“Haw-w-w-w-w!” You heard right! That marvel from Boonetown, Iowa is back with a tale of starry-eyed colonels with visions of Hollywood and hidden german gun placements. Can that Knight of Calamity manage to find the Boche’s long-range guns while placating a colonel who thinks he’s the next Cecil B. DeMille all while avoiding landing in a dank cell in Blois? Find out in “Cinema Bums” from the pages of the May 1935 Flying Aces.

Can a Pinkham reform? A certain high and mighty Wing colonel thought so. But the Ninth shook in its shoes. For the Boonetown wonder’s eyes were entirely too friendly when they rested on the colonel—friendly like the eyes of a surgeon when he hovers over a guinea pig with a meat axe in his hand.

• Download “Cinema Bums” (May 1935, Flying Aces)

Amidst all the great pulp thrills and features in Sky Fighters, they ran a true story feature collected by Ace Williams wherein famous War Aces would tell actual true accounts of thrilling moments in their fighting lives! This time it’s France’s Lieutenant Roland Garros’ Most Thrilling Sky Fight!

Roland Garros was one of the world’s foremost airmen before the World War began. When the French army was mobilized, Garros joined his squadron, the Morane-Saulnier 23, just as it was leaving for the front. He built up a wonderful record for himself in respect to scouting.

Garros was an inventor as well as an aviator, and from the beginning of the war he set about improving the airplane as a fighting machine. On February 5th, 1915, he mounted a machine-gun on his airplane in such a manner that it fired through the whirring blades of the propeller, and thus changed the whole course of aerial warfare. His gun was not arranged to fire in synchronism with the propeller, so to save it from being shot through with holes, he armored it with steel tips. The bullets hitting it would thus be deflected harmlessly.

Improvements came later, but Garros, with his crude invention, shot down the first enemy airplane to be winged from the air. And from February 5th to April 19th, 1915, he succeeded in shooting down four others, becoming the first flying Ace.

The Germans learned his secret and equipped their planes in the same manner as his.

The account below is taken from an interview he gave the day after he shot down his first victim.

WINGS OF DEATH

by Lieutenant Roland Garros • Sky Fighters, March 1934

NATURALLY, the question in my mind was whether it would work in the air or not. I had tried it on the ground, and the gun functioned perfectly. I was able to hit a small target at a range of 100 meters. That success made me anxious to take off immediately. But mon commandant, Capitaine de Beauchamp, restrained me until the next morning.

Then he patted me on the shoulder and smiled: “Come back, mon enfant and tell the rest of us how it worked.” I waved and shot down the field, taking off lightly as a feather, despite the added weight of machine-gun and ammunition.

I flew towards Germany, until I came to a German drome. Three ships were on the ground getting ready to take off. I slanted off when I saw them, knowing that they saw me. too. But I wanted them to come up and fly after me.

I would let them chase me until they got close, then I would turn suddenly and fire on the leader.

I knew I could duck their bombs and rifle fire, then would come the surprise. All three Taubes came up and started in my direction. I slowed down. They circled trying to herd me back towards my own trenches. I let them get closer. The leading Taube was less than a hundred meters behind. “Now is the time!” I said, and threw my little ship around swiftly. The German darted past. I had banked so swiftly he couldn’t follow. I banked again, lowered my nose, until it sighted right on the German pilot’s back. I pressed the gun trigger.

Clackety-clack—clack-clack!

The gun stuttered, shook. The bullets spewed out. Linen stripped from the Taube, blasting back in the wind stream. I moved my controls slightly, pulled the trigger again. The pilot wilted. The Taube went up on one wing, began slipping sideways. Then it nose-dived and plunged into the ground.

I wheeled then to attack the others. But one had been forced down with motor trouble. The other was running away towards his own drome. I chased him clear to the ground, and fired my last rounds as it landed. I had no more bullets, so rushed home to make my report to Captain de Beauchamp. I was breathless! My invention had worked in the air!

Eugene M. Frandzen painted the covers of Sky Fighters from its first issue in 1932 until he moved on from the pulps in 1939. At this point in the run, the covers were about the planes featured on the cover more than the story depicted. On the May 1934 cover, Frandzen featured the Sopwith Snipe and the Halberstadt C-4!

ON THIS month’s cover the two types of ships shown are the Sopwith Snipe and the Halberstadt C-4.

