From Tennessee farm boy to famous aviator and respected entrepreneur, Walter was a driving force in the commercial aviation industry for 33 years.
When the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Walter Herschel Beech was working as a trained chauffer and automobile engine mechanic for the White Motor Company in Minneapolis, Minnesota. In 1911, he had left the family farm near Pulaski, Tennessee, to seek his future elsewhere. During his employment with White, he was responsible for the overhaul and repair of engines used in the company’s heavy-duty trucks as well as various six- and eight-cylinder engines that powered Packard, Pierce-Arrow, Rolls-Royce and other expensive limousines that he drove and maintained for officials of the Union Investment Company. His manager, C.M. Haviland, praised Walter for being a “sober and industrious” young man who, by 1915, had evolved into a “first-class mechanic and an excellent driver.”1
Beech’s initial attraction to aviation came soon after he relocated to Minneapolis when he purchased the wreck of a Curtiss biplane in 1914 and rebuilt the aircraft. During July and August 1914, he managed to make a series of short flights before gradually flying higher, farther and longer as his piloting skills improved. 2
When war came to America, Beech decided that “he should be of some service to his country” and resigned his position with White. He enlisted in the United States Army and was given the rank of sergeant on Nov. 9, 1917, and assigned to the Army Signal Corps at Kelly Field, San Antonio. In January 1918, he was transferred to the 328th Aero Squadron Aviation School at Rich Field near Waco, Texas.
Initially he was tasked with various administrative and executive responsibilities, where he won the praise of his commanding officer, Major John G. Whitesides, for exhibiting “splendid ability, untiring zeal and exceptional worth.” Whitesides considered Beech to be “an airplane motor expert” and reassigned him to Captain Charles R. Forrest, who was responsible for maintaining the engines of more than 400 Curtiss JN-4D, Curtiss JN-6H and de Havilland DH-4 biplane trainers based at Rich Field.
Becoming a pilot
When the war ended in November 1918 Walter remained in the Army Signal Corps, and with help from his squadron officers, he eventually qualified for training as an Army aviator.3 On June 18, 1919, Sgt. Beech climbed into the rear cockpit of a JN-4D and received his first hour of dual instruction. He soloed on July 9, then he accumulated 52 hours in the air to complete the Army’s program and earn an enlisted pilot designation.
Credit: Walter and Olive Ann Beech Collection, Wichita State University archives, Special Collections
By 1920 Beech realized there was little opportunity for advancement in the Army, and in June he was honorably discharged. Major Whitesides wrote a letter of reference for Walter, describing him as “a most capable and efficient non-commissioned officer” whose departure would “leave a vacancy which by no means will be easy to fill.”
Fortunately for Beech, he was able to find employment as a pilot for the Williams-Hill Airplane Company, Arkansas City, Kansas. In April 1921, the company’s hangar and seven airplanes were destroyed in a fire, and Beech traveled to Wichita, Kansas, where he found part-time work with the Wichita Laird Airplane Corporation led by E.M. “Matty” Laird. Laird was building a small number of open-cockpit, three-place biplanes called the Swallow.
In an interview with the author in 1982, Laird recalled that Beech was “a pilot of limited experience” and that he “washed out a Swallow in his first week with the company.” Eventually, Walter became a demonstration pilot and competed in air races, earning the company much-needed revenue. When Laird resigned in October 1923, the business was renamed the Swallow Airplane Manufacturing Company under the control of Melvin “Jake” Moellendick.
The Travel Air era
Late in 1924, Walter, along with designer Lloyd C. Stearman, joined forces with aviation pioneer Clyde V. Cessna and local businessman Walter P. Innes, Jr., to form the Travel Air Manufacturing Company. Its first airplane was the Model A powered by the ubiquitous Curtiss OX-5 engine and featuring a front cockpit for two passengers. Beech was in charge of sales and marketing, Stearman was chief designer and Cessna provided money and shop equipment to begin series production of the biplane.
In September 1925, Beech was one of three Travel Air pilots to receive a perfect score during the National Air Tour for the Edsel B. Ford Reliability Trophy. In August 1926, pilot Beech and his navigator Brice Goldsborough won the second Ford Reliability Tour flying a specially modified Travel Air Type BW powered by the new Wright J4 static, air-cooled radial engine rated at 200 horsepower. In January 1927, however, Beech became president of Travel Air after Stearman and Cessna resigned to establish their own companies.
Demand for new airplanes built by Travel Air, Cessna, Stearman, Waco and many other airframe companies surged in the wake of Charles A. Lindbergh’s epic solo flight from New York to Paris in May of that year. In August 1927, Beech supervised construction of two Type 5000 cabin monoplanes – the “Oklahoma” and the “Woolaroc” – to compete in the highly publicized Dole Race from California to the Territory of Hawaii. The Woolaroc emerged victorious, winning the first prize of $25,000.4
By late in 1927 Walter realized that the days of open-cockpit flying were waning rapidly, particularly for the businessman who recognized the benefits of flying. Late that year he conceived plans to build a cabin monoplane designed specifically for business aviation. The result was the Type 6000, which made its first fight in April 1928. Soon, Hollywood personalities including actor Wallace Beery and major corporations such as Black & Decker, Phillips Petroleum and Continental Oil Company ordered airplanes custom-built for their transportation requirements.
