Lincoln Beachey was said to be the first of the daredevil pilots to achieve national fame and one of the first to accomplish the inside loop manuever. Following performances at the 1910 Dominguez Hills Air Meet, Beachey went on to perform such feats as flying over Niagara Falls and under the International Bridge. He is also credited with the first flight in Puerto Rico and as the first to fly over Washington DC, finishing that flight with a landing on the White House Lawn.

1915 – Performing an aerial show at the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco, when pulling out of a dive from 3,500’ over San Francisco Bay, the wings of his airplane broke away. Beachey survived the crash, but was trapped in the wreckage and drowned.

More data to come. SEE the Beachey Tribute sites.

Enshrined in National Aviation Hall of Fame 1966.

The Man Who Owned the Sky, Frank Marrero (paperback 1996)