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  • On this day in Florida history - August
    • Aug. 15, 1887 - Eatonville becomes one of first all-black towns in U.S.
    • Aug. 13, 2004 - Hurricane Charley kicks off unusually active 'cane year
    • Aug. 12, 1981 - Developed in Boca Raton, first PC released by IBM
    • Aug. 11, 1987 - Santeria church vows to sacrifice animals despite Hialeah ban
    • Aug. 10, 1981 - Tragic discovery confirms death of missing Adam Walsh, 6
    • Aug. 9, 1956 - Reporters look down noses covering Elvis in Daytona Beach
    • Aug. 8, 1896 - Cross Creek, Yearling author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings born
    • Aug. 6, 1868 - Great Seal of the State of Florida adopted by Legislature
    • Aug. 5, 1763 - Britain takes over Pensacola, expands slavery over two-decade Fla. rule
    • Aug. 4, 1842: U.S. gives free Florida land to settlers willing to fight Seminoles
    • Aug. 1, 1939 - Florida Highway Patrol formed; to begin with 60 troopers
  • On this day in Florida history - July
    • July 31, 1962 - Actor, tax evader Wesley Snipes born in Orlando
    • July 30, 1956: Delta Burke, star of tabloids and television, born in Orlando
    • July 28, 1896: With railroad into town, city of Miami incorporated
    • July 27, 1816: U.S. forces obliterate 300+ free blacks, Indians at 'Fort Negro'
    • July 26, 1876 - Daytona incorporated, named after founder Matthias Day
    • July 25, 1884 - St. Petersburg Times debuts as West Hillsborough Times
    • July 25, 1957 - Country star, actress Pam Tillis born in Plant City
    • July 23, 1836 - Cape Florida Lighthouse attacked by Seminoles
    • July 22, 1964 - First 536 home lots sold in new city of Coral Springs
    • July 21, 1821 - St. Johns and Escambia become first two Florida counties
    • July 20, 1969 - U.S. astronauts walk on the moon
    • July 19, 1952 - Skynyrd guitarist Allen Collins is born; stardom and tragedy await
    • July 18, 1940 - Winners of St. Pete mayor's safety slogan contest announced
    • July 17, 1821 - Spain officially transfers Florida to United States
    • July 16, 1943 - Former 'Canes, Dolphins, Cowboys coach Jimmy Johnson born
    • July 15, 1997 - Killer gigolo guns down Gianni Versace at South Beach mansion
    • July 14, 1921 - Florida's most famous 'cracker cowboy' dies at 58
    • July 13, 1927: Officials dump $250k in liquor into Gulf Stream
    • July 10, 1972 - First of two major party conventions opens in Miami Beach
    • July 9, 1957 - Pass-a-Grille and three other towns form St. Pete Beach
    • July 8, 2011 - Last space shuttle launched from Cape Canaveral
    • July 7, 1983 - 'Operation Everglades' drug bust rocks Everglades City
    • July 6, 2003 - 'Hillbillies' star Buddy Ebsen, raised in Orlando, dies at 95
    • July 5, 1928 - Elks begin arriving for 1st Florida national convention
    • July 4: Florida celebrates America's Independence Day
    • July 3, 1971 - Doors singer, Melbourne native Jim Morrison dies
    • July 2, 1961: Key West icon Ernest Hemingway dies; cats live on
    • July 1, 1951: St. Pete woman's burning death baffles investigators
  • On this day in Florida history - June
    • June 1, 1937 - Amelia Earhart leaves Miami to begin final voyage
    • June 2, 2008 - Bo Diddley, 79, dies at his home in Archer
    • June 3, 1961 - Arrest made in case that leads to 'right to an attorney'
    • June 4, 1939 - Jewish refugee ship turned away from Florida coast
    • June 5, 2013 - Zephyrhills woman, 84, claims $590 million Powerball jackpot
    • June 6, 1990 - Broward Judge rules 2 Live Crew album 'obscene'
    • June 7, 1928 - Two elections workers shot in Tampa ballot box heist
    • June 8, 1888 - First train rolls into terminus "St. Petersburg"
    • June 9, 1903 - Flagler's Breakers Hotel burns down in Palm Beach
    • June 10, 1991 - South Florida learns it will get new major league baseball team
    • June 11, 1953 - Sabal Palmetto palm becomes Florida's state tree
    • June 12, 1913: With first bridge, Miami Beach is open for business
    • June 13, 1974 - Askew appoints first female Cabinet member
    • June 14, 1966 - FSL's Miami and St. Pete set record for longest baseball game
    • June 15, 1822: City of Jacksonville founded, named after Andrew Jackson
    • June 16, 1955 - Judge Chillingworth and wife go missing
    • June 17. 1942 - German U-boat saboteurs land at Ponte Vedra Beach
    • June 18, 1983 - Sally Ride becomes first American woman in space
    • June 19, 1972 - Hurricane Agnes makes landfall in Panhandle
    • June 20, 2003 - Non-profit Wikipedia established in St. Petersburg
    • June 21, 1926 - Miami barbers don't want to be called 'chirotonsors'
    • June 22, 1990 - Florida bans thong bikinis in state parks
    • June 23, 1938 - Marine Studios, 'world's first oceanarium,' opens
    • June 24, 1987 - S. Fla's most famous resident, Jackie Gleason, dies at 71
    • June 25, 1981 - Dolphins QB Bob Griese retires after 14 seasons
