Viewing page 21 of 459
This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.
[[monument dedication announcement]] FRED J. WISEMAN... the man... his flight Today, August 17, 1968, we gather at Kenilworth Park to unveil a monument and participate in other events honoring FRED J. WISEMAN'S historic air mail flight between Petaluma and Santa Rosa-the world's first by airplane with sanction from a local post office and available to the public. On February 17, 1911, another crowd assembled on these same grounds to watch the pioneer aviator take off in his "kite with an engine." Several people are here today who were present fifty-seven years ago. Included in Wiseman's cargo were three letters, a bag of groceries and a bundle of newspapers. Two pieces of mail contained single-sentence notes written by George P. McNear, a local financier, to Mayor James R. Edwards and to banker, John P. Overton of Santa Rosa. Following is the third letter from Petaluma Postmaster J. E. (Emmett) Olmsted to his Santa Rosa counterpart, H. L. Tripp: "Petaluma sends, via air route, congratulations and felicitations upon the successful mastery of the air by a Sonoma County boy in an aeroplane conceived by Sonoma County brains and erected by Sonoma County workmen. "Speed the day when the United States mail between our sister cities, of which this letter is the pioneer, may all leave by the air route with speed and safety." Remnants of the "aeroplane" are preserved in the National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C.. Smithsonian officials say mail had been air-borne for centuries with birds, kites and balloons, and even that a few letters had been carried by heavier-than-air machines before 1911. But none of the latter flights was open to the public or had post office sanction. Born in Santa Rosa, November 10, 1875, Wiseman early showed a bent for mechanics and once owned a bicycle shop in the Rose City. Automobiles were his next logical interest. He raced successfully on a number of tracks with a Stoddard-Dayton. After a 1909 trip to Dayton, Ohio, and a visit with Wilbur and Orville Wright, the young Californian was determined to build his own flying machine. Returning to Sonoma County, he got mechanical help from Jesse W. Peters and financial aid from Ben Noonan, a Santa Rosa butcher. Result was a "Wiseman-Peters biplane," called the "first practical airship in California." It carried a five-gallon gas tank, good for about twenty miles. This was the craft tested on the Grant A. Laughlin farm near Fulton, probably sold to "Nevada people," according to a 1910 newspaper clipping. What plane made the first air flight? Although most literature on the subject takes it for granted Wiseman was connected with only one, local research indicates that a second aerial ship, constructed in Petaluma and the parts of which are now at the Smithsonian, took off from the old Kenilworth horse race track headed toward Santa Rosa. Seated in air-conditioned solitude with the motor and propeller behind him, the pilot manipulated controls leading to what looked like rudders or box kites fore and aft. He used his shoulders on apparatus in balancing on a turn or in a current of air. Wooden "ski" skids to brake on landings were between bicycle wheels. Air time involved seems to have been between 12 and 14 minutes, according to various accounts. The dates, February 17-18, are on the plaque because Wiseman was forced down overnight by magneto trouble in the Denman Flat area, four and one-half miles north of Peta-luma. He managed to lift off under difficult circumstances the next day. Terminal point was supposed to have been the county seat fairgrounds, but a loose wire hit the propeller about a mile short of the goal and the flight ended in a cow pasture. Another 1911 newspaper story credits the flying pioneer with having invented gear used on the Battleship Pennsylvania in San Francisco Bay to stop the machine in which Eugene Ely made the first shore-to-ship landing. Wiseman died October 4, 1961, in Oakland at the age of 85. He said in his later years that he gave up flying because a number of records were set quickly, stunt men took over, "and they didn't live very long." His air mail odyssey between Petaluma and Santa Rosa remains a benchmark in aviation and postal history. - ED MANNION [[end page]] [[start page]] DEDICATION OF FRED J. WISEMAN MONUMENT Saturday, August 17, 1968 Kenilworth Park :: Petaluma, California [[line]] PROGRAM WILLIAM J. BARNARD, Aviation Director, County of Sonoma Master of Ceremonies 2:30 P.M. Musical Selections ... Twelfth District Naval Band Under Direction of Chief Warrant Officer H.E. Huddleston, U. S. Navy 3:00 P.M. Raising of the Colors ... Petaluma Post No. 1929 V. F. W. Pledge of Allegiance ... Audience Invocation ... The Reverend Charles O'Leary Saint James Parish, Petaluma The Flight-1911 ... Edward Fratini, Historian The Return Flight-1968 ... Lewis Meyers, Mayor of Santa Rosa Piloted by Jack Gardiner Guest Speaker ... The Honorable Don Clausen Congressman, First District Unveiling of the Monument ... Mrs. Henry H.(Hap) Arnold, Sonoma Mrs. Helen Putnam, Mayor of Petaluma Introduction of Guests ... Master of Ceremonies Finale ... Twelfth District Naval Band
