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Bessie The Barnstormer, America's First African American Licensed Pilot By Cap Mason, FlightSim.Com Flight Simulator editor In celebration of Black History Month, I want to tell you the amazing story of Bessie Coleman, America's first African American licensed pilot. She overcame formidable challenges to become a pilot and barnstorm her way across America in a Curtiss Jenny. Bessie Coleman, the first African American female pilot, grew up in a cruel world of poverty and discrimination. When young Bessie first went to school at the age of six, it was to a one-room wooden shack, a four-mile walk from her home. Often there wasn't paper to write on or pencils to write with. When Coleman turned 23 she headed to Chicago to live with two of her older brothers, hoping to make something of herself. But the Windy City offered little more to an African American woman than did Texas. When Coleman decided she wanted to learn to fly, the double stigma of her race and gender meant that she would have to travel to France to realize her dreams. It was soldiers returning from World War I with wild tales of flying exploits who first interested Coleman in aviation. She was also spurred on by her brother, who taunted her with claims that French women were superior to African American women because they could fly. In fact, very few American women of any race had pilot's licenses in 1918. Those who did were predominantly white and wealthy. Every flying school that Coleman approached refused to admit her because she was both black and a woman. On the advice of Robert Abbott, the owner of the "Chicago Defender" and one of the first African American millionaires, Coleman decided to learn to fly in France. Coleman learned French at a Berlitz school in the Chicago loop, withdrew the savings she had accumulated from her work as a manicurist and the manager of a chili parlor, and with the additional financial support of Abbott and another African American entrepreneur, she set off for Paris from New York on November 20, 1920. It took Coleman seven months to learn how to fly. The only non-Caucasian student in her class, she was taught in a 27-foot biplane that was known to fail frequently, sometimes in the air. During her training Coleman witnessed a fellow student die in a plane crash, which she described as a "terrible shock" to her nerves. But the accident didn't deter her: In June 1921, the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale awarded her an international pilot's license. When Coleman returned to the U.S. in September 1921, scores of reporters turned out to meet her. The "Air Service News" noted that Coleman had become "a full-fledged aviatrix, the first of her race." She was invited as a guest of honor to attend the all-black musical "Shuffle Along." The entire audience, including the several hundred whites in the orchestra seats, rose to give the first African American female pilot a standing ovation. Over the next five years Coleman performed at countless air shows. The first took place on September 3, 1922, in Garden City, Long Island. The "Chicago Defender" publicized the event saying the "wonderful little woman" Bessie Coleman would do "heart thrilling stunts." According to a reporter from Kansas, as many as 3,000 people, including local dignitaries, attended the event. Over the following years, Coleman used her position of prominence to encourage other African Americans to fly. She also made a point of refusing to perform at locations that wouldn't admit members of her race. Coleman took her tragic last flight on April 30, 1926, in Jacksonville, Florida. Together with a young Texan mechanic called William Wills, Coleman was preparing for an air show that was to have taken place the following day. At 3,500 feet with Wills at the controls, an unsecured wrench somehow got caught in the control gears and the plane unexpectedly plummeted toward earth. Coleman, who wasn't wearing a seat-belt, fell to her death. About 10,000 mourners paid their last respects to the first African American woman aviator, filing past her coffin in Chicago South's Side. Her funeral was attended by several prominent African Americans and it was presided over by Ida B. Wells, an outspoken advocate of equal rights. But despite the massive turnout and the tributes paid to Coleman during the service, several black reporters believed that the scope of Coleman's accomplishments had never truly been recognized during her lifetime. An editorial in the "Dallas Express" stated, "There is reason to believe that the general public did not completely sense the size of her contribution to the achievements of the race as such." Coleman has not been forgotten in the decades since her death. For a number of years starting in 1931, black pilots from Chicago instituted an annual fly over of her grave. In 1977 a group of African American women pilots established the Bessie Coleman Aviators Club. And in 1992 a Chicago City council resolution requested that the U.S. Postal Service issue a Bessie Coleman stamp. The resolution noted that "Bessie Coleman continues to inspire untold thousands even millions of young persons with her sense of adventure, her positive attitude, and her determination to succeed." Fly the Jenny and barnstorm with Bessie Now, you can try your hand at barnstorming