Eddie Rickenbacker
Eddie Rickenbacker – originally spelled Rickenbacher, he changed the spelling during the First World War – lived a life improbably fraught with danger and adventure. Before he became America’s most famous aviator he was a race car driver, competing in the Indianapolis 500 four times. He grew up in Columbus, Ohio, in a family which spoke German at home. His formal education did not extend beyond the seventh grade, but he was noted for his mechanical skills. He once tried to convince the Army that racers would make superior pilots due to their experience with speed but the Army remained skeptical, even after Rickenbacker demonstrated his own ability.
Rickenbacker enlisted when the United States entered the war and was among the earliest American troops to arrive in France, where he was soon working as a mechanic. The lack of a college degree was an obstacle to his becoming a pilot, but the Army couldn’t afford to lose his mechanical skills, and he bartered them for flight training. He also trained a mechanic to replace him and by the spring of 1918 Rickenbacker was assigned to the 94th Aero Squadron, which displayed the soon to be famous Hat in the Ring insignia on its planes. In late April Rickenbacker shot down his first enemy airplane.
Despite being grounded for most of the summer of 1918 because of a severe ear infection, Rickenbacker became the leading American ace of the war, eventually credited with 26 air to air victories, and rose to the rank of Captain. He became the commanding officer of the Hat in the Ring squadron in September, 1918, less than two months before the Armistice which ended the fighting. In the late summer and fall of 1918 the American air service was tasked with destroying as many German observation balloons as possible, a dangerous task which many avoided. Rickenbacker destroyed five.
Eddie Rickenbacker was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross eight times, the most of any American in history. One of these awards was converted to the Medal of Honor many years after the war. He was also decorated by the French, who awarded him the Croix de Guerre and the Legion of Honor. When he returned to the United States after the war it was as the most famous aviator in the nation. He used his fame to generate publicity for the automobile company he founded, the Rickenbacker Motor Company, which lasted until bankruptcy in 1927. He also owned and operated the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
He was also a founder and eventual owner of Eastern Airlines. He was nearly killed in the crash of an Eastern flight near Atlanta, Georgia in 1941, suffering severe injuries. The following year, on a flight at the behest of the Secretary of War, Rickenbacker and his companions were adrift at sea for 24 days after their aircraft was forced to ditch after running out of fuel. They survived on rainwater, sea birds which they knocked down, and fish caught with their bare hands. Not all of the men survived but Rickenbacker did. America’s leading ace of World War I cheated death many times, not all of them in the air.