The Sopwith Snipe was considered by many to be the finest job turned out by the Sopwith Company. The 1918 Snipe knocked the Germans out of the skies with system and precision. In four days a single Snipe squadron accounted for thirty-six enemy planes. In one day alone they smacked down thirteen.

Major Barker, of Canada, pulled the outstanding feat of his career in a Snipe. Attacked by fifty Boche planes he fought back, downed four and lived to tell the tale. He gave lots of credit to his Snipe.

The Halberstadt C-4 was a good all round fighter-reconnaissance plane. Its bulky forward fuselage and its thin, tapering short section behind the cockpits gave it a nose-heavy appearance. Despite its awkward proportions it had good flying characteristics and was a dependable ship when not forced beyond the limits of its class.

One of the pastimes indulged in by the retreating Germans during 1918 was blowing up bridges they had crossed. And one of the best little things our hard-worked engineers did was to smack down pontoon bridges to replace them.

Of course then the Boche artillerymen came out of their dugouts and popped over a few tons of steel-cased shells, which, if nicely directed had the nasty habit of destroying the engineers floating road. Now the obszrvers in the two-seaters had to direct this demolition fire by wireless. They were usually protected by several scout plinos flying above and capable of giving even battle to anyone asking for an argument.

A little mix-up of this sort is happening in the picture on the cover. The Halberstadt has spotted the pontoon bridge. He gets his wireless going. The German artillerymen start ranging their shells. Above are his protecting planes, Fokkers. Hardly had the German observer warmed up his dot-dash key than two Sopwith Snipes swooped down on the Fokkers, sent two of them down. One Fokker remained. One Snipe started after him while the other Snipe tore in at the Halberstadt.

The German reeled in his aerial and un-limbered his Parabellum gun. He signalled his pilot to fight his way out. Above he saw the lone Fokker coming down to his assistance.

The Snipe roared in on the two-seater, guns blazing. The Halberstadt pilot flipped his ship up and over. His gunner all set for this maneuver pressed his trigger as the plane started up. He kept the gun chattering as the Halberstadt started over on its back. He hoped to catch the Snipe in his spraying arc of fire.

Twin Vickers bucking in their mounts on the Snipe; the Parabellum vibrating in the hands of the German observer. Three streams of lead slicing through the air, perforating fabric, ricocheting off metal parts.

The diving Fokker abruptly disintegrates in mid-air. A ranging German Shell hunting the pontoon bridge hits his ship, explodes; blows the ship to bits.

The odds are now too great for any two-seater, no matter how good it, or its crew, may be. A matter of minutes remain till it will be all over. Trucks, cannon and infantry will continue to pass over the pontoon bridge, shelled of course, but not as accurately as would have been the case had the artillery-directing Halberstadt been allowed to remain on tha job five minutes longer.

Sky Fighters (Canadian Edition), May 1934 by Eugene M. Frandzen
(The Ships on The Cover Page)

Next time, Mr. Frandzen features the German Junkers and D.H.4!

Starting in the May 1932 issue of Flying Aces and running almost 4 years, Eugene Frandzen’s “Lives of the Aces in Pictures” was a staple of the magazine. Each month Frandzen would feature a different Ace that rose to fame during the Great War. This time around we have Belgium’s favorite Ace—Lt. Edmond Thieffry!

Thieffry was Belgium’s daring ace who entered the war as an orderly and worked his way up to being King Albert’s leading sky fighter—preferring to fight alone, crashing at the enemy ships from high above. A strategy that worked well for him leaving him with 10 victories on his balance sheet by the end of the war.

After the war, Thieffry resumed his pre-war job as a lawyer, but kept his hand in aviation—helping to found Sabena (Societé Anonyme Belge d’Exploitation de la Navigation Adrienne) in 1923 which would remain Belgium’s national airline until 2001.

Thieffry was killed in a crash close to Lake Tanganyika during a test flight while trying to set up an internal air service in the Congo on April 11th, 1929. He was 36 years old.

• Download “Lives of the Aces in Pictures – Part 8: Edmond Thieffry” (December 1932, Flying Aces)

(Editor’s Note: These early installments of Frandzen’s “Lives of the Aces in Pictures” that were published in the pulp-sized issues have been reformatted from a two page spread into a one page feature.)

