1934 free fall flight control:

[patworks 5]

1934 free fall flight control:

Freefall parachute: T. S. Baldwin introduced the first silk limp parachute in a pack with a harness in 1897. Baldwin's gear and approach opened doors for foldable- packed parachute for other gypsy moths. Later, Broadwick refined that into the coat pack type that Tiny jumped. At 1st, no one used a ripcord. By 1919 Floyd Smith, Irwin, Stevens and several others made and marketed pack-type parachutes.

unconscious and incapable -- Prior to 1911? ) it was believed that any person falling free would instantly lose consciousness. Live tests proved this presupposition to be false. However Since it was a 'known' scientific ‘fact’ that falling over 300 feet rendered you unconscious and incapable, there wasn't a long line of people anxiously wanting a ripcord for delayed free falls. However, by 1924, half a dozen well known parachutists were skilled free fall masters of today's skydiving maneuvers: In 1918 Floyd Smith and Leslie Irvin jointly developed a "modern free-type, manually operated parachute." Early free fallers, battled the tangible danger of uncontrolled body spins. The extremely fast and dangerous rotation where, “Everything becomes blurred and the jumper loses his sight and judgment.” As a consequence “blood rushes to the head and unconsciousness may result.” Floyd described This real and present danger “The untrained person in a free-fall spin is about like a novice pilot in a blind spin without instruments.”

Expert free fallers -- Smith and a few others became very proficient when they "fell free through the air" saying, "Since that day scores of men have made long free falls or delayed-opening jumps." and "I have seen extraordinary progress in the control of the human body in the air." These skills were ”tribal knowledge” of select elite free fallers. Their knowledge of controlled flight died with them. There was no mechanism to transfer knowledge beyond their small cadre. The exception was Floyd Smith. 1934 in a popular magazine, Mr. Smith documented control skills they’d learned ten years earlier. He accompanied his descriptions of the positions for free fall flight control with photo-illustrations of each.

Lost & Found: The lost knowledge was resurrected 25+ years later at Les centres de parachutisme français. In the early 1950s, after French state run school training our two most important free fall parachuting missionaries learned the arts of body flying that they communicated broadly on their return to the United States of America. These two notable French-Americans, Raymond Young and Jacques A. Istel graduated from the courses then transferred their knowhow to the U.S.A..

1924 Free Fall Maneuvers Floyd Smith, Spud Manning, “Kohley” Kohlstadt, and Harry Eibe, and few others demonstrated and illuminated positions expert free fallers make the most of for a spectrum of maneuvers. Including techniques for:
1924 Free Fall Maneuvers*
basic stable
head down
tracking
back tracking
delta
front loop
back loop
carving
Steering fwd. movement
parachute canopy deployment on your back
head down deployment
flat-stable deployment

*{quote}; making a quick turnover (front loop); High-Speed Vertical Fall (head down); position for falling Flat, Face down (Basic stable); position for Backward Loop; going into Spiral side; inducing a spin; Position Assumed for Loop with Back inside (Backloop); tracking on your back (back tracking); Using the Arm as a Rudder to Guide the Body (Steering); executing a Slow Roll; initiate a turn {end quote}.

Terminal velocity -- Adding, "If you lie in the air flat with arms and legs outspread, you will reach a maxim velocity of about 105 miles an hour at sea level." Freefly, "If you take a head-first position you attain the greatest speed." Later, Floyd continues, "I refer to a sort of swan dive with the both at angle of about forty-five degrees to the earth. By pulling in one arm you can quickly roll over on your back." And tells what position will "turn you over backward..." Floyd Smith said that his most difficult position was "straight head first" adding that Manning learned to maintain a head down for 5,000 feet, "to come out gradually and maintain control while slowing up into a swan dive." Causing "considerable horizontal movement... a gliding plane against the air."

Hard experience: Smith emphasized that control of the human body in free fall requires accumulated experience. The how-to information on positions for expertise was developed as “the result of hundreds of free falls by men who have specialized in it.”

Zero altimeters -- In 1924 F. Smith’s free fall peers included “Kohley” Kohlstadt, Harry Eibe, H. E. “Spud” Manning, and John Tranum (England).
“By laying flat and balancing with spread arms you can fall indefinitely at relatively low speed and in perfect position to calculate your distance to the ground. “To judge opening altitude Eibe and Kohlstadt relied in counting off the seconds in fall whereas Manning and Smith relied on angular observation AKA “ground rush” to calculate altitude with a variation of less than 100 feet. Thirty years later in Houston, in the 1960’s my freefall RW friends and I relied on this “no altimeter” technique and consistently eyeballed pull time with canopy open deviation of about 75 feet.

Above is from my research on my 5th book to be titled something exciting like, "A Chronology of Skydiving." ... out late this year. Hopefully

Pat Works nee Madden Travis Works, Jr .B1575, C1798, D1813, Star Crest Solo#1, USPA#189,

[Spooky52 0]

Very interesting reading. Thanks, Pat.

If you know how many guns you have - you don't have enough!

[wmw999 2,122]

Thanks, Pat, that was interesting.

Speaking of old-timey parachuting, I recently got a copy of Jump! Tales of the Caterpillar Club, and it's absolutely wonderful. It's chock full of no-shit-there-I-was stories, as well as a decent number of look-Ma-no-hands stories . Plus, of course, a listing of the members up to then (mid-1929) Caterpillar Club, as well as a definitive statement that a skydiver is not automatically a member, but that one who has used their reserve might be able to make a case for it.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Gene03 0]

Good story Pat.

Lot of history I bet most of us weren't aware of. Including me.

Wendy,

From what I understand this is one of those snotty-nosed pilot things.

I say fuck them let them have their fun.

We're skydivers and we have the memories and the logbooks.

“The only fool bigger than the person who knows it all is the person who argues with him.

Stanislaw Jerzy Lec quotes (Polish writer, poet and satirist 1906-1966)

[riggerrob 558]

Great research Pat!
And it was good to see you again in Daytona Beach.

Have you read "Yorkshire Birdman?"
How about Leo Valentine's book?