The North Texas State Normal College Album 7

More from the North Texas State Normal College photo album.  The airplane, a true symbol of 20th century modernity makes it's return, along side a one room school house, a true symbol of  19th century rural America.  Click on NTSNC in the labels section to see the whole collection.

Aerial Photography

Yet another poorly made, no name stereo card.  This one commemorating aerial photography in World War 1.  Aviation in what was once called the Great war didn't begin with life and death dogfights.  The first military aviators were spotters, gathering information on troop movements.  They were successful enough that shooting them down became a military necessity.  And so was born the dogfight, the synchronized machine gun and eventually the bombing raid.  I always knew that photography could be dangerous.

Very Cool Sun Glasses

In the beginning there were flight goggles. (See yesterday's post.) When airplanes changed form open cockpits to enclosed flight decks, pilots no longer needed goggles, but they did need sun glasses. The first aviators were made from lenses removed from no longer needed goggles, wrapped in wire. I wonder if this young man is looking for airplanes in the sky.

Head In the Clouds

Feet in the snow. Do kids still admire pilots? I doubt it. There was something very romantic about earlier ages of aviation. Goggles, open cockpits, barnstorming, and of course, Lindbergh soloing the Atlantic when that was a good way to get killed. I was born in 1955, and we still looked up to the World War 2 fighter pilot when I was a kid.

Aviation

I run across these all the time; collections put together by dealers by theme, but otherwise not related. With my post of the flying family just a couple of clicks back, I thought it would be a good time to put up this aviation themed collection. As usual when purchasing a group like this, I'm drawn to some images more than others, and in some cases, I don't really have an interest in some of the pictures at all. But since I would prefer to err on the side of putting up too much rather than too little, I'm posting them all.

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To be born in 1955 is to be interested in airplanes. World War 2 had only ended a decade earlier and movies of fighter pilots and bombing raids were still an entertainment staple. Jets had come along, but prop planes were still common commercial air carriers. When I was 14 in 1969 man walked on the moon. A 75 year old person in 1969 would have been nine when the Wright Brothers made their first flight at Kitty Hawk, and would have been old enough to have clear memories of the announcement that man had flown a powered craft for the first time. A fast progression of technology. And too, it didn't hurt that my mother was from England and built Minerva engines for Spitfires during the war.

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The long shot of the control tower and terminal with the factory smoke stack to the right is labeled, "11/4/39 Broward Field Hartford, Conn." The two color photos are stamped, "THIS IS A KODACOLOR PRINT MADE BY EASTMAN KODAK EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY T. M. REGIS. U. S. PAT. OFF. Aug 20, 1948." Still flying prop planes out of a small airport. Note the cars parked on the edge of the tarmac. There is a date stamped on the picture of the two girls in the helicopter, MAY 1984" but that has to be when it was printed rather than taken. The hair is all wrong for the 80s. The picture that shows a few small planes lined up on a runway is stamped "AMERICAN PHOTO SERVICE NOV 9 1948." The photographer was clearly drawn to the sky since it's the main part of the composition. Written on the back of the Aviation Mechanics School with it's Army Air Force insignia, "Hanger 1510B we use it for school-we work inside, it's a pretty big place." The TWA wing tip, again a prop passenger plane, "Geneva." I suspect that the group picture wasn't taken at an airport but the plane in the background just barely qualifies it as an aviation themed photo, written in the margin, "Lorasine Schleminns, Bill Donlin, Gabriel Pea, Beth Donlin and Becky-Wash, D.C." The old lady with the leis, "Oct 9, 1950." This may have been her first flight. The group of people standing in front of the control tower, "Our group at the Lourdes, France airport before we left for Paris." And the plane on the grass field, "July 12, 1939 Bendix Airport. U. S. Army Bomber." I'm fascinated that so many of these people dressed up to fly. The last time I flew, I wore jeans and an old, comfortable shirt.

Crashed Plane World War 1

It's been awhile since I've put up any of these World War 1 press photos. Again, I know a lot about photo printing, but not much about press imagery. I think, but am not certain, that the originals are rotogravures. When I worked in the photo lab, I made a black & white copy neg from the one image and made a regular black & white print. The crashed plane is labeled, "German plane C.L. 111 a 3892-18 brought down between Montfaucon and Cierges." The other image is labeled, "A Breguet bomber. While the ground soldiers were pushing back the Germans through the Argonne bombing planes went forth each night to increase the enemy troubles. These bombers destroyed railway lines, supply bases and munitions dumps behind the lines. Photo by U.S. Air Service." Note the U.S. Official and Signal Corps U.S.A. logos.

Yale Aviation

Another of the old rotogravures (I think) from World War 1. The caption, "General view of the Yale unit's aviation station at Huntington Beach, L.I. ) I would guess that the L.I. stands for Long Island, New York.