This time around we have a tale from the anonymous pen of Lt. Frank Johnson—a house pseudonym. Sky Fighters ran a series of stories by Johnson featuring a pilot who who was God’s gift to the Ninth Pursuit Fighter Squadron and although he says he’s a doer and not a talker, he wasn’t to shy to tell them all about it. Which earned him the nickname “Silent” Orth.

In the first of the Silent Orth stories, Orth arrives at the Ninth Pursuit as a replacement and sets about to eliminate their pesky boche problem—seems a Baron Schmidt has been hammering their sector and the Ninth has been making little headway. In trying to do so, Orth finds out what happens when the new guy doesn’t stay in line—he ends up in “Coventry,” from the pages of the February 1934 Sky Fighters.

His wingmates couldn’t stand Jason Orth’s opinion of himself—But he certainly knew his stuff in the air!

• Download “Coventry” (February 1934, Sky Fighters)

Amidst all the great pulp thrills and features in Sky Fighters, they ran a true story feature collected by Ace Williams wherein famous War Aces would tell actual true accounts of thrilling moments in their fighting lives! This time it’s American Lieutenant Alan Winslow’s Most Thrilling Sky Fight!

Alan Winslow first went oyer to France as a member of tho American Ambulance Section serving with the French Army. After America entered the war he was transferred to the American Army. When the American Air Service under command of Colonel Mitchell began definite duties on the Western Front, Alan Winslow had won his commission as a First Lieutenant and was assigned as a pilot in the 94th Aero Squadron, the famous “Hat in the Ring” outfit later made famous by Captain Eddie Rickenbacker.

Lieutenant Winslow and Douglas Campbell were both inexperienced battle flyers, but it fell to their lot to be the first American flyers in an American Squadron under American command, to engage the enemy in actual combat. Winslow and Campbell downed their respective enemies within two minutes of one another in the same dogfight. Wlnslow’s opponent fell first, hence he is credited with the first American air victory.

The account below was taken down by one of Winslow’s squadron mates.

FIRST AMERICAN VICTORY

by Lieutenant Alan Winslow • Sky Fighters, February 1934

I DON’T know yet just how it happened. Our Spads were lined up on the deadline ready for a practice flight over the lines when the field sirens began to scream raucously. All of us rushed out to see what was the matter, looking naturally towards the front lines. Then the anti-aircraft guns began to pop and I saw white mushroom puffs just over the northern border of the field.

Right in the midst of the archie bursts were two black winged planes flying towards our field. They weren’t more than 2,500 feet high. Campbell and I both rushed for our planes.

When I got in the air I kited off towards the front in a climbing turn to get the Boche between me and their home lines.

The Boche didn’t appear to be at all disturbed about us taking off after them. They flew serenely on towards Toul, snapping their pictures, I suppose, while Campbell and I clawed for the ceiling behind them. The archies kept up a continual fire, and only ceased when Campbell and I swung about and pointed our Spads for the two Rumplers. I picked one, Campbell
took the other. I fired a short burst from my guns to make sure they were clear, then dived in to the attack.

The Boche gunner in the rear seat calmly swung his guns on me and opened up with a stream of tracer.

I don’t know just what I did, but I ducked that burst somehow by agile maneuvering. When I redressed he was out of my sights, so I nosed up, renverscd and went back again with my fingers trembling over the Bow-dens, ready to fire the instant I lined him.

Again the Boche tracer stream came and I ducked, but not without sending out a few of my own. I nosed down and slid under Mm; zooming up on the other side. Banking quickly to line the Rumpler again, I was surprised to see it go tumbling down the sky. My first nervous burst had been effective,

But fearing a trick, I followed down after it until it crashed. Only then did I think about Campbell and the other Boche. I banked and climbed back to go to his assistance, and saw his Boche going down just like mine.

Eugene M. Frandzen painted the covers of Sky Fighters from its first issue in 1932 until he moved on from the pulps in 1939. At this point in the run, the covers were about the planes featured on the cover more than the story depicted. On the April 1934 cover, Frandzen featured the Nieuport 17 and the giant Gotha bomber!

ON THE COVER this month you will find two ships as radically different in design as you could wish for. The fleet little scrapper, the Nieuport 17 and the cumbersome engine of destruction, the Gotha bomber. The Nieuport was one of the most effective scouts that the French turned out. Owing to its high speed and maneuverability it was very popular with the French flyers. It was really a parasol in that the lower wing was so small that its chief function was to give girder strength to the upper wing. The Nieuports of this type were commonly called “one-and-a-half-planes.”