    • June 26, 1964 - Governor orders extra police to riot-torn St. Augustine
    • June 27, 1964 - State tells Daytona: Stop price-gouging your tourists
    • June 28, 1911 - Big Cypress Indian Reservation created by President Taft
    • June 29, 1931 - Monticello hits 109 degrees -- hottest-ever for Florida
    • June 30, 1975 - Cher marries Daytona Beach's favorite son Gregg Allman
  • On this day in Florida history - May
    • May 1, 1562 - Jean Ribault arrives at St. Johns River, claims Florida for France
    • May 2, 1936 - Panama City Beach incorporated in Bay County
    • May 3, 1901 - Jacksonville burns to the ground
    • May 4, 1990 - Execution goes awry as flames, smoke shoot from head
    • May 5, 1961 - Alan Shepard becomes first American in space
    • May 6, 1965 - Rolling Stones play Clearwater, write 'Satisfaction' riff
    • May 7, 1940 - Voting machine shortages create long wait at polls
    • May 8, 1923 - Killings of work camp prisoners detailed in hearing
    • May 9, 1981 - Sinkhole swallows house, five Porsches in Winter Park
    • May 10, 1781 - Spanish Gen. Bernardo de Gálvez captures Pensacola
    • May 11, 1996 - ValuJet Flight 592 crashes into Everglades
    • May 12, 1997 - Tornado hits Miami, poses for photos, videos
    • May 13, 1955 - Jax fans chase Elvis after show, tear off his clothes
    • May 14, 1973 - Skylab launches new era of space study...and toys
    • May 15, 1947 - Florida State College for Women goes co-ed, renamed FSU
    • May 16, 1929 - Lake City mob lynches grocer after wife shoots chief
    • May 17, 1980 - Not guilty verdict triggers three days of rioting in Miami
    • May 18, 1955 - Educator Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune dies
    • May 19, 2004 - Drugstore chain owner Jack Eckerd dies at 91
    • May 20, 1913: Henry Morrison Flagler dies in his home at Palm Beach
    • May 21, 1956 - Police close beach after catching black, white teens talking
    • May 22, 1931 - Canned rattlesnake goes on sale from Arcadia
    • May 23, 1898 - School for Deaf & Blind issues first diplomas
    • May 24, 1931 - Writer develops Planet of the Apes storyline for Miami
    • May 25, 1961 - JFK challenges nation to land on moon within decade
    • May 26, 1845 - Florida holds first statewide election
    • May 27, 1965 - Mysterious land deal near Orlando revealed
    • May 28, 1935 - Now controversial "Old Folks At Home" becomes state song
    • May 29, 1967 - Woman jailed after 25 kids found in station wagon
    • May 30, 1989: Claude Pepper dies after 60 years of public service
    • May 31, 1539 - DeSoto comes to Florida, changes continent forever
  • On this day in Florida history - April
    • April 1, 1926 - Air Mail service begins in four Florida cities
    • April 2, 1513 - Juan Ponce de Leon lands in Florida
    • April 3, 2006 - Gators basketball team win first-ever national title
    • April 4, 1933 - NASCAR 2nd generation leader Bill France Jr. is born
    • April 5, 1925 - 'Great Miami Tornado' kills 5, destroys 250 homes
    • April 6, 1959 - Seminole Tribe votes to support building "Alligator Alley"
    • April 7, 1890 - Author, Everglades crusader Marjorie Stoneman Douglas born
    • April 8, 1923 - News of "lost" Tamiami trail blazers heats up
    • April 9, 1921 - Whites kicked out of West Palm Beach "colored" town
    • April 10, 1766 - John Bartram ends journey through Carolinas, Ga., Florida
    • April 11, 1986 - FBI shootout in Dade prompts cops' need for more powerful guns
    • April 12, 1981 - Space Shuttle launched for first time
    • April 13, 1951 - Marion County sheriff killed by forged check suspect
    • April 14, 1528 - Bumbling conqueror Pánfilo de Narváez lands near Tampa
    • April 15, 1896 - Henry Flagler's railroad arrives in Miami for first time
    • April 16, 1915 and 1917 - Aviation takes two steps forward
    • April 17, 1961 - U.S. launches failed Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba
    • April 18, 1957 - Florida to U.S.: Integration ruling unconstitutional
    • April 19, 1930 - First Publix store incorporated in Winter Haven
    • April 20, 1967 - Orange Juice becomes official state beverage
    • April 21, 1924 - NY's infamous 'Bobbed Haired Bandit' caught in Jax
    • April 22, 2000 - Elian Gonzalez seized in raid, returned to Cuba
    • April 23, 1982 - Keys secede from Union, create Conch Republic
    • April 24, 1965 - Orlando honors hometown astronaut with John Young Day
    • April 25, 1966 - Gov. Haydon Burns says his plane trailed by UFO
    • April 26, 1920 - Crop shippers seizing ice, creating shortage
    • April 27, 1969 - 1,000 students help during FSU admin building fire
    • April 28, 1985 - World's tallest sand sculpture built at Treasure Island
    • April 29, 1980 - U.S. braces for magnitude of Mariel Boatlift
    • April 30, 1915 - Broward County created, named after former governor
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Picture
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Daytona's Deadliest 
Air Crash: 
Aug. 10, 1937

