Advanced search  
Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 9   Go Down

Author Topic: X16020  (Read 118079 times)

Ric Gillespie

  • Executive Director
  • Administrator
  • *
  • Posts: 6098
  • "Do not try. Do or do not. There is no try" Yoda
X16020
« on: September 15, 2015, 05:00:03 PM »

For the new book project we need photos of c/n 1055 after the aircraft was completed but before it was delivered to Earhart.  On July 19, 1936 Lockheed Aircraft Corporation registered the aircraft in the Experimental category "for factory test work." 
I know I've seen at least one photo of the aircraft with the X registration but we don't have a copy. I think it was published in an old issue of Air Classics magazine.

The airplane was delivered to Earhart in Las Vegas on July 24, her 39th birthday, and that raises a question.  Why Las Vegas? 
Logged

Dale O. Beethe

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 130
Re: X16020
« Reply #1 on: September 15, 2015, 07:04:07 PM »

What happens in Vegas......................no, that's not it.  It would seem an odd place to pick up a new aircraft in 1936.  Las Vegas certainly wasn't the city it is now back then.
Logged

Ric Gillespie

  • Executive Director
  • Administrator
  • *
  • Posts: 6098
  • "Do not try. Do or do not. There is no try" Yoda
Re: X16020
« Reply #2 on: September 15, 2015, 07:09:47 PM »

I wonder if there was a tax advantage to taking delivery in Nevada.
Logged

Dale O. Beethe

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 130
Re: X16020
« Reply #3 on: September 15, 2015, 07:24:28 PM »

It could be, but you'd think if there were taxes to be paid it would be wherever it was normally hangared.  Had to be a reason.
Logged

Friend Weller

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 156
Re: X16020
« Reply #4 on: September 15, 2015, 07:59:30 PM »

Celebratory dinner at the Peppermill Restaurant??  Oh wait, they'd have to wait another 36 years.....!!   ;D
Friend
TIGHAR 3086V
 
Logged

Ric Gillespie

  • Executive Director
  • Administrator
  • *
  • Posts: 6098
  • "Do not try. Do or do not. There is no try" Yoda
Re: X16020
« Reply #5 on: September 15, 2015, 08:22:19 PM »

It could be, but you'd think if there were taxes to be paid it would be wherever it was normally hangared.  Had to be a reason

 I live in Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania has a sales tax.  Delaware has no sales tax. If I buy something and arrange to have it shipped to an address in Delaware the seller does not have to charge me sales tax. I don't know if that would be true for an airplane being delivered to Nevada in 1936 but, as you say, there had to be a reason.
Logged

Dale O. Beethe

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 130
Re: X16020
« Reply #6 on: September 15, 2015, 08:27:41 PM »

Just found a paper online that said Nevada didn't get a general sales tax until 1955.  What was AE's state of residence at the time?
Logged

Ricker H Jones

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 120
Re: X16020
« Reply #7 on: September 15, 2015, 08:30:55 PM »

From July 1935 to June 1943 the California sales tax was 3%.  Nevada had no sales tax until 1955.  That sounds like something that a buyer would take advantage of, and I'm wondering where the aircraft was titled. (1)
Logged

Dale O. Beethe

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 130
Re: X16020
« Reply #8 on: September 15, 2015, 09:01:54 PM »

Three percent of whatever the Electra cost in 1936 would be substantial, and I get the impression her budget was pretty tight at the time.  Rick, you may be on to something here.
Logged

Ted G Campbell

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 344
Re: X16020
« Reply #9 on: September 15, 2015, 09:34:47 PM »

All,
What part did Purdue U. play in this, vis-a-vis the "Flying Laboratory"?
Ted Campbell
Logged

Ric Gillespie

  • Executive Director
  • Administrator
  • *
  • Posts: 6098
  • "Do not try. Do or do not. There is no try" Yoda
Re: X16020
« Reply #10 on: September 16, 2015, 09:20:32 AM »

What part did Purdue U. play in this, vis-a-vis the "Flying Laboratory"?

In 1935 Purdue set up a research foundation.  Wealthy Purdue alumni donated money (tax deductible) to the foundation.  The money was given to Earhart for the purpose of buying an airplane that was to be used as a flying laboratory and perhaps a flight around the world. For legal liability reasons the university kept it an arm's-length relationship. The airplane was titled to Amelia, not Purdue.
Logged

Randy Conrad

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 398
Re: X16020
« Reply #11 on: September 19, 2015, 09:24:32 PM »

Are you in need of these documents Ric?
Logged

Ric Gillespie

  • Executive Director
  • Administrator
  • *
  • Posts: 6098
  • "Do not try. Do or do not. There is no try" Yoda
Re: X16020
« Reply #12 on: September 20, 2015, 12:14:40 PM »

Are you in need of these documents Ric?

Yes, I'd like to have copies of those.  Where did you find them?
Logged

Ric Gillespie

  • Executive Director
  • Administrator
  • *
  • Posts: 6098
  • "Do not try. Do or do not. There is no try" Yoda
Re: X16020
« Reply #13 on: September 20, 2015, 12:37:03 PM »

The letter is especially interesting.  Apparently Mantz accepted delivery in Vegas and then flew the airplane back to Burbank.  I wonder when AE first flew the airplane alone? It was a big step up from her Vega - empty weight almost three times heavier, twin-engines, constant speed props, retractable landing gear.  Did the Vega have flaps?
Logged

Bill Mangus

  • TIGHAR member
  • *
  • Posts: 420
Re: X16020
« Reply #14 on: September 20, 2015, 02:28:36 PM »

Interesting letter.

Paul L. Briand, Jr's book Daughter of the Sky - The Story of Amelia Earhart, 1960 tells a story of AE going out to Burbank "inspect the new Lockhed for the first time, examining the plane closely; she walked the 55-foot span of the wings, climbed into the cockpit, worked the controls, and started the engines."  This makes sense as she and GP were living in Rye, CA, or North Hollywood according to Susan Butler in her biography of AE,East to the Dawn, 1997.  Either place (same place?) is apparently close to Burbank.  Butler says she "took possession of the Electra on her thirty-ninth birthday, July 24, 1936" but doesn't give a location.  Mantz was living in "Toluca Lake in North Hollywood at the time.  AE stayed there twice, once for approximately a month, once for a few days, before she and George rented a house for themselves." (Butler).  They eventually bought their own house there.

These are the only two AE biography's I have on hand.  If anyone has others it might be interesting to check them and see what they say.  Neither give any indication of why Mantz may have been in Las Vegas or why he would have been the one to take delivery.  Maybe there was some strange rule that only someone certified/qualified to pilot an Electra could legally take delivery.  Perhaps AE wanted a Lockheed pilot to make the initial 'shakedown/test' flight since she'd never flown one before and Mantz (and AE?) flew it back to Burbank as her first lesson in the Electra.  Maybe she flew from Burbank to Las Vegas as a passenger.

More mystery.
Logged
Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 9   Go Up
 

Copyright 2024 by TIGHAR, a non-profit foundation. No portion of the TIGHAR Website may be reproduced by xerographic, photographic, digital or any other means for any purpose. No portion of the TIGHAR Website may be stored in a retrieval system, copied, transmitted or transferred in any form or by any means, whether electronic, mechanical, digital, photographic, magnetic or otherwise, for any purpose without the express, written permission of TIGHAR. All rights reserved.

Contact us at: info@tighar.org • Phone: 610-467-1937 • Membership formwebmaster@tighar.org

Powered by MySQL SMF 2.0.18 | SMF © 2021, Simple Machines Powered by PHP