The Rise and Fall of Charles Lindbergh: Chapters 7–11

In the same month that Charles seized on the idea to fly from New York to Paris, newspapers had been following the exploits of French pilot René Fonck and his ill-fated attempt to make the flight and win the Orteig Prize.

That was what the American public demanded in those days—stories about social scandal and murder trials. They were riveted by fashions and fads, transfixed by boxing matches and beauty contests.

That was what the American public demanded in those days—stories about social scandal and murder trials. They were riveted by fashions and fads, transfixed by boxing matches and beauty contests.

Responding to these sensation-seeking readers, publishers had introduced a revolutionary type of newspaper—the tabloid.

By distilling the news to its most sensational or salacious essence and reporting on it in a minutely detailed and hyperbolic style, writers could grab readers’ attention and hold it over the course of days, or even weeks.

By distilling the news to its most sensational or salacious essence and reporting on it in a minutely detailed and hyperbolic style, writers could grab readers’ attention and hold it over the course of days, or even weeks.

He mulled over the question as he flew above the farmlands of central Illinois.

A crack-up or crash could ruin a brand’s reputation, so companies like Boeing, Douglas, and Curtiss were extremely particular about accepting orders. And when it came to pilots vying for the Orteig Prize, well, manufacturers were even more selective.

Every six pounds of jettisoned equipment meant another gallon of fuel he could carry.

In his obsessive search to strip away pounds and ounces, he’d traded a sextant for twenty-five pounds of gasoline, a radio for ninety more.

Meanwhile, a flurry of newspaper articles touted the latest exciting air news: famous plane designer Igor Sikorsky was building a bigger, better plane for René Fonck’s next attempt across the ocean; flying in Charles Levine’s Bellanca, Clarence Chamberlin and another top pilot, Bert Acosta, broke the world’s endurance record for staying in the air fifty-one hours; and from the other side of the Atlantic, French fliers Charles Nungesser and François Coli had decided to try for the prize.

Dubbing him “Lucky Lindy” (a nickname that he would always detest, but that reporters thought pithy and memorable), they turned the spotlight of publicity on him.

Dubbing him “Lucky Lindy” (a nickname that he would always detest, but that reporters thought pithy and memorable), they turned the spotlight of publicity on him.

Standing stiffly side by side, the Lindberghs endured a barrage of thoughtless and insensitive questions.

It wasn’t until they demanded that Evangeline kiss her son farewell that she balked.

He wouldn’t be able to take off tonight—the plane had to be fueled first, a tedious process that involved filtering all 450 gallons of gas through cheesecloth to clean out impurities.

Fighting the urge, he stuck his hand out the side window, diverting a strong gust of air into his face.

There was a black square framed by regularly spaced lights, but on one side the airfield was a jam of erratic light.

They waved flags and burst into rousing renditions of “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

And at Harlem’s Savoy Ballroom, reveling patrons shouted, “Lindy’s done it!”, then created a new dance on the spot. Called the Lindy Hop, it quickly became a national craze.

It was June 11—Charles Lindbergh Day—and four navy destroyers, two army dirigibles, and eighty-eight army air corps planes escorted the Memphis through Chesapeake Bay en route to Washington, DC, where President Calvin Coolidge, along with members of Congress, top military brass, important business leaders, and 250,000 euphoric Americans waited on the National Mall to honor him.

It was June 11—Charles Lindbergh Day—and four navy destroyers, two army dirigibles, and eighty-eight army air corps planes escorted the Memphis through Chesapeake Bay en route to Washington, DC, where President Calvin Coolidge, along with members of Congress, top military brass, important business leaders, and 250,000 euphoric Americans waited on the National Mall to honor him.

Charles would face far more adulation at home.

Five thousand gushing verses, such as Willis A. Boughton’s “American Rhapsody to Lindbergh,” were published in magazines and newspapers just in the first three weeks after his landing.

Was it any wonder Washington, DC, erupted in a cacophony of church bells, sirens, factory whistles, and car horns when the USS Memphis came alongside the navy yard dock?

“Here comes the boy!” exclaimed the radio broadcaster when Charles stepped onto the gangplank. “He stands quiet and unassuming....He looks very serious and awfully nice. A darn nice boy!”

“On the evening of May twenty-first,” he began in his clipped, reedy voice, “I arrived at Le Bourget, France. I was in Paris for a week, in Belgium for a day, and was in London and England for several days. Everywhere I went...I was requested to bring a message home to you....Always the message was the same. ‘You have seen...the affection of the people of France for the people of America demonstrated to you.’”

Now the most famous man in the world, Charles was deluged with business proposals to endorse products, speak on stages, star in movies, write newspaper columns, and lend his name to various ventures.

He didn’t try for any literary flourishes.

Instead, he wrote a terse, listlike account of his flight to Paris that included little about his personal life but plenty about the remarkable performance of his American-made earth-inductor compass and his Wright Whirlwind engine.

She hurried up the wide marble stairs and found Charles leaning against a stone pillar, “a tall slim boy...so much slimmer, so much taller, so much more poised than I expected. A very refined face, not at all like the grinning ‘Lindy’ pictures—a firm mouth, clear, straight blue eyes, fair hair and nice color.”

Charles believed “mating [was] the most important choice of life....One mates not only with an individual, but also with that individual’s...ancestry.” And he had no intention of diluting his extraordinary Lindbergh-Land genes by marrying a woman whose own were not “conducive to evolutionary progress.”

Their goal was to spread the word about eugenics, a pseudoscience that advocated improvement of the human race through controlled breeding.

So, too, were undesirable traits such as shiftlessness, criminality, drunkenness, and “feeblemindedness,” a catchall term that included everything from severe mental illness to learning disabilities.

By 1921 the eugenics movement had become so mainstream that most college-level biology textbooks devoted a chapter to it.

They celebrated the qualities of the Nordic and Anglo-Saxon “races” and disparaged others who threatened the nation’s “racial strength.”

In his majority opinion, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote, “It is better for the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or let them starve for imbecility, society can prevent those manifestly unfit....Three generations of imbeciles are enough.”

It was this pragmatic thinking that led him back to the Morrow daughters. Not the sparkling, vivacious Elisabeth, but the one “resting in [her] shadow”—Anne.

It was this pragmatic thinking that led him back to the Morrow daughters. Not the sparkling, vivacious Elisabeth, but the one “resting in [her] shadow”—Anne.

Charles seemed entirely at home in the palatial surroundings, “push[ing] open the great carved door without knocking, picking up his mail casually,” noted Anne.