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Clarence Marshall Young

"I tried. Lord knows, I tried," Clarence Young sighed recently.

His efforts, and his achievements have been phenomenal, absolutely phenomenal. And he is the kind of public servant whose dreams and direction are too often forgotten, once the panoply of early aviation history has given way to more fancy than fact.

Clarence learned to fly in Italy during the first War, proving to be a modest hero when he was shot down over Austrian lines, and later escaping. In Iowa, he organized the first company in the U.S. to sell surplus Jenny planes, and began his real climb in 1926, when he was appointed aviation director of the Philadelphia Sesquicentennial Exposition. The following year he was appointed Chief of Air Regulation under William Patterson MacCracken, the first Assistant Secretary of the Department of Commerce Aeronautics Branch. In 1929, there was a new sign on Young's door: Assistant Secretary of Commerce, Aeronautics. He held the job until the end of 1933. His effort at the national and regional plans level, the laws he helped write, the programs he began, the zest and professional love he brought to his office, and engendered in his colleagues have so enriched U.S. aviation, that some have suggested he is its pre-War II architect.

In 1934, Young joined Pan American, drew the plans and established criterion for its pioneer 8,746-mile TransPacific service, and remained as its Pacific division manager until 1945.

[[image - small drawing of a propeller]]

Clarence Marshall Young: born Colfax, Iowa, July 23, 1889.

[[image No. 141 - black & white photograph of a China Clipper passing over an unfinished Golden Gate bridge]]

[[image No. 142 - drawing of Clarence Marshall wearing a flight cap and goggles]]

[[image No. 143 - black & white photograph of description shown in text below]]

[[caption]]President Coolidge on the White House Lawn (143) presents the Collier Trophy for 1929 to W. P. McCracken, right, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Aeronautics. Between them, left to right, Clarence M. Young, Senator Hiram Bingham, president of the National Aeronautic Association, and Dr. George Lewis, director of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, NASA's predecessor. Young, always a dashing figure, was popular with media artists (142) here from American Magazine, 1932. China Clipper, outward bound on Nov. 22, 1935, with the Golden Gate looming in unfinished glory (141). [[/caption]]