E. W. (POP) CLEVELAND -1952 AKA E. W. (Pop) Cleveland

E. W. CLEVELAND Cohocton, New York from Ellington, 1918

Among those who made the Air Service possible, are-- E. W. Cleveland--Curtiss motor expert. Has flown since 1913. Trained pilots at the Canadian Curtiss School for the R. F. C. in 1914 and 1915. Was the first to instruct stick control on Standard airplanes. Started first class of dual instruction at Ellington Field. Has been with army since beginning of war. from Ellington, 1918 Courtesy of Gary D. White

 

KNOXVILLIANS INVITED TO NATIONAL AIR RACES Knoxville Journal, Knoxville, Tennessee: July 10, 1931. Transcribed by Bob Davis - 5-21-04       Knoxvillians yesterday were given an invitation to the National Air Races in Cleveland next fall by the chairman, E. W. (Pop) Cleveland, Chief Starter of the National Air Tour and oldest pilot in point of service in the country, having started flying in 1911.       In the first place, Pop likes the mountains. He greatly enjoyed his flight over the mountains into Knoxville yesterday. "Mountain flying is difficult on account of shifting winds," he said, "but the scenery makes up for that." Pop wouldn't make any predictions about air freight. "It may be a long time coming," he said. "At present Henry Ford is the only man hauling freight by air, and he hauls only his own freight. It will doubtless be popular someday, but not soon, I fear. Bob Davis

ONLINE RESOURCES      If you search for "E. W. Cleveland +aviation" using Google, 2-15-04, you will find five very helpful links. Three of them are found on the National Air Tour website and are quite comprehensive. If time permits, I suggest that you follow each of the links. You may want to use the "FIND" function on "Cleveland" to find the location of the relevant entries.

National Air Tour, 2003      This is the first of three links to articles on E. W. Cleveland on the National Air Tour website. It features the stop at the Allegheny County Airport in Pittsburgh and offers a story from 1927 which recounts a conversation with Cleveland at the time. If yoiu scroll a little farther down the page, you will find a link to two newspaper clippings of the era. They are in the pdf format and will require the Adobe Acrobat reader to view. The first one, PIT31.7.8.1.pdf, is especially interesting to me. It features the story of my father-in-law, Walter E. Lees, who flew the Packard Diesel powered Bellanca in the race.      To access the page , just click on the title above.

 

Ellington Field: A Short History, 1917-1963      This page offers a single paragraph with a reference to Cleveland. The citation reads:      "Because of a lack of military pilots in 1917, the U.S. Army Air Service relied on civilian pilots to help train cadets. Civilian pilots often had mor flight experience than military aviators. During the war, Ellingon Field had seven civilian instructors: W.F. Sullivan, H.B. Crewdson, E.W. Cleveland, G.K. Hood, W.A. Pack, O.W. Hoover, and E.H. Lee. Upon graduation, a flight cadet would be christened a military aviator. After graduation, an aviator was shipped to Europe for more training and assignment to a combat squadron."      To access the page , just click on the title above.

 

Pop Cleveland died in a crash near Seattle in August 1952 The Ford Air Tours, 1925 - 1931, page 166, by LesleyFarden.

If you have any more information on this pioneer aviator please contact me. E-mail to Ralph Cooper   Back