The crash of an Eastern Airlines jet resulted in the first fatalities in seven years for the airline founded by World War I flying ace Eddie Rickenbacker
Picture
Eastern Airlines Crash Wreckage, August 10, 1937. Used by permission of Richard Kebabjian http://www.planecrashinfo.com/.
By Denny Bowden
Volusia History - Retracing

Florida's Past
Fifteen-year-old Morning-Journal paperboy Ron Edwards was riding his bike on dark streets at 4:40 a.m. that Tuesday morning, the 10th of August, 1937, when he “heard a plane go silent.” He didn’t recall hearing an explosion. It was stark silence that sent him pedaling like a banshee out of Daytona Highlands to race to the crash site.

   Strewn across the high spot of Mr. Ararat Cemetery was the fuselage wreckage of a DC-2 Eastern Airlines transport–the remains of what is still Daytona Beach’s deadliest airline crash.

   Felix Rawlins and three other men busy in the milking stable of Ralph Taylor’s dairy just to the north of the “Old DeLand Road” [today's Bellevue Avenue] were watching through the windows on that morning as the roaring aircraft accelerated down the runway of tiny Sholtz Field [today's Daytona Beach International Airport]. Then, two seconds after liftoff, “both motors caught fire at once. The plane tilted in the air and the left wing came off and the crippled ship coasted down about 200 yards towards the trees beyond the [air] field. It plowed into the ground and nosed over. One motor came loose and the fire in it went out."

Eastern Airlines was managed by the legendary World War One ace, Captain Eddie Rickenbacker, who refused to use the word “safe” in advertising even though Eastern had no passenger fatalities from 1930 to 1936.

The Wreckage–Deaths, Survivors, and Daytona’s Heroes

   At the wreck, one of the plane’s two engines was still burning in the dark, so Rawlins and the others smothered it with sand and turned to help the survivors. Two men had managed to exit the wreck, and they were sitting on the ground “just outside the plane,” and two other men were shouting for help. Inside the airplane it was silent.

