When Adm. E. J. King succeeded to command of BUAERO, he brought to it a type of leadership quite different from that which had characterized its thirteen years under Admiral Moffett. Admiral King, who was one day to become Commander in Chief during World War II, was a man of strong convictions who made his own decisions. With his brilliant intellect and decisive manner, he dominated the Bureau completely.
The cancellation of air-mail contracts set off a chain reaction that disrupted the whole United Aircraft and Transport structure. To comply with the law requiring separation of manufacturing companies from transport organizations, United Airlines was split off into a separate company known as United Airlines Transport Corporation. With the transport link between the eastern and western manufacturing groups thus disrupted, we divided them into two separate companies. The four Connecticut companies, Pratt and Whitney, Hamilton-Standard, Chance Vought, and Sikorsky, comprised the new United Aircraft Corporation. The western group took the name of Boeing Airplane Company.
In the reorganization, William E. Boeing severed all his aviation connections. Frederick B. Rentschler resigned the presidency of United. Phillip G. Johnson, deprived by law of his right to manage the airlines, later moved to Canada to create the great Trans-Canada Airlines. Donald L. Brown moved up from Pratt and Whitney to become president of United Aircraft Corporation, and I became its senior vice-president. Thus a Congressional investigation that proved no wrongdoing deprived the country of the services of three outstanding pioneers.
President Roosevelt had, meanwhile, appointed Admiral Reeves Commander in Chief, United States Fleet. Having in mind the progress of events in the Pacific, I had undertaken a study of a big boat designed to scout its vast areas, using available harbors as bases of operations. About the time the job was completed, the admiral invited me to join him on the California, at Hampton Roads, to watch the aircraft carriers in operation. Frank Wagner, his Operations officer, met me at Old Point Comfort and the admiral himself greeted me at the gangway. The bulkheads of his cabin had been papered with charts of the Pacific, evidence enough of the Old Man’s absorption with that problem. When, after lunch, he developed his estimate of the Pacific situation and asked if I thought it possible to build a flying boat capable of patrolling the area, I was able to produce from my brief case exactly what the doctor had ordered. The hearty laugh with which Bull Reeves greeted this legerdemain brought back memories of the happy days of FLEET AIR.
Under pressure from the fleet, BUAERO, which at this time was absorbed in carrier aircraft and about ready to wash up big boats, invited bids on which Sikorsky won the award. As the designs progressed, BUAERO developed increasing interest in the project and finally authorized a second development by Consolidated Aircraft of San Diego. In the competition for the production order, Sikorsky lost out to Consolidated on price, but the Sikorsky design was selected by the new transoceanic operator, American Export Airlines, for whom we built three passenger ships. The American line, organized and operated under the able leadership of John Slater, provided nonstop flying-boat service from New York to Foynes, Ireland, and during the war provided comfortable berths for many very important people while many others of the same character shivered in bucket seats in hastily improvised land-plane service via Newfoundland, Iceland, and the Azores. In other words, Sikorsky flying boats showed the way to transoceanic service and, at the moment, actually outperformed the land plane.
However, even under such fair terms as those granted us by American Export Airlines, we did not succeed in avoiding serious losses at Sikorsky. Meanwhile, Pan American had turned to Martin and then Boeing, and each of these able builders had suffered similarly. By that time, too, the aircraft industry had suffered from the political debacle in Washington. We had reached the end of our rope and could no longer afford to contribute either our management or engineering talents, let alone our slender capital, to the subsidization of airline operations. We decided to drop out of the big-boat business.
And when I broke this sad news to Mr. Sikorsky—by then I had become president of United Aircraft—he received it like the great gentleman he is. He understood our problem; he was grateful for all the consideration the company had given him. He wondered if perchance we would grant him one more favor; he would like to go back to his first love—experimenting with helicopters. He thought he might succeed now where he had failed before. A modest sum of money would meet his requirements and he hoped this was not asking too much.
Quite certain that no one could possibly build a successful helicopter but that Mr. Sikorsky at least deserved a try, I magnanimously agreed to back him. Igor Sikorsky did invent the helicopter, just as the Wrights before him had invented the airplane, by diligent study, by painstaking experiment, by teaching himself to fly and then teaching others. In so doing, the man who had given the world the means of vaulting the last barrier to air commerce went to the other extreme to create the only vehicle that can operate in three dimensions without a prepared surface from which to take off or land. Aviation owes much to his creative mind, one that not only finds no difficulty in reconciling science and religious faith, but on the contrary, exercises that intuitive quality that marks real genius.
The moral of this brief review of the history of a representative airplane company is that profit has a counterpart in loss, and both are essential to progress. Again, financial results are not the sole measure of excellence; there is also the intangible factor of stewardship. When the final account is cast up, Igor Ivanovich Sikorsky will rank among the immortals of American aviation.