

This route was described by one Post Office official as “starting nowhere and ending nowhere, and over impossible country getting there.” Varney was awarded the contract from Pasco, Washington, to Elko, Nevada. With the passage of the Air Mail Act of 1925, individuals began to compete for airmail contracts. Army, but they hoped to encourage private enterprise to take over the mail contracts. The Post Office Department began transporting mail by airplane in cooperation with the U.
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According to Vern Halliday, airport manager from 1927 to 1936, a large wind sock indicated the wind direction during the day, while a large illuminated arrow, free to turn, provided pilots with landing information during the early evening hours. Later, Woodward Field was renamed Salt Lake City Airport. In addition to runways, it had an office building, a hangar for eight planes, and a service area to rebuild planes. airfields used by the Post Office Department.

With its 106 acres, Woodward Field was one of the largest of the 15 U. Woodward, an airmail pilot who was killed November 6, 1920, when his plane crashed in a snowstorm in Wyoming. At the suggestion of Salt Lake City Mayor Clarence Neslen, the new facility was named after John P. Just before Christmas, on December 21, 1920, Woodward Field was dedicated at 22nd West and North Temple. He had left Reno at 9:25 that morning on an all-day flight that now takes an hour or less. The flyer saw the smoke and finally made a safe landing at 4:15 p.m. While he circled the valley, officials lighted a smudge pot as a signal. In fact, one pilot flying in from Reno on September 10, 1920, had difficulty finding the temporary landing strip at Buena Vista Field near 8th South and 14th West. Salt Lake City offered little more than a safety landing strip and a refueling stop in the first months of the airmail run. This route was opened on September 8, 1920. The last leg of what was developing into a transcontinental route linked Omaha with San Francisco via North Platte, Cheyenne, Rawlins, Rock Springs, Salt Lake City, and Reno.

C., and New York City with a refueling stop in Philadelphia.įrom 1918 to 1920 routes were expanded to include Chicago, Cleveland, and Omaha. Airmail service in the United States began on May 15, 1918, over a single route between Washington, D.
