U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1929
The following text is from a letter written by Chester Cy Martin to The SW American Newspaper, July 1, 1967. It was found among his paper after his death.
Dear Sir:
Recently I stopped in Fort Smith on my return trip from a reunion of the 20th Aero
Squadron, First Day Bombardment Group of World War I in Louisville, Kentucky to find
Fort Smith celebrating its 150th anniversary, and your paper putting out a special edition.
Your story on aviation did not do justice to the origin of your important and busy airport.
The first airmail flight in the United States was made in Fort Smith. Mail was picked up and franked in a pasture near the intersection of Midland Boulevard and Spradling Avenue. The mail was dropped onto the lawn of the Sixth Street Post Office. This flight was made in 1911 or 1912 in a Curtis Pusher with two chain driven propellers. The pilot, I believe was Lincoln Beachey. First Day Covers of this mail are very valuable.
Ollie L. Blan and Floyd Muncie, who had been flying officers in World War I, were pioneers in Fort Smith's Aviation History. Ollie Blan operated with an OX Waco from a six acre pasture near the old sorghum mill west of the present airport. Floyd Muncie with a Travelaire, operated from a mowed strip in Oklahoma near the west end of the Garrison Avenue Bridge. Blan and Muncie kept the small spark of aviation interest alive in the early '20s with tuition from rare flight students, short hops around the field, occasional charter flights and barnstorming.
Barnstorming was landing in some small pasture near a town where there was a fair or
some sort of celebration in progress, showing off the plane, doing a few stunts and carrying
a few passengers after the fear of getting both feet off the ground had been overcome.
Crop dusting by then was slowly emerging from its cocoon.
Ollie Blan and the assets at South Fort Smith were later moved across the Arkansas River in Oklahoma near the present stockyards when the Fort Smith Aircraft Company was organized with Bert Harper as president, Ollie Blan as operations manager and Cy Martin(myself) as service manager. With the Fort Smith Aircraft Company, Fort Smith air-minded people lifted off.
Location of Alexander Airport from Downtown Fort Smith
Courtesy of H.E. Huber
(Click on map for larger view.) 
Student flight training, penny-a-pound flights on weekends and holidays, charter flights and sales begin to pick up. Parachute jumps were used to pep up the penny-a-pound sales where the passenger paid according to his weight.
Principals among those who kept interest in aviation stimulated in those days prior to the Big Depression were Bert Harper, Graham Williams, WWI Ace Wendell Robertson, Leigh Kelley, Frank Morehead, Buell Phillips, Red Ward, Jerry Noble, Monte Echols, Gene Dorough, Rud Ross, Ben Ames, Vint Miles Sr, Henry Ayers, Patsy Kelley (our only girl student), Harold Littlefield, Ted Bell, Charles Hayes, Vint Miles Jr, Scott Robinson Jr, Bill Blan, Boyd Wood Oily, George Lasley, Roy Shine, Dewey Holley and Joe Basso.
Private planes hangered at the field, whose rentals helped pay expenses, were Red Ward's four place J5 powered Stinson and a Siemens-Halske powered Waco; Bert Harper's Challenger powered Robin; Robert Echol's Gypsy Moth; Graham Williams's OX powered Commandaire' Jerry Nobles' Kinner powered Eagle and Rud Ross' Curtis-Wright Pusher.
All of the Pushers were powered with three-cylinder Szekeley engines. Roy Shine and Joe
Bosso tied their planes down in nearby pastures. Roy Shine owned a Hisso powered JN4D
and Joe, a Travelaire or whatever he could trade for while barnstorming.
The Fort Smith Aircraft Company was on the "Highway 66" of the Air. On our register were names like Will Rogers, Frank Hawks, Amelia Earhart (flying an Autogyro) Lady Heath, Reg Robbins, Bernt Balche, Rosco Turner, Richard Halliburton (and his famous Flying Carpet), Art Goebels, Jacqueline Cochrane, Phoebe Omlie, Tom Hatton, Ellis Fagan, Harvey McGinnis, Carol Cone and many others. Some of the notables of aviation were in a hurry and failed to sign our register -- simply filled their tanks, gave their ship a glance inspection and pushed on as far as they could before dark.
The first airborne bank robber was captured at this field by a "small posse" led by Sheriff John B. Williams. When the reward of $500.00 was divided evenly among us, we each received $2.50.
There were no cross-country aids to night flying in those days. One evening as we were
closing up at dark, a Ford "Tri-motor", commonly called a "Tin Goose", flew in. The pilot
had been forced off course by a storm and was low on gas. He had followed the river in to
Fort Smith for a landing. His passengers and the mail were taken into town for the night,
and when morning came and he had himself located, he flew on.
Here, I would like to add that Ollie Blan , Floyd Muncie and some of the Early Birds held Pilot Licenses signed by Orville Wright himself.
When 1929 fell upon us like a blanket, I went with what is now known as the Federal Aviation Agency. At that time it was the Department of Commerce, Airways Division and a part of the Coast Guard. It has been called by many other names since Its origin. I stayed in Air Navigation until retirement in 1962.
Cy Martin
July 1, 1967
Pilot's License 15589
A & E License 2387
He was assigned to Ponca City, Oklahoma. On Valentine's Day he received this comic telegram from his old friends at Fort Smith Airport.
