Chapter 7

'GULP, ' thought Bill. 'Married? Well ... Maybe ... she's nice ... it's been nearly 4 years ... she's still a virgin ... I think. It would be nice to fulfill my Will ... heirs of my body ... the trust ... the lottery ... but, she's going with me.' Out loud he said, "Staggerwing?"

"Yes, something we can fly around the country in the past. How about we go to Wichita on the train and Time it to 1933 and buy a new Staggerwing ... got any gold?"

"Well ... some ... but I have a few jewels that are easier to sell. Uncut diamonds, some emeralds, a few rubies," mentioned Bill. "Somewhere I have nearly a million in pre 1928 hundreds ... we could go first class and buy a Spartan or a Howard." Bill hummed to himself, "I wonder where I put that?"

"A Spartan? Bill, a Spartan is twenty five thousand dollars."

"Retractable landing gear."

"Staggerwing has retractable gear."

"257 miles per hour."

"Oh..."

"Low wing monoplane ... no wires."

"Oh..."

"All metal ... and they look so cool polished."

"Ok..."

"Aerobatic ... OK? You mean that?" Bill realized he'd convinced her.

They gave their notice at work. The reason, E'veen's recurring headaches. As much as E'veen has been an, "I'm with him," girl, Bill was an "I'm with her," guy. They got excellent references.

They took the bus (ick) to Tulsa, waited until dark, timed it to 1936 with their luggage and got a hotel suite. They went to dinner and enjoyed the evening. Billy Graham wasn't established there yet, so they could go dancing.

1936 wasn't great. Tulsa was a dusty, smelly, oil boom town but it was the mid thirties. Deep in the throws of the depression, the town was home to oil money and very little else.

Taxes, continuously on the rise during the Twenties, a time of 'false' prosperity, remained the same, even though the property values and employment decreased. More people lost homes to the tax collector than homes lost to the banks. Income dropped drastically and protests arose. Government is extremely reluctant to let go of the dog just because it barks.

The Spartan plant was solely the inspiration of the oil tycoon of Tulsa. He wanted a fast and showy aircraft to haul him around. No one built a plane like he wanted so he hired the best in an employers economy and built his own. The Spartan Executive Model 7W was a direct result of founder William Skelly's vision for an aircraft designed to accommodate the luxury and performance expected by the world's wealthier individuals.(WIKI) That the plane was faster than most of the Army fighters of the day was icing on the cake. His fellow oil rich neighbors wanted to go fast too, and they bought ... as did movie moguls and cinema stars.

Spartan didn't build a lot of planes but the ones they did build were the cream of the crop of executive aircraft of the Thirties. With average wages of a dollar a day, five bucks a week won't buy much of an airplane. The 7W was just shy of twenty five thousand ... TWENTY FIVE THOUSAND!?? Only the rich ... and Bill and E'veen had a little under a million in a suitcase. Not wealth ... but they had CASH.

Spartan sold them a plane built for a silent screen movie star fallen on the hard times of sound film. License? Bill took the company pilot for a ride ... then E'veen took the controls, performed the perfect barrel roll, and scared company man. Bill popped open the leather case with many different steam ship decals all over it, counted out two hundred and fifty one hundred dollar bills and they were on their way.

Tulsa is a long way from everywhere. By air, it's about three hundred and fifty miles south of Lebanon Kansas, the geographical center of the US of A ... in 1936. (It's still the center of the lower 48.) From Tulsa to San Francisco, it's pretty close to seventeen hundred miles. From Tulsa to Boston is close to fifteen hundred. Bangor, Maine has better seafood. But people sing about 'Old Cape Cod' and they had never heard a song about Bangor. Cape Cod? Look out! Here they come.

It's still a hell of a long flight. Seven hours ... don't complain ... today, it's 25 hours by car on the freeways. They did it in two days.

It didn't take very long for the pervading illness of the times to set in. The Depression sucked. E'veen kept trying to save everybody and Bill had to cut off her pocket money. They did a double time bunk.

Depress the stem and they were in 2006 ... that was a surprise to the radars but a quick rewind and they were in the post war years. It was a recession but Bill knew the government would throw money at it. One bad thing. Well, two bad things.

Number one: In 1940, the government decided the aviation industry wasn't doing a good job as far as safety and record keeping was concerned, so ... enter the Civil Aeronautics Administration and the Civil Aeronautics Board.

CAA was responsible for Air Traffic Control, AIRMAN and AIRCRAFT certification, safety enforcement, and airway development. Airman and aircraft are both capitalized because they apply directly E'veen and Bill ... and the Spartan.

Bill has the very best of fake military certification ... he can fly ... the Army knows it. E'veen? She can fly but she hasn't jumped through the hoops. E'veen doesn't have PROOF she can fly..."If it's not written down it never happened." It's not going to work to take a test and fly with an examiner ... no ... she HAS to go to school. She can fly but only if there's a licensed pilot sitting next to her.

If she wants to fly ... by-her-self ... she has to be certified. It costs money and ... worse ... time ... to be certified. Gone are the days of..."you got it kid" ... after 3 or 5 or 8 hours of stick time. Now it's 40 hours ... and you're paying a male chauvinist pig to talk down to you because you happen to be a woman. You are PAYING HIM to be nasty to you.

CAB was entrusted with safety regulation, accident investigation, and economic regulation of the airlines. The CAA was part of the Department of Commerce. The CAB was an independent federal agency. We'll lump the two together.

The other thing was radar.