4A COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL JANUARY 10, 2018
O PINION
Offbeat Oregon History: 1933 a rough year for aviators
PHOTO COURTESY FINN JD JOHN
A Ford Trimotor parked on an airfi eld at Langley Research Center in 1934. (Image: NASA)
By Finn JD John
For The Sentinel
C
ommercial air travel has become so safe
and so banal — especially for the poor fi sh
packed into the “coach” seating — that it’s some-
times easy to forget what a new experience fl ying
is, historically speaking.
That was not the case in the year 1933, though.
That was the year that saw Oregon’s fi rst two fa-
tal commercial passenger airplane crashes: one in
January, and another in November.
There was no National Transportation Safety
Board in 1933, and no Federal Aviation Adminis-
tration. So the stories of these early plane crashes
have to be taken directly from newspaper reports.
Luckily, they’re fairly complete.
Ford Tri-Motor crash, Eugene
In January 1933, the closest thing to an “airlin-
er” one could step aboard was the Ford Tri-motor,
a large spindly-looking machine that looked a bit
like a giant cricket built out of roofi ng tin. It had
been introduced in 1926 and had an enviable rep-
utation for ruggedness and dependability; the fi rst
overfl ight of the South Pole was done in a Tri-mo-
tor with skis in place of landing gear.
One great advantage of the Tri-motor was that,
with three engines pulling it through the air, there
were only one or two possible circumstances in
which losing an engine would cause it to crash.
But unfortunately, as they prepared their big air-
plane for takeoff on the afternoon of Jan. 24, Unit-
ed Air Lines pilot Harold Adams, copilot Kenneth
Houseolder, and stewardess Cornelia Pederman
were about to fi nd out the hard way what one of
those circumstances was.
The three of them had taken off from Swan Is-
land Airfi eld in Portland at 10:15 a.m. that morn-
ing on a regularly scheduled fl ight southward —
probably to Medford, although the newspapers
don’t specify. The weather was iffy, with a very
low cloud cover, and all the passengers who had
been booked for the fl ight had had their tickets
canceled; but there was still the mail to deliver, so
the fl ight went on as scheduled.
But by the time the airplane got to Eugene, the
ceiling had dropped so low that Adams wasn’t
willing to risk going farther south. So he dropped
into the Eugene airport and had the mail trans-
ferred to a southbound train. Then he taxied the
heavy airplane back to the runway, fed the en-
gines fuel, and started the takeoff run.
And it appears the right-hand engine failed just
as the plane was lifting off the runway. The big
craft veered sharply, hit a runway light, wobbled
slowly into the air — and was swatted out of the
sky by a telegraph pole. It pancaked down onto a
vacant house, which was knocked six feet off its
foundation and collapsed under the impact.
This probably saved stewardess Pederman’s
life; she survived the crash with just a broken
ankle. Adams and Houseolder weren’t so lucky.
Both were rushed to the hospital, but soon died of
their injuries.
In Adams, particularly, Oregon aviation lost
a real treasure. A native of Myrtle Point, Adams
was an old Army pilot, having learned to fl y in
France in 1918; after the war, he made a living
for a time as one of those classic “Barnstormer”
stunt fl yers, making his way from town to town
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Cascade Christian School 5th grade
students are doing a project on the
state of Oregon and ask that resi-
dents send postcards, pictures, bro-
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section. For more information on
daily road conditions, visit cottage-
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The special election for Ballot
Measure 101 is set for Jan. 23. Reg-
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lieve you should have received a
ballot and have not, please contact
the county clerk's offi ce at (541)
682-4234.
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Jan. 9 at 8 p.m. at the Healing Ma-
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The interior of a Ford Trimotor as seen from the view-
point of a passenger.
•
•
trix.
Buster's Main St. Cafe will have
complimentary meals for veterans
and active duty personnel on Jan.
11 from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.
State
Representative
Cedric
Hayden will speak at the next
meeting of the Cottage Grove 912
Project on Monday, Jan. 15, 6:30
p.m., at Stacy's Covered Bridge
Restaurant, 401 E Main. Heath-
er Buch, candidate for Lane Co
Commissioner will also speak. The
meeting is open to the public.
Volunteers are needed for United
Way to provide companionship,
transportation for shopping and er-
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respite care to home bound, elderly
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power to the engines so that in the crash they
would not ignite the fuel tanks.
The plane hit the hillside before Woodworth
could reach the switch.
It must have been an unusually fortunate strike,
because the majority of people on the airplane
survived. The cockpit was demolished, and Da-
vis was instantly killed; but somehow Woodworth
was thrown clear through a hole torn in the hull,
injuring him but saving his life in the process.
