a contract mail route from Pasco, Wash., to Boise, Idaho, and proceeds to Elko, Nev., with 200 pounds of mail.

Detroit-born pilot Charles A. (Augustus) Lindbergh, 24, takes off from St. Louis April 15 on the first regularly scheduled mail flight between that city and Chicago. Lindbergh is chief pilot for Robertson Aircraft, whose owners Frank and William Robertson have three DH-4 biplanes (see 1927; American Airways, 1930).

The Air Commerce Act of 1926 passed by Congress May 20 establishes federal regulations with regard to air carriers, requiring that aircraft be inspected for airworthiness and bear identification markings on their exteriors; pilots must be tested for their aeronautical knowledge and pass physical fitness tests; Congress requires the federal government to build new airports, develop and maintain airways and navigational aids, and institute rules (Civil Air Regulations) governing altitude separation of planes (see Kelly Act, 1925). The Department of Commerce's Aeronautical Division is given responsibility and oversight duties for implementing the new law that encourages the growth of commercial aviation (see Airmail Act, 1930).

Trans World Airlines has its beginnings in the Western Air Express Co. (see 1930).

Northwest Airlines has its beginnings in the Northwest Airways Co. that begins service between Chicago and St. Paul (see 1934).

Lockheed Aircraft Corp. revives at Hollywood, Calif., as Alan H. Loughhead reunites after a 10-year hiatus with John K. Northrop (see 1916). The two obtain financing from local brick-and-tile manufacturer Fred S. Keeler, who puts up $25,000 for a 51 percent stock interest, they adopt the name Lockheed to profit from association with the now-successful automobile brake business of Alan's brother Malcolm, and they produce the high-speed Vega monoplane, basing it on their innovative single-bodied fuselage construction. Powered by a 424-horsepower Pratt & Whitney Wasp engine (see 1925) and able to carry six people, the Vega has a cruising speed of 185 miles per hour and a range of 1,000 miles, publisher William Randolph Hearst's son George buys the first one for $12,500, Lockheed moves to larger quarters at Burbank, and the Vega will be wildly successful, attracting some high-profile aviators (see 1929; Northrop, 1928).

The Benjamin Franklin Bridge opens to traffic July 1, spanning the Delaware River between Philadelphia and Camden, N.J., after 4½ years of construction. Designed by Kraków-born engineer Ralph Modjeski, now 65, and initially called the Delaware River Port Authority Bridge (it will be renamed in 1956), it has cost $45.2 million, its main span is 1,750-foot (533-meter) in length, and it is the world's longest suspension bridge thus far.

Engineer Washington A. Roebling of 1883 Brooklyn Bridge fame dies at Trenton, N.J., July 21 at age 89 after 38 years in retirement.

The Florida Keys link of the Florida East Coast Railway completed in 1912 is destroyed September 19 by a hurricane that further deflates the boom in Florida real estate (see real estate, 1925; 1935).

The Chief departs from Chicago's Dearborn Station November 14 to begin daily Santa Fe service between Chicago and Los Angeles with seven cars including four sleeping cars, a diner, a club car, and an observation lounge car. The 63-hour run will be reduced to 58 hours in 1929 and 56 hours in 1930 (see 1911; Super Chief, 1936).

Some 55 million passengers use New York's 16-year-old Pennsylvania Station, 44 million use the 13-year-old Grand Central Terminal, 27 million the Flatbush Avenue Station. Rail travel has enabled many New Yorkers to move from heavily congested parts of the city to various communities in Long Island, Westchester, and Connecticut. Roughly 80 percent of commuters on the Long Island Rail Road live in areas within 25 miles of Manhattan.

Greyhound Corp. is incorporated to compete with intercity passenger rail service (see 1922). Eastern Wisconsin Co. head Edwin Carl Ekstrom, 37, and his brother Robert have been operating Safety Motor Coach Lines between Grand Rapids, Mich., and Muskegon. They buy 52 buses from Frank Fageol, who has built them and who gives Carl a greyhound that its recipient promptly names "Bus"; the dog becomes the symbol of Safety Motor Coach Lines.

The Delta Queen launched at Cincinnati is a paddle-wheel passenger steamer designed for service between the Queen City and New Orleans. Fare for the 7-day trip on the Ohio and Mississippi rivers is $35.

Chrysler introduces the Imperial, a luxury model that will compete with Cadillac, Lincoln, Packard, and Pierce-Arrow.

The Pontiac motorcar introduced by General Motors is a renamed Oakland (see 1924).

The Model T Ford sells for $350 new with a self-starter but is losing ground to GM's Chevrolet (see 1922; Model A, 1927).

E. L. Cord's Auburn Automobile Co. acquires Duesenberg Automobile and Motor Co. (see 1924; Model L-29, 1929).

The Society of Automotive Engineers establishes S.A.E. viscosity numbers to standardize engine lubricating oils, assigning heavy oil the number 50, light oil the number 10 (see 1911).

Prestone is introduced by Union Carbide and Carbon (see commerce, 1917); the first ethylene glycol antifreeze for motor-vehicle radiators, it retails at $5 per gallon.

The Triplex Safety Glass Co. of North America is founded by U.S. entrepreneur Amory L. Haskell, who has obtained U.S. rights to the 1910 patent of Edouard Bénédictus. Haskell begins production on one floor of the Lipton Tea factory at Hoboken, N.J., and receives assistance from Henry Ford to build his own factory, but the initial price of safety glass is $8.80 per square foot and it costs a Cadillac owner $200 to replace all the glass in his car with safety glass (see 1927; Sloan, 1929).

Safety-glass windshields are installed as standard equipment on high-priced Stutz motorcar models.

Route 66 has its beginnings in a plan to link Chicago and Los Angeles with a 2,448-mile continuous highway that will be called the "Main Street of America," although it will not be "continuously paved" until 1937, after a major effort by otherwise unemployed youths working on road gangs under a federally-financed program. Tulsa, Okla., entrepreneur Cyrus Avery and Springfield, Mo., promoter John Woodruff have championed the idea of a route that would link predominantly rural communities with a national thoroughfare to facilitate shipping of farm produce to market. The 18-foot-wide road will take truckers and motorists west via St. Louis, Joplin, Oklahoma City, Amarillo, Gallup, Flagstaff, Winona, Kingman, Barstow, and San Bernardino; it will be lined with motor courts, Burma-Shave signs, two-pump service stations, and curio shops, trucks will use it to carry California farm products east.

Waltham, Mass., inventor Francis W. (Wright) Davis, 38, patents a power-steering unit and installs it in a 1921 Pierce-Arrow Runabout. Formerly chief engineer of Pierce-Arrow's trucking division, Davis and his master craftsman George Jessup will demonstrate the power-steering unit to Detroit automakers beginning next year, but commercial production of cars with power steering will not begin until 1951.

U.S. auto production reaches 4 million, up nearly eightfold from 1914 (see 1927).

The Mercedes-Benz supercharged SS sportscar is introduced by the new German motorcar giant Daimler-Benz created by a merger of Daimler Motoren-Gesellschaft with Firma Benz & Cie. (see 1886; Jellinek, 1901; diesel, 1936). Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and his friends drive Benz motorcars, but Germany's upper classes tend to prefer Maybach and Auto Union products such as the Audi and Horch.

Harvey Firestone leases a million acres for 99 years and opens Liberia to rubber cultivation (see 1924). He has promoted rubber-tree plantations in the Philippines and in South America since 1900, become Ford Motor Company's major tire supplier, and will plant 6,000 acres to rubber trees in the next decade.