in a Jenny. Microsoft included an outstanding model of the Curtiss Jenny as a stock airplane in FS2004. But, never content with just stock, our merry band of Friends of FlightSim.Com have uploaded a full hangar of outstanding Jenny textures, models, videos and more. Check out these gems from the freeware downloads library. Gas up the old girl and see if you can barrel-roll with Bessie. Or, try flying long-distance adventures in an open cockpit. And, leave that GPS alone. The original Jenny pilots flew by dead reckoning. FS-ACOF - Misc. FS2004 Video--Forrest Gump & Jenny Name: forrest.zip Size: 14,258,549 Date: 02-14-2005 FS2004 Video--Forrest Gump & Jenny. Forrest Gump did some amazing things including flying an airplane named Jenny. Features the "Century of Flight" Curtiss Jenny and theme music from the movie "Forrest Gump". By Mark Dannebaum. FS-ACOF - FS2004 Flights/Adventures FS2004 Continental Crossings Name: contcros.zip Size: 82,705 Date: 06-18-2004 FS2004 Continental Crossings. You are a rash sky-conqueror piloting a Curtiss Jenny. You want to bring three dangerous crossings across Canada, Sahara and Australia to a conclusion. They are some of the most hostile territories on the world. By Alessandro Menabo. FS-ACOF - FS2004 Early Aircraft FS2004 Capt. Gooley Jenny Name: cptjenny.zip Size: 2,455,555 Date: 01-07-2004 FS2004 Capt. Gooley Jenny. The default Curtiss Jenny in the livery of Captain John Gooley. His "flying circus" included three aircraft of this type. Repainted by John O'Leary. FS-ACOF - FS2004 Early Aircraft FS2004 Curtiss Jenny Name: jennll4.zip Size: 5,676,235 Date: 11-03-2003 FS2004 Curtiss Jenny. Two liveries for the default Curtiss Jenny and a revised flying file made by John Murphy. By Leon Louis and John Murphy. FS-ACOF - FS2004 Flights/Adventures FS2004 Canadian Historical Adventures Name: cdnhstr2.zip Size: 289,056 Date: 11-01-2003 FS2004 Canadian Historical Adventures - Flight 2. In this second flight you will retrace "Wop" May's steps and fly a Curtiss Jenny from Peace River to Fort Vermillion in a blizzard to deliver medical supplies to save people from an epidemic. By David Voogd. Cap Mason

Taming The Beast: How To Fly the Curtiss Jenny By Ken Glaze (18 June 2005) After reading Andrew Herd's excellent articles about the default FS2004 antique aircraft I was inspired to re-visit those planes, which, if you're anything like me, have been pushed to the back of your virtual hangar, ignored in favor of newer, more exotic aircraft. Of these old birds, my favorite is the Curtiss Jenny. It's modeled in FS2004 with a number of archaic features, such as a single ignition source and no mixture control for the engine, which fascinates the mechanic in me. However, for pilots there are two items missing from this airplane which make it a bit difficult to fly. Despite this, after examining the plane I found was that the Jenny wasn't so difficult to fly, IF the pilot remembers a fundamental aspect of flying fixed wing aircraft and it's that bit of knowledge that I'll be talking about in this article. Before I get started, I'll offer up my apology to anybody who's really knowledgeable in fixed-wing aircraft aerodynamics. The following is a simplification of a rather complex subject, but since this is intended for pilots, rather than aerodynamicists, I felt that this was necessary. If anyone really wants to talk about the full details of the aerodynamics touched here, please contact me directly and I'd be happy to discuss them. Anyway, the two obvious items from the pilot's standpoint that makes the Jenny different than any other production aircraft in FS2004 are 1. it has no airspeed indicator gauge and 2. it has no elevator trim. However, the Jenny does have a way of telling the pilot what airspeed it's flying at and that is related to the lack of elevator trim. To show you how and why this is, I will now refer to my copy of the book Stick And Rudder, which states that: Attitude controls airspeed. To explain this simply: the amount of lift a wing creates is determined by airspeed and angle of attack. The higher the angle of attack (to a certain limit known as the stall) and/or the higher the airspeed (to another certain limit known as the inflight break-up), the higher the lift. Therefore, during straight, un-accelerated (not curving) flight, a given airspeed will have a corresponding angle of attack that allows the plane to fly at that airspeed, and any change in that angle (and/or airspeed) results in a change in flight path. The way for us pilots to use this information is to focus on what we can directly control, which is the angle of attack using the elevator. This is called "attitude flying" and is a technique in which we use angle of attack (aka attitude) to control airspeed and throttle to control the rate of altitude change, either up or down. The application of this you see this every time a plane takes off: the attitude of the plane is increased until it lifts off the ground (or in the case of the Jenny and other taildraggers, takeoff airspeed is) and the plane climbs at a low airspeed. Once at altitude, if you reduce only power, the plane stops climbing and remains at the same airspeed. If you reduce only the attitude, the plane stops climbing and speeds up. This is attitude flying at work, high attitude equals slow airspeed and vice versa. Now, remember