Among the aviation phenomena of the late 1920’s was the outbreak of glorified stunt flying. Barnstormers and wing walkers of the earlier half of the decade now began vying with one another on a world-wide scale, competing for rich prizes offered by various personalities, and for assorted motives. Some courageous souls, quite unprepared, took off in the direction of the wide blue yonder and never came back; others, more successful, returned to bask for a while in the pitiless glare of publicity and then faded out. But one day, while the whole world seemed to hold its breath and to offer up a little prayer for him, a lone eagle soared out over the broad Atlantic and, after thirty-three hours, let down through the murk over Le Bourget, outside Paris. And after taxiing toward a milling throng so dense he had to cut his engine to avoid injuring someone with his propeller, he remarked, “I am Charles A. Lindbergh.” Perhaps one measure of the character of this performance is the fact that, to this day, in spite of all the strides in airplane development, no person has sought to duplicate a solo flight from New York to Paris. The impact of Lindbergh’s flight on the progress of American aviation is well known; it started an upsurge that carried aviation over a dead center and started it spinning on its way. What is not so well known is the underlying character of the man himself and its influence on American air power. For, just as a community or an enterprise mirrors the character of its pioneers, so has aviation taken on some of the personalities of its immortals. In BUAERO we were at first inclined to look at this last stunt as more or less a lucky break, until Guy Vaughan came down to tell us about the night take-off. Since Lindbergh was flying a Wright Whirlwind engine, Guy had invited him to dinner. And while he and his wife, Helen, sat talking with Lindbergh, word came from Dr. Kimball, the weather wizard, that things were clearing over the Atlantic. The party drove out to the flying field and when the men had pushed their way into the hangar to look for the _Spirit of St. Louis_, the tiny ship was lighted by a single, dim carbon-filament bulb—“so dim,” according to Guy Vaughan, “you had to strike a match to see if it was burning.” Outside the hangar, Dick Byrd, aided by his ample staff, had also been making preparations. But Guy Vaughan and Charles Lindbergh, using their own hands, topped off the fuel tanks of the _Spirit of St. Louis_ and started her rolling out onto the ramp. Guy ascribed Lindbergh’s achievement to three things: he was the best pilot in the world, he trusted nothing to anyone but himself, and he took no unintelligent chances.