   One man was “screaming and carrying on” – Colonel Jesus Triana-Marin, an officer from Mexico City. Taylor and another dairyman dragged him to safety, leaning him against a pine tree before turning to assist the other survivors. When they returned to the colonel a short time later, they were surprised to find the man seemingly dead, though newspaper accounts later reported that he died in the hospital around 10:30, six hours after the crash.

   Pilot Stuart Dietz was killed on impact, but co-pilot Robert R. Reed and three others were hurriedly loaded by Taylor and his men into their milk delivery trucks to drive them to the hospital. [Mt. Ararat is the African American cemetery situated at the highest point on the south side of Bellevue Avenue just to the east of Clyde Morris Boulevard.] 

   In 1937, though, there was no direct road from Mt. Ararat to the hospital, so they had to drive east on Bellevue Avenue for almost half a mile to Canal Road [today's Nova Road] and then north one mile to Volusia Avenue [today's International Speedway Boulevard] and then the mile west to Halifax Hospital.

   Mr. and Mrs. L. F. Hulin were awakened by the crash because their small farm was “just west of the southern end of the airport runway.” The wrecked plane crashed about 1,000 feet from their home, and Mrs. Hulin said, “There must have been 10,000 people out here today to see the wreck."

Weather and the Crash

   The day before the crash the official temperature at Sholtz Field reached 90, but the .55 inches of rain at the airport were likely afternoon showers, and on the morning of the crash it dropped to only 67 degrees. The Taylor family recalled that it was foggy on the morning of the crash, and during the afternoon when people were working to investigate the crash site, there were showers.

World War One Flying Ace and Eastern Airlines

   Eastern Airlines was managed by the legendary World War One ace, Captain Eddie Rickenbacker, who refused to use the word “safe” in advertising even though Eastern had no passenger fatalities from 1930 to 1936, totaling 180 million “revenue passenger miles” and had received an award in 1937 for eight years of “safe operation.” With its safety record, Eastern had tripled its riders from 1933 to 1937, but this crash in Daytona Beach could be so devastating to Eastern Airlines that Rickenbacker was called by ship-to-shore on the yacht of Alfred P. Sloan (Chairman of the Board of General Motors) in Newport, Rhode Island, and he immediately flew to New York City and then to Florida, arriving the same night as the crash.

Crash Deaths and Injuries

   In the meantime, at Halifax Hospital the co-pilot had died, as well as J. F. Phillpotts of Kingston, Jamaica. His young son, Peter, who had escaped the flames at the crash site was improving at the hospital and would then spend several days with Ralph Taylor’s family in the garage apartment over the dairy stable until his mother arrived. [For many years the Taylors received letters and Christmas cards postmarked with Jamaica stamps, and Ralph Taylor, Jr., (Rusty) recalls that the boy may have entered the British R.A.F. near the end of World War II, after which they heard no more news from him].

   More than forty hours after the crash, passenger Fred M. Thompson remained unconscious and in critical condition at the hospital, and Brian Merrill, the plane’s steward, was struggling with internal injuries. The three other survivors, including young Peter, were in better condition.
Blaming and Finger-Pointing

   Losing no time, Rickenbacker announced the next day that the pilot had not caused the crash. This was following a day-long investigation by the Eastern Airlines accident board at the mammoth Williams Hotel [downtown at the corner of Palmetto Avenue and Magnolia Avenue]. Rickebacker’s issued statement explained that just hours before the flight, Florida Power and Light workers had set up a new overhead power line and pole directly at the south end of the north-south runway “without notice of any kind, official or otherwise, to airport officials or employees, air line officials, employees, or department of commerce officials.” 

Newspapers across the country published editorials calling for the clearing of obstructions around airports.

   The DC-2 struck the “high tension line” and what Rickebacker described as “the supporting pole of approximately 30 feet in height placed in line with the center of the north-south runway.” Making matters worse, it “was a creosoted pole, black and blending into the darkness without obstruction or warning light of any kind."

   The News-Journal reported, “The pole hit by the liner was lifted clear out of the newly-dug hole and tossed into the palmetto scrub. There was not a speck of earth on its butt and observers said they believed the earth had not yet been filled in and tramped (sic) down around it. Out in the field lay the wing tip that had been torn from the ship, and hanging to it was one heavy strand of copper wire. The cross-beam of the pole was imbedded in the tip of the wing."

