Regional aviation history on display at the Fort Smith Museum of History

 

story and photos by Ruby Dean
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Could you imagine trying to fly a plane without a control tower? Would you fly an airplane assembled just a few days before you decide to fly it?

Some of the early pilots in U.S. aviation history, including Bud Mars, flew planes in what we now view as primitive conditions.

One hundred years ago Friday (May 21), Bud Mars made the first flight in Arkansas. He only reached an altitude of 75 feet. Crowds gathered to watch history being made in what is now Kay Rodgers Park.

In celebration of the centennial of the Fort Smith Museum of History, the museum is featuring an exhibit, “The Fort in Flight: Bud Mars and the City’s Aviation History,” which opened Friday (May 21) in the Boyd Gallery, which also is the 100th anniversary of the first flight in Arkansas. About 45 people attended Friday’s opening reception of the new exhibit.

In 1926, the first airport, Alexander Field, was established in Moffett, Okla. It was just past the Fort Smith stockyards in a field that was owned by Leigh Kelley.

Also in the exhibit are the region’s female pilots, one of which was Leigh Kelley’s daughter, Betsy Kelley Weeks, Louise McPhetridge Thaden and Helon Hestand Arlitt. Weeks and Thaden had dreamed of flying since they were young girls. Leigh Kelley agreed to let Betsy get her flying license as long as she would work in his office every day. She did, and received her license (No. 9948) in 1928.

Thaden earned her flying license (No. 1943) in 1928 and held the distinction of earning the first commercial license on the west coast. She set and broke numerous records and won various races. In 1929, she won the Powder Puff Derby which was an all woman cross-country race from Santa Monica, Calif., to Cleveland. She bested Amelia Earhart in this race.

Weeks and Thaden belonged to the “Ninety-Nines.” It was a national organization of licensed women pilots in America. The name came because of the number of charter members the organization had.

Fort Smith has a rich aviation history and can be seen at the Fort Smith Museum of History through August 12. The exhibit includes photographs, artifacts and even engine parts. The Fort Smith Air Museum, Museum of Women Pilots in Oklahoma City, the Fort Smith Regional Airport, the 188th Fighter Wing and private collections have loaned memorabilia and photographs for the exhibit as well as a Curtiss OX-5 engine from the collection of the Arkansas Air Museum in Fayetteville.