The big Gotha smacking the ground was just the last word in bombers as far as Germany was concerned. She built some bigger ones and stuck more engines on them than this 77 ft. twin-engined job, but in the case of the larger bombers they had plenty of trouble lifting them off the ground.

Slip back a few hours and take off with this broken Gotha as it leaves its home drome with a half a ton of bombs snuggled against its belly. With its two 160 horse power Mercedes churning the two pusher props more than four tons of ship and load are eased into the air. Two other giant bombers follow. The field is circled twice and then the three ships with their motors blasting orange streaks of flame from six exhaust stacks point their noses westward, toward the English Channel. The vibrating motors are laboring like mogul locomotives pulling a heavy train over a steep mountain grade—they are climbing. At last they reach twelve thousand feet, level off and throttle down to about sixty-five miles per hour. It is a clear night with high clouds scudding just below. Finally the nose of the leading Gotha is pointed downward. The other two follow. They slip down through the clouds. The Channel is below, now it has been passed. Again the bombers level off, wing slightly to the left. Scattered houses, the outskirts of London are below. Now the dwellings are bunched together. The gunner in the front pit has his eye glued to a Georz bomb-dropper’s sight. The pilot is watching his galvanometer, his left hand is on his bomb releases. Government buildings are now below at an angle of about twelve degrees.

Two giant bombs drop flatly from beneath the Gotha, lazily point their noses downward, then gathering momentum they go streaking down at their target. Buildings rock, flames spurt from shattered windows. Sirens from tops of buildings wail their eerie warnings through the chill before dawn air. AIR RAID. Again the bombs go racing toward the sleeping city. A ton and a half of high explosive has been released.

The British home defense planes are in the air, sweeping up to engage the giant destroyers, but already those dark shapes have slunk off into the blackness and are well out over the Channel.

The British were taken by surprise. They had not adequate speed in their protection planes. The advantage of the raiders was too great, they escaped across the Channel. But did they get back to their hangars behind the German lines? They did not! One was forced down with a balky engine. The two others ran into a dawn patrol of French airmen out looking for big game. Spandaus and Vickers snarled and spat lead as the eastern sky burst gloriously into color as the sun rose over the torn and twisted battle fields. A Vickers’ bullet found a vulnerable spot in the left engine of the Gotha pictured on the cover. Another killed the pilot. Flames, a dive, oblivion for the raiders. The Nieuport pilot circles the flamer once, salutes his fallen foe. It’s all in the day’s work.

Sky Fighters, April 1934 by Eugene M. Frandzen
(The Ships on The Cover Page)

Starting in the May 1932 issue of Flying Aces and running almost 4 years, Eugene Frandzen’s “Lives of the Aces in Pictures” was a staple of the magazine. Each month Frandzen would feature a different Ace that rose to fame during the Great War. This time around we have France’s Ace of Aces—Lt. René Fonck!

Lt. René Fonck is recognized as one of the greatest French air fighters since Captain Guynemer and is credited with bringing down no less than 75 enemy planes, out of a claimed 142—bringing down six in one day (twice)! As his fame grew, sadly, so did his ego and he never really gained the admiration and popularity of Guynemer.

After the war, Fonck returned to civilian life, but kept his hand in aviation even trying to win the Orteig prize by being the first person to fly across the atlantic—he unfortunately crashed on take-off, killing two of his three crew members. Charles Lindbergh would win the prize seven months later.

He return to military aviation and from 1937-39 he acted as Inspector of fighter aviation within the French Air Force. However his later record of working with the Vichy government following the fall of France in June 1940 later besmirched his reputation. A French police inquiry about his supposed collaboration with the Vichy regime completely cleared Fonck after the war. The conclusion was that his loyalty was proved by his close contacts with recognised resistance leaders such as Alfred Heurtaux during the war—and he was awarded the Certificate of Resistance in 1948.

Just five years later Fonck suffered a fatal stroke and died in 1953 at the age of 59.

• Download “Lives of the Aces in Pictures – Part 7: René Fonck” (November 1932, Flying Aces)

(Editor’s Note: These early installments of Frandzen’s “Lives of the Aces in Pictures” that were published in the pulp-sized issues have been reformatted from a two page spread into a one page feature.)