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[[stamped]] FROM THE FLYING PIONEERS BIOGRAPHIES OF Harold E. Morehouse [[/stamped]]

ARTHUR H. MIX
Pioneer Aviation Mechanic - Aviator - Inspector

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Arthur H. Mix was born at Byron, Illinois March 19, 1885, where he attended local schools, then Illinois State Teachers College. After completing his education he started to work as a newspaper reporter. In his youth he had always dreamed of travel and adventure, so his newspaper job was soon too tame to suit him.

As a result he quit and headed for Arizona where he accepted work with Wells Fargo, driving a 4-mule team stagecoach from Old Tombstone to Fort Huachuca. After two years as stagecoack [[stagecoach]] driver Mix quit and enlisted in the United States Fifth Cavalry, Troop C, at Fort Huachuca. Toward the end of his second hitch the unit was moved to Hawaii.

There in late 1910 Mix was sent to watch flights by Bud Mars and Tod Schriver and report back to the officers. The two aviators were flying for and under the management of Captain Thomas S. Baldwin. Mix was so interested he decided to make aviation his career.

During mid-summer, 1911 the Signal Corps established the first United States military flying school at College Park, Maryland, and Mix succeeded in getting transferred there to work on the Government planes, to become the first enlisted man in what is now the United States Air Force. That season there were four

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