Denials and Crash Investigations

   Another vice president of Eastern denied the published report that the airlines had asked the hospital to withhold information, but reporters were being directed back and forth from the hospital to the airport manager and back to the hospital, and obtained the names of the dead and injured only after repeated requests. Not even the Volusia County commissioners were above finger-pointing, and they were asked for information about the width of the county’s right-of-way on the DeLand-Daytona Beach highway at the airport and also about the commission’s resolution that authorized the erection of the “high tension line from the airport to an airways beacon farther west.”
  
   Federal investigators also met in downtown Daytona Beach at the Casino Burgoyne on the east side of Beach Street [The site today of an open park across from Stavro's Pizza and Abraxas Books]. The findings of their meeting corroborated Rickenbacker’s account of the tragic end of Flight 7 which had arrived from Chicago at 4:00 a.m., unloaded passengers, luggage, and mail before attempting to lift off at 4:40 en route to Miami. Newspapers across the country published editorials calling for the clearing of obstructions around airports.

   The power company later indicated that between 7:30 and 9:30 on the evening before the crash, one of their employees had used the public telephone in the airport’s administration building to phone in a report to his superior that an underground circuit at the airport had failed, and he advised that an overhead line be installed. Then during the installation that night another employee used the same phone, apparently assuming that the men on duty in the airport office were aware of the work being done because of the equipment and the lights being used. Ultimately, the Bureau of Aircraft Accidents determined “the probable cause of this accident was the absence of reasonable notice to those operating and navigating the aircraft.” 

   Daytonans were worried about the future of their airport, but when a News-Journal reporter asked if the city would lose Eastern Airlines’ airmail, passenger, and express service, “Captain Rickenbacker boomed his reply: ‘There’s not a chance of it!’” 

Sholtz Field (Airport) and the Relocation of Taylor’s Dairy

   Sholtz Field was named for Florida Governor David Sholtz, who had attended Stetson Law School and practiced law in Daytona Beach before being elected governor (1933-1937). The airfield was expanded hugely during World War Two when the U.S. Navy purchased much of Ralph Taylor’s 180-acre dairy farm, and because all-new barbed wire was used in the war effort, the family had to remove and re-use their barbed wire fencing before relocating all of their equipment and making the cattle drive to the land along the Tomoka River just northwest of where U.S. 92 now passes McDonald’s Restaurant. A great portion of the Daytona Beach International Airport now stands where the dairy was at the time of the Eastern Airlines crash.

DC-2s in Movies and Books

   Most of us today are unaware that in the early years of airliners, the planes were referred to as “ships,” but with this in mind we can understand how it is that the Douglas DC-2 was the type of airliner (ship) that Shirley Temple was singing about in her song the “Good Ship Lollipop,” singing and dancing as the DC-2 taxied on the runway in her movie Bright Eyes (1934). Many of us will also remember the DC-2 in the flying scenes of the film Lost Horizon (1937), and the heydays of commercial piloting of the DC-2s are dramatically recounted in Ernest K. Gann’s 1961 best-selling memoir Fate Is the Hunter (though the 1964 movie was not based on his book at all).

How Pilots Taxied, Took Off, and Landed the DC-2

   The Douglas DC-2, a 14-seat, twin-engine commercial airliner with an 85-foot wingspan, was first built in 1934, and it quickly became the first airplane to convince the general public that air flight was safe, reliable, and comfortable. 

   I highly recommend that you watch the 9-minute fascinating video of the DC-2 with detailed explanations (and video) of exactly what the pilot had to do for taxiing, cross-wind operations, braking operations, take off, and landing. (I hope you’ll watch it.) To view it, click this link.

Denny Bowden, Ph.D., writes about Volusia County history on the blog,
Volusia History - Retracing Florida's Past.
His work is reposted here by permission.
Read more of his Denny's blogs at 
http://volusiahistory.wordpress.com/
Previous posts
Zora Neale Hurston's unsung years on Florida's east coast
Florida's Worst Freezes
Washtub Baths and Pot-bellied Stoves in 1930s Florida
Annie Oakley was nearly crushed to death near Daytona Beach
Before the Seminoles, Timucuans dominated northern Florida
The ghost settlement of Freemanville
Daytona Beach ends Stan Musial's pitching career
and aims him to the Hall of Fame
How Daytona Beach teens' lives changed during World War II