By 1930, more than 200 of the Type 6000B and A6000A had been delivered and 60% of Travel Air production was monoplanes. Travel Air was the nation’s leading manufacturer of lightweight private and business airplanes. Sales had soared to new heights in 1928 and 1929, and Beech’s leadership had not gone unnoticed on Wall Street.
In March 1929, the company had set an all-time sales record for one month – $300,000. By June, the factory and its 600 workers were building as many as 20-25 airplanes per week but could not meet demand. Travel Air’s performance finally caught the attention of the Curtiss-Wright Airplane Company and Travel Air became a subsidiary in August 1929. Walter Beech was an important part of that merger and became a vice president of the Curtiss-Wright Corporation. Reflecting on his success and notoriety, Walter reportedly told the Wichita press, “I’m just a country boy. Get a picture of me when I first came to Wichita. I’ve made good and I’m not afraid to say so.”
Despite a highly successful sales year at Travel Air, the debacle on Wall Street in October 1929 suddenly and ruthlessly crushed demand for new airplanes nationwide. Layoffs soon began, and airplane production plummeted. There was, however, one very bright spot in Beech’s life. In February 1930 he married the company’s office manager, Miss Olive Ann Mellor. Clyde Cessna, who hired her early in 1925, recalled that Beech had always admired the slender girl with a fondness for polka-dot dresses.
Returning to Wichita to take a bold step
By 1932 the stock market was still in shambles. Millions of people were out of work. Businesses and banks had failed by the thousands. New airplanes sat unsold despite deep discounts of up to 50%. Beech knew there was little hope of a bright future with Curtiss-Wright. It was against this dark and gloomy economic backdrop that Walter and Olive Ann Beech decided to relocate to Wichita and form the Beech Aircraft Company.
Despite the deepening financial depression, Walter believed that a market still existed for a fast, four-place aircraft aimed at executive and corporate travel. All he needed was an airplane, and in early 1932 Curtiss-Wright engineer Theodore “Ted” Wells completed design work on a cabin biplane featuring a negative-stagger wing configuration. He calculated the aircraft, powered by a Wright R-975E-2 radial engine rated at 420 horsepower, would have a maximum speed approaching 200 mph, a range of 800-1,000 statute miles and a landing speed of only 60 mph. It would become the Beechcraft Model 17R1.5
Walter resigned from Curtiss-Wright in March 1932. He preferred to risk failure building the first Beechcraft in the midst of a Great Depression than descend into oblivion behind a corporate desk. To honor his return to Wichita, on May 3 the Wichita Chamber of Commerce hosted a lavish dinner in the Spanish Ballroom of the Hotel Lassen. The gala celebration was deeply appreciated by Walter and Olive Ann.
After seven months of construction in two leased buildings of the defunct Cessna Aircraft Company, the first Beechcraft was completed and prepared for its maiden flight on Nov. 5, 1932. Walter was pleased that Wells’ biplane had attained a maximum speed of 201 mph. His dream of creating his own company had become a reality.
During his distinguished career, Walter logged more than 10,200 hours in the air. He held transport pilot certificate No. 534 and in 1948 was issued a commercial license with single-engine (land) privileges by the Civil Aeronautics Administration.
Although most people who knew Walter addressed him as “Mr. Beech,” Olive Ann simply called him “Popper.” The couple had two daughters, Suzanne (married Thomas N. Warner) and Mary Lynn (married William L. Oliver). In addition to his passion for aviation, Beech was an avid hunter who enjoyed duck hunting, shooting wild game and fishing, according to Mary Lynn Oliver. He also was an ardent fan of wrestling, and she recalled accompanying her father to matches when she was a little girl.
In 1940, Walter contracted encephalitis that affected his nervous system. He ceased flying in September 1941 and eventually was unable to drive an automobile. On Nov. 29, 1950, Walter H. Beech died. He was posthumously enshrined in the Aviation Hall of Fame on July 23, 1977, and was inducted into the Kansas Aviation Hall of Fame on Nov. 13, 1987.
During his career, the Tennessee farm boy had distinguished himself as a skilled pilot, mechanic, an expert salesman and a savvy entrepreneur who was not afraid to take risks despite the formidable odds stacked against him.6
Notes:
- Letter from C.M. Haviland dated July 27, 1917. Special Collections Department, Ablah Library, Wichita State University.
- Claims by Walter Beech that he soloed and flew in the Curtiss biplane were never substantiated by him or any other source.
- During the past 110 years a myth has persisted that Beech was a flight instructor during the war. He was not an instructor but became an Army aviator after the war.
- The “Woolaroc” was built by Travel Air but sponsored by Frank Phillips of the Phillips Petroleum Company based in Bartlesville, Oklahoma.
- Without Ted Wells’ cabin biplane design there probably would not have been a Beech Aircraft Company. He should be remembered as the third “founder” of the company.
- Walter Beech became a wealthy man after the merger of Travel Air with Curtiss-Wright. During 1932-1934 the infant Beech Aircraft Company came perilously close to failing financially. It was, in the words of Ted Wells, “a starving airplane company.”