In the 1980s dad joined the OX-5 organization composed of people who had used the venerable old OX-5 engine. Here is a record he sent of his early aviation experiences .
Chester Cy Martin: OX-5 Member No. 10001
On May 9, 1917, one month and 11 days after the United States declared war on Germany, I enlisted for service in the air and was sent to Camp Kelly in San Antonio, Texas. There I was a part of the 20th Aero Squadron which was then a branch of the Signal Corp. The United had no air force as such. As of that date, the strength of the Aeronautical Division of the United States Army Signal Corp stood at 131 officers and 1087 enlisted men. These were distributed roughly into two squadrons. The First Squadron, fully organized, was located at Columbus, New Mexico. The Second Squadron was divided between San Diego and the Philippines.
At Camp Kelly I was assigned to field duty and training as an Airplane Mechanic. There were two Wright JN4-Ds with OX-5 engines, and one LWF with a Hall-Scott water cooled engine at the field. We were given training on these.
In July we were sent to Wilbur Wright Flying Field at Dayton, Ohio. There I was assigned to field duty and given the rating of Sargeant. We took training here on six Jennys with OX-5s and two Standards with Hall-Scott engines.
Our squadron was next ordered to England for training with the Royal Flying Corp. We arrived in Great Britain on New Year's day, 1918. Here our squadron trained on planes being made ready for action and on others returning from the front to be repaired and placed back in service if possible. I was assigned to field duty and given the rank of Flight Sergeant with a crew of twenty-seven men.
I made my first dual flight with an English pilot whose name I do not recall. There were no OX-5 engines in the planes I worked on in England. This squadron was attached to the Royal Flying Corp from January 1918 until August 1918.
British Planes Used
The squadron was ordered to France and left England on August 12. On September 5, we were stationed at Amity, France, to take part in the St. Mihiel offensive. We were equipped with De Havilan DH-4s with American built Liberty motors with V-12 at 45-degree with battery ignition. We had 18 DH-4s.
On September 23, we moved to Maulan at the beginning of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive. Besides maintaining our DH-4s we serviced and often made emergency repairs on drop-ins, Spads, Breguets, and Neuports and Salmeons.
After the Armistice was signed, all planes, engines and equipment were sent to Columbey-les Belles. The 20th Aero Squadron was demobilized at Garden City, New York in May, 1919.
In 1926, I joined with a group which formed the Fort Worth Air Craft Company in Fort Smith Arkansas. In addition to landing field, charter service, hangar storage, maintenance and service, we conducted a flying school. We had two principal employees. Ollie L. Blan, who had been a pilot in World War I, was manager and flight instructor in our school. I was maintenance manager and instructor in the ground school. The principal engine used for demonstration in the ground school was the OX-5. As service manager, I performed maintenance on the planes of the company and those of our clients and visitors when required.
We had the following planes
One evening, just before dark, as were were "folding our wings", a Ford Tri-motor landed at our field. At that time, there were few facilities for night flying. The pilot had lost his way and followed the river to Fort Smith. He was carrying some mail. We tied him down for the night, carried him and his mail to town. I do not recall the pilot's name nor where he had flown from.
While I was an employee of the Fort Smith Aircraft Company, I took instruction from Ollie L. Blan, whose license was signed by Orville Wright, himself. I made my first solo flight in a Waco-10, No. 3629, June 3, 1929. I received my pilot's license May 22, 1933. I received my Mechanic's License No. 2387, April 20, 1938.
Our field was an authorized stop on the 1929 Powder Puff Derby. We serviced the planes of most all the women who flew in that race: Jacqueline Cochran, Edna Gardiner Whyte, Louise Mc Phetridge, Phoebe Omilie, and others.
In 1932, I became an employee of what is now the U.S. Department of Transportation - the F.A.A. I retired in 1969. I was hired as an Airways Mechanician and retired as Airways Mechanical Engineer.
I let my pilot license expire and I have not flown as a pilot for many years.
"The young man had seen the Wright Brothers exhibiting their kite-like machines and came home fired with ambition to make and fly his own. With plans from a technical magazine, and a two-cylinder 30-horsepower motor, he began the construction of what was to be the first practical airplane built and flown in Arkansas. He took the plane out into a pasture and flew for all of a quarter of a mile.
The sad end of the first try was a crash, but he later became a full-fledged pilot."
After my father's death, I found a these few momentos from the Fort Smith Aircraft Company. One particular item was this old box probably made from a shipping crate. It contained many special tools used on some of the old aircraft. The box is stenciled "Fort Smith Aircraft Corporation, Alexander Airport, Fort Smith, Arkansas - Express - Collect." My Cousin Bob Martin is taking the box to the Air Museum at Fayetteville, Ark.
Bob also has a rigging diagram for a Gypsy Moth that my father gave him. I hope that he can have a copy made of it that can be scanned and put on this page in the future.
This page is under construction. As new information comes in I will add it to the web site.
If you have information or pictures about Fort Smith Air Craft Company, its personnel, Alexander Airport or other early Aviation History in Arkansas, please contact J. Cy Martin 
cymartin@flash.net
For old time aviation http://www.smilinjack.com/
7-7-1999
