july 2018 AH 63PREVIOUS SPREAD: HOWARD W. CANNON AVIATION MUSEUM; OPPOSITE: U.S. AIR FORCE; TOP RIGHT: PRINT COLLECTIONS/GETTY IMAGES; BOTTOM RIGHT: GETTY IMAGES
Unlike the Army pilots, these men were relative
amateurs—Robbins a former cowboy and Kelly a
former railroad mechanic. To maintain the engine,
Kelly ventured out on an eight-inch-wide catwalk
twice a day and greased the rocker arms. The two
remained aloft for 172 hours, just over seven days.
“If anyone beats our mark, we’re going up again,”
Kelly said after the flight. But it was only a matter
of weeks before their record fell, and Robbins and
Kelly never did reclaim the record.
A month later, Roy Mitchell and Byron New-
comb stayed airborne over Cleveland in a Stinson
Detroiter for 174 hours, from June 28 to July 6.
To keep their engine running, the pair devised a
system to grease the rocker arms through lines that
came into the cabin.
While Mitchell and Newcomb were still circling
Cleveland, Loren Mendell and Roland Reinhart
took off on July 2 from Culver City, Calif., in a Buhl
Airsedan dubbed Angelino, returning to earth on
July 12 after a record 246 hours and 43 minutes
in the air. No sooner had they landed, however,
than Dale Jackson and Forest O’Brine launched
a record attempt from St. Louis in a Curtiss
Robin on July 13. The pair shattered Mendell and
Reihhart’s briefly held record, remaining aloft for
420 hours, 17 minutes—more than 17½ days.
Nearly a year after Jackson and O’Brine’s record,
on June 11, 1930, John and Kenneth Hunter
took off from Chicago’s Sky Harbor Airport in
the Stinson SM-1 Detroiter City of Chicago, and
didn’t touch ground for 23 days, one hour and 41
minutes. While John and Kenneth piloted City of
Chicago, brothers Albert and Walter flew the refu-
eling and resupply plane, and their mother and sis-
ter helped with ground operations. The brothers
had remained low-key about their flight due to a
failed attempt a year earlier, but as the days aloft
rolled by they made national news. Will Rogers
even rode in the refueling aircraft. Though the
brothers serviced the engine by climbing outside
the plane using handholds and a narrow catwalk,
they were forced to land when an oil screen in the
engine became clogged. Upon landing, thousands
of people were on hand to greet them.
The Hunters’ record would stand for five years
until another set of brothers, Al and Fred Key
of Meridian, Miss., took off on June 4, 1935, in
a borrowed Curtiss Robin named Ole Miss. The
Key brothers’ record attempt was made possible
by contributions in money and services from local
residents and businesses. In order to reduce the
inherent hazards of aerial refueling, A.D. Hunter
devised a system for them that allowed hands-
off refueling and incorporated a check valve in
the hose to prevent fuel spills. Local welder Dave
Stephenson built an extensive catwalk so Fred
could service the uncowled engine in flight, and
Frank Covert made a special fuel tank that replaced
all three seats. James Keeton used his own CurtissRobin for resupply, performing 435 refuelings.
For the final refueling, the crewman who operated
the air-to-air system was absent, so airport porter
Germany Johnson stepped in and performed flaw-
lessly. After 653 hours and 34 minutes in the air,
the brothers landed to a cheering crowd of more
than 30,000 people. (In 1955 the restored Ole Miss
was donated to the Smithsonian for permanent
display, and today it hangs in the National Air and
Space Museum’s Golden Age of Flight gallery.)
The Key brothers’ record held until October
1939, when Wes Carroll and Clyde Schlieper took
off from Marine Stadium in Long Beach, Calif.,
in a float-equipped Piper Cub called Spirit of Kay.
After the water takeoff, the men circled over Seal
Beach and the desert, where they took on fuel and
supplies from an automobile. While one of the
men flew the plane low over the speeding 1935
Ford convertible, the other man reached down
to retrieve supplies and cans of fuel handed up to
him. They didn’t set foot on the ground for 726
hours—30 days and six hours. In a Piper Cub!
World War II put endurance flights on hold. It
wasn’t until March 1949 that two pilots in an Aer-
onca Sedan named Sunkist Lady topped Carroll
and Schlieper’s record. After three previous
attempts, Dick Riedel and Bill Barris of Fullerton,
Calif., took off on March 15, 1949, and headedSETTING NEW MARKS
Top: Dale Jackson and
Forest O’Brine make
one of 48 refuelings
to their Curtiss Robin
while spending 420
hours in the air in July- Above: Kenneth
Hunter sits on the
catwalk of the Stinson
SM-1 Detroiter City of
Chicago during his and
brother John’s record
23-day flight in 1930.