Page 21 - Volume 12 Number 4

At the El Paso control point, Earl had stretched his lead to more than one hour, but the western half of the nation still lay ahead. After a grueling ve days of hard ying, Cessna number 99 landed gently on the grass of Mines Field near Los Angeles, followed only one minute later by Dake and the American Moth. Rowland was of cially declared the winner in the Class A division, earning $5,000 for his efforts. Later that day he was given checks totaling $4,000 from the Rich eld and Kendall oil companies, sponsors of the event.
Including additional cash awards for achieving lowest elapsed times between certain control points, Earl corralled $10,910 to split between himself and Clyde Cessna. While attending the 1928 National Air Races (NAR), Earl entered number 99 in the 75-mile, “Free-for-All” race and easily won the event, adding another $1,200 to his winnings. In the wake of Earl’s victory, orders for the Model AW poured in to the Cessna of ces.2
Clyde’s next foray occurred in May 1929 when he entered two factory- sponsored aircraft – the prototype DC-6 cabin monoplane and a specially- built prototype mail carrier dubbed the CM-1 – in the inaugural Gardner Trophy Race sponsored by Russell E. and Fred W. Gardner. Unlike other competitions, the Gardner race was a full-throttle speed dash and cared nothing about ef ciency, load carried and elapsed time. The event consisted of two phases: a qualifying ight starting from ve widely separated locations in the United States, and a speed race from St. Louis to Indianapolis and return. The winners of the qualifying ights would earn $750, with the rst- and second-place nishers earning the right to y in the dash between cities. The victor in that event would take home $5,500.
The CM-1 was radically different from production Cessna ships with a modi ed Model AW wing mounted midway on the welded steel tube fuselage that was covered with laminated plywood to give it a rounded, smooth appearance. An open cockpit was located at the trailing of the wing and a large compartment for air mail was installed in the forward fuselage and accommodated up to 500 pounds of mail and express packages. The xed landing gear was adopted from the Model AW, and a tail skid supported the aft fuselage. The CM-1 was powered by a Wright Aeronautical nine-cylinder, static, air-cooled radial engine rated at 225 horsepower driving an adjustable- pitch steel propeller. The engine was nestled snugly beneath an NACA cowl.
When CM-1 was nally completed, there was little time for proper ight tests. Cessna had again enlisted the services of local pilot Earl Rowland, who with help from factory workers and mechanics, prepared the airplane as best they could before Earl took off for San Antonio, Texas. He ew unopposed from Texas to St. Louis, Missouri, easily winning his division. Rowland’s victory quali ed him for the speed dash that was scheduled for Memorial Day to coincide with the Indianapolis 500 automobile race. Unfortunately, the CM-1 suffered from a lack of power from the Wright radial and nished a disappointing and distant fth behind Charles “Speed” Holman ying a Laird LC-RJ-200 biplane and pilots Sydnor Hall, Art Davis and John Wood. The underpowered Cessna DC-6 own by Stanley Stanton was so slow it was not competitive and nished in last place.
During the months immediately after the stock market debacle on Wall Street struck America in October 1929, Wichita’s aviation industry was forced to its knees as sales of new airplanes slowly grounded to a trickle. By 1930 Walter Beech at Travel Air, Clyde Cessna and Lloyd Stearman were forced to lay off hundreds of workers.
Mr. Cessna was unhappy with the state of the U.S. economy, and in 1930 he turned to air racing as one way to help keep the doors of his company open. American Cirrus Engines, Inc. sponsored the All American Flying
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KING AIR MAGAZINE • 19