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The High Way to Europe
by Anne Lyon Haight

[[strip of paper at top: Town & Country September, 1939]]

The sun shone brightly on the great flying boat Dixie as she soared away to Europe on her maiden voyage and the first transatlantic passenger flight. She carried a load of Pan American officials and famous first-flighters, four of whom, Mr. Eck, Colonel Donovan, Mrs. Clara Adams, and myself, had booked passage as long ago as 1931.

After the excitement of goodbyes, bands, photographers, and a benediction by the Rev. William Woon, it was a relief to be off. A white press plane, going through the most perilous-looking gyrations, escorted us down the bay, and a friend of mine swooped over and under and about us dipping a bon voyage message with his wings. Our big airliner seemed very steady and substantial in comparison. Telegrams were being opened and read on all sides and the steward was passing gum, which a few chewed frantically, perhaps to ease the nervous tension of getting away.

As we flew over Long Island the passengers began to move about and make themselves at home. Mrs. Juan Trippe, wife of the president of Pan American Airways, watched for her house, where her children had spent the morning making flags out of sheets to wave a she passed overhead. C.V. (Sonny) Whitney, chairman of the board, half apologized as he adjusted a window shade, saying that he couldn't help feeling like a housewife with a brand-new house. (He never did lose his house-wifely attitude, for he kept an eagle eye on every detail all the way across.) Graham Grossvenor, a director of the Line, was equally interested, and wandered about jotting down ideas in a little black notebook. Strangely enough, Mrs. Grosvenor, who has been with him on almost all the Pan American first flights and thoroughly enjoys such experiences, always takes a seat away from the window because she dislikes looking down from a height. Mrs. Whitney spent the afternoon writing, except for an hour or two while Ben Smith, famous financier, was amusing her with tricks done with string, matches, and pennies.(Mr. Smith is an ardent first-flighter: he flew on the Hindenburg's first west-east trip and got to Europe in time to come back on the Queen Mary's maiden voyage.) John Franklin and Eddie McDonnell, also directors, got into something when they started a bridge game with Wild Bill Donovan, commander of the Fighting 69th during the War, and Roger Lapham, president of the American Hawaiian Steamship Co. The game waxed hot and heavy, with many ups and downs during the trip, and was tantalizingly even when cut short by arrival in France. 

Mrs. Trippe, who has always loved flying, seemed to enjoy every minute. I remember hearing her describe, ecstatically, the survey flight to South America with her husband and Colonel Lindbergh in 1930. At the time I was green with envy, never dreaming that the following year I was to make the first commercial flight over that route myself, with Lindbergh piloting. Mrs. Trippe wrote constantly in a little black book, for she has kept a diary of all the Pan American trail blazings. If Sonny Whitney ever felt like a housewife, she certainly felt like a proud mother, for every time the Clipper came down for a landing she beamed approvingly at its good behavior.

Some of the first-flighters wrote dozens and dozens of letters and postcards to be mailed back on the return trip—especially Mrs. Clara Adams. She had gone into it in a big way and taken the precaution of getting 1,000 sheets of the Line's note paper, and her luggage must have been considerably lighter when she started the next lap of the journey. Mrs. Adams is quite an extraordinary person. If I understood her correctly, she is a granddaughter of General von Hindenburg and is related through her husband to the Adamses of Boston. She and Julius Rapaport of Allentown, Pennsylvania, intended to fly around the world, by different routes, so there was a great rivalry between them. He, a jolly man of ample proportions, thoroughly enjoyed pulling Mrs. Adams' leg. She was good-natured about it, but assured me that he would never have dared call her "Clara" if her husband had still been alive.

Dinner time approached, but there had been no evidence of anything to drink. We began to think of the glowing accounts of the press flight, when highballs succeeded themselves automatically and champagne flowed like water. After looking into the situation Mr. Grosvenor reported that the boat was dry; through a misunderstanding all liquor and tobacco had been carefully removed from the Clipper the night before. A blanket of gloom spread over all, and I began to think of the flask of brandy carefully packed in the wrong bag and stowed away in the luggage compartment of the wing. However, the genial Mr. Rapaport was able to supply a bottle of Scotch for the really thirsty, who drank it from paper cups in the bridal suite, and everyone was gay at dinner. After coffee, Mr. McVitty, a first-flighter from Chicago, dramatically produced a bottle of brandy.

At night the Whitneys occupied the bridal suite, but during the day they packed away their belongings and generously turned it over to us as an extra lounge. It developed into a quiet reading and siesta room where Colonel Donovan was an enthusiastic napper. For the rest of us, it was first-come-first-served. Mrs. Trippe had tipped me off in the afternoon that if I wanted a berth on the side with the moon I had better take it quickly and deposit my things. Afterwards I was very grateful to her because nothing could have been more beautiful than the moonlight on the ever changing clouds, or the lightning during two small but spectacular storms, or the never-to-be-forgotten sunrise.

Next morning we were all up at six watching for land. There was great excitement when we sighted the Azores at seven o'clock, just fifteen and a half hours out of New York. The change of time was completely baffling, for we had lost four hours. As I was under the impression that it was early in the morning, I told a Portuguese that I thought them all extraordinarily good-natured for such an early hour, but much to my surprise he replied, "It's not at all early, it's eleven o'clock."

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