than attitude is controlled by the elevator. Since the Jenny has no elevator trim, the amount of back pressure needed to deflect the elevator cannot be changed, so the position of the control stick always corresponds to the deflection of the elevators. Now for an exercise in basic logic: IF the attitude controls airspeed, AND the elevator controls attitude, AND the control stick always shows the position of the elevator, THEN the control stick's position indicates the current airspeed (or at least when the airspeed is changing to). This makes the Jenny an airplane that you really feel the airspeed: the harder you're pulling back the elevator, the slower the Jenny is flying. Did you follow that? Well, for you visual learners, take a look as the first picture here. This is a completely stock-standard FS2004 Jenny at an airspeed of 49 knots in straight and level flight. Note the amount of up elevator; given our new knowledge of attitude flying, we know that this is a visual indication that the plane is flying slowly. Since the elevator has no trim, the control stick has to be held back to keep the elevator at this position, so the stick's position is back towards me in the cockpit and telling me we're flying slowly. Now, in the second picture below, I've added full power and allowed the Jenny to stabilize. The airspeed is now 63 knots and the plane is in straight and level flight. There still is a little bit of up elevator, but not nearly as much as earlier, which means the stick is farther forward than in the first picture, which indicates we're going faster. If I were to pull the stick back to the position seen in the first picture, the aircraft would eventually return to 49 knots, but it would now it would be in a climb because of the increased power from the engine. That's the real secret to flying the Jenny and the key to attitude flying, remembering that the throttle controls climb and the elevators control airspeed. This knowledge won't change your technique during cruise flight because airspeed isn't critical, but during final approach, this becomes very important because the stick position will be your primary indicator (and controller) of airspeed. If you find yourself too fast, pull back the stick slightly and leave it there. If you need to descend, reduce power. If you get too slow, release some back pressure and if you start descending too fast, add power. At first, you'll do these adjustments separately, but with a little practice, the adjustments will become second nature and happen at the same time. In the Jenny, the key is to memorize the amount of up elevator that gives you about 45-50 knots, then keep the elevator there throughout your approach and use the throttle to control your descent. Now you know how to take advantage of what you probably first thought was a problem with the Jenny. In fact, this is one of the main reasons why this plane doesn't have an elevator trim in the first place; early pilots were expected to feel their airspeed, not read it from a gauge. Historically, pilots were also taught to judge airspeed by listening to the tone the air made as it went through the flying wires, which is something that FS2004 does with mixed success. Now, refer back to the second picture and remember that the stock Jenny requires a small amount of up elevator even at full throttle to maintain straight and level flight. I don't know about you, but flying an airplane that always needs back pressure on the stick to keep it level is a bit irritating. The fix for this is simple, given our new knowledge of attitude flying and the ability to recognize the terms "horizontal tail" and "angle of incidence" inside the Aircraft.cfg file (this assumes you're comfortable editing this file). For those of you who are brave enough to play "virtual aircraft mechanic", I've found that setting the horizontal tail angle of incidence to negative one (-1.0) gives the Jenny a comfortable hands-off cruise of about 49 knots at 1175 RPM. In terms of the real aircraft, this changes the angle that the horizontal tail is mounted on the fuselage by lowering the leading edge by one degree. This increases the downward "lift" of the tail when the elevator is in the neutral position, which has the same effect as holding up elevator. So, have I beat this subject into the ground, yet? Well, hopefully you now understand how attitude controls airspeed and how the lack of elevator trim makes the Jenny's control stick into its airspeed indicator. Most of you have probably spent a lot of time learning to fly using instruments, now here is a challenge that's completely the opposite of that, visual flying in its simplest form. Your altitude is how big the trees are, your airspeed is how the plane feels and your GPS is your knowledge of the area. So now go and dust off that old Curtiss Jenny and enjoy fixed-wing flying at it simplest (and don't use Control-Z to cheat on the airspeed)! Footnote: Yes, this is a bibliography! Stick And Rudder, written in 1944 by Wolfgang Langewiesche, is the bible of attitude flying and is currently published by McGraw Hill. I also used Aerodynamics For Naval Aviators, written by H. H. Hurt in 1960. It originally was a Navy flight school textbook and is currently published by Aviation Supplies and Academy, Inc. Both are available online from various sources. Ken Glaze kglaze@san.rr.com