Stone later established a world speed record for amphibious aircraft and aided in development of the catapult and deck landing gear for aircraft carriers.

From the beginning, a handful of visionaries saw Coast Guard aviation as essential to the service’s future. Seaplanes were eventually augmented by landplanes and, in later years, by helicopters, with the Coast Guard playing a leading role as a pioneer of rotary-wing aviation. But during the long, lean years after the armistice that ended World War I, not everyone was convinced that aircraft were here to stay, or that practical uses existed for them.

It may surprise some, but the true history of Coast Guard aviation began before there was a Coast Guard (established Jan. 28, 1915, through a merger of the Life-Saving Service and the Revenue Cutter Service) and before there was an aircraft that functioned anywhere in the world (beginning Dec. 17, 1903).

The years between world wars were a time of small budgets and limited support for the nation’s sea services. Capt. William P. Wishar, commander of the first Coast Guard air station at Morehead City, North Carolina – which he’d operated for two years – wrote in 1920 that his station was being forced to operate on a shoestring. Despite a difficult climate and rough weather, Morehead City had been opened – in preference to Key West, Florida, after a study – because it was close to what seamen called the “graveyard of the Atlantic,” meaning Cape Hatteras. “We would have more opportunities to locate vessels in distress, derelicts, menaces to navigation, and vessels ashore on Diamond Shoals, Lookout Shoals, and Frying Pan Shoals,” Wishar wrote.

Although Coast Guardsmen scrimped and scrounged under Wishar’s leadership – and saved lives – the station ran out of funding in 1922 and went out of business. As the Roaring Twenties unfolded with the Great Depression looming just ahead, the future of Coast Guard aviation may have appeared to be no future at all. More Americans than ever were engaged in coastal seafaring activities, ranging from fishing to pleasure cruises, a trend that would continue until today, but it was unclear whether there would be enough money to keep the Coast Guard’s air arm alive. Ironically, the solution would come not by saving souls but by interdicting alcohol.

 

Stepping back

It may surprise some, but the true history of Coast Guard aviation began before there was a Coast Guard (established Jan. 28, 1915, through a merger of the Life-Saving Service and the Revenue Cutter Service) and before there was an aircraft that functioned anywhere in the world (beginning Dec. 17, 1903).

When Ohio bicycle mechanics Wilbur and Orville Wright came down to Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, beginning in 1901 to take advantage of strong winds – blowing from the sea – they received substantial help from surfmen of the Life-Saving Service at the Kill Devil Hill Lifeboat station. Members of the Coast Guard’s predecessor service, including Adam Etheridge, William Tate, and John T. Daniels, were on the scene and helped three years in a row when the Wrights assembled devices they’d come to test. On the morning of Dec. 17, 1903, three surfmen helped carry the fragile device – once completed, it was clearly an airplane, although no human being had so far made a controlled, powered flight in one – from the Wrights’ shed to their planned launch site.

As the Coast Guard’s own website tells us, lifesavers like Tate and Daniels continued to help the Wrights in later years when the brothers returned for other flight experiments. The underpaid, brave, and tough government employees became local heroes and were bombarded by the press during the anniversary celebrations over decades that followed. Tate helped place historic markers at Kitty Hawk during the 25th anniversary celebrations while Daniels overcame his fear of flying during the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the first flight and took a ride as a passenger aboard another revolutionary aircraft, a Coast Guard helicopter. Lt. Stewart Graham – Coast Guard helicopter pilot No. 2 – an aviation pioneer in his own right, was the pilot.

 

The roaring twenties

The first Coast Guard aircraft not borrowed from the Navy was a Loening OL-5 amphibian acquired in 1926 by ubiquitous aviator Stone. It was a “quirky bird,” said another Coast Guardsman whose name is lost to history, “solid and dependable but demanding the utmost of constant attention.”