Back in the passenger cabin, the three passen-
gers on the left-hand side were in the most trou-
ble, as the wing had hit a tree and come through
the side of the plane. Among these three was Rob-
ert C. Coffey, M.D., director of the Coffey Clinic
in Portland and a world-famous cancer specialist,
who was apparently killed instantly; his death was
reported in newspapers nationwide and in Time
Magazine. Two other passengers on the left side
of the plane also died — either from the impact,
or from the fi re that quickly broke out.
Stewardess Libby Wurgaft quickly got the door
open and started hustling the stunned survivors
out before the fl ames could reach them. She had
to go back into the burning plane four times be-
fore everyone who could be saved was out.
Then the survivors had to fi gure out what to do
next. They had crashed in the middle of what is
now Forest Park, a long way from anyone.
The survivors kindled a fi re with the help of
some papers one of them had in his pocket, and
huddled around it while the two of them who
could walk — copilot Woodwarth and Medford
resident Floyd Hart — stumbled off in search of
help. They fi nally found a camp of woodcutters,
who directed them to a telephone; but it wasn’t
until 4 a.m. that the survivors were safely rescued.
Ironically, the medical facility to which they
were taken was the Robert C. Coffey Clinic and
Hospital.
IN BRIEF JAN. 10-JAN.16
C ottage G rove
S entinel
with his trusty plane (probably a Curtiss JN-4)
and performing aerobatics, wing-walking stunts,
and similar daredeviltries. For a time he ran a fl y-
ing school in Roseburg. He was hired by United
Air Lines in 1931, and quickly forged a reputa-
tion as one of the operation’s most careful and
trustworthy pilots. Copilot Houseolder, a 25-year-
old Eugene native, doubtless considered himself
lucky to be fl ying with him.
Boeing 247 crash, Portland
Just 10 months later, the airline business had
changed a great deal. For one thing, the old, slow
Ford Trimotors had been replaced at United Air-
lines by a new generation of sleek, silver aircraft
that actually looked like airliners, albeit tiny ones.
The fi rst of these was built by United Air Lines’
sister company, Boeing, up in Seattle; it was
called the Boeing 247, and it had two engines and
carried up to 10 passengers at speeds of 200 miles
an hour, which was faster than top-line fi ghter
planes could go.
It was also capable of instrument fl ight and
night fl ight. Both of these were involved in what
happened shortly after takeoff at 10:50 p.m. on
the cold, foggy night of Nov. 9.
The airplane was going to The Dalles, lined up
on the runway to take off into the teeth of the usu-
al wintertime wind that comes up from the south.
But as it reached the midpoint, just as the tail
wheel lifted off the turf, the big bird did a partial
ground-loop.
A ground-loop is a hazard that many tail-drag-
ging airplanes are particularly vulnerable to; it’s
the same dynamic that makes badly loaded trail-
ers start pitching and swaying from side to side.
It happens because the center of gravity is behind
the wheels, and if that center of gravity happens to
move far enough to one side of the wheels it tries
to pass them, spinning the aircraft around. This
can cause serious damage.
In this case, though, pilot Al Davis apparently
caught it in time, swinging the tail of the plane
safely back behind the wheels and continuing the
takeoff run. But the maneuver caused the plane to
swerve off the edge of the runway. It shot across
another runway, through a parking lot and out
over the Willamette River, which it very nearly
fell into; but instead, the engines roaring at full
power, it slowly climbed off the river and gained
altitude.
And this is the point at which pilot Al Davis, a
Seattle native, made his real mistake. He appar-
ently did not look at the compass. Assuming that
the rough take-off had been more or less a normal
one (remember, this was in heavy fog) he carried
on climbing to altitude, assuming he was fl ying
south, actually fl ying due west.
The fi rst sign of trouble came when it was too
late to do anything. Copilot H.B. Woodworth, an
Oakland native, saw treetops looming out of the
fog.
“Look out for the trees!” he shouted.
Pilot Davis, who was focusing on the instru-
ments, looked up, tried to bank away, saw it was
no use, and shouted, “Cut!” — meaning to cut
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•
Each January, the one-night Point
in Time Count takes place across
the nation. As a volunteer, you
collect the important data that pro-
vides a snapshot of the problem of
homelessness. This valuable data
helps policymakers target resourc-
es to the areas of the state experi-
encing the greatest need. For more
information visit lanecounty.org/
homelesscount or email Alexan-
dria.Dreher@co.lane.or.us.
• The Eugene Symphony Guild's Af-
ternoon Tea Saturday, Jan. 20 at the
Eugene Country Club, 255 Country
Club Drive. 1 p.m. for social and
1:30 pm for tea with petite sand-
wiches and desserts. $40. Reser-
vations by Jan. 17 to Betsy, (541)
434-9188.
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