The Winnie Mae of
Oklahoma
The Winnie Mae of Oklahoma, arguably one of the most famous
airplanes ever, is a special Lockheed Model 5C Vega flown by famed
aviator Wiley Post, completed two around-the-world record flights and a
series of special high-altitude sub-stratospheric research flights. It was
named for the daughter of its original owner, F. C. Hall, who hired Post to
pilot the plane, which had been purchased in June 1930.

With the consent of his employer, Post entered the Winnie Mae in the
National Air Races and piloted the plane to the first of its records, now
inscribed on the side of its fuselage: ‘Los Angeles to Chicago 9 hrs. 9
mm. 4 sec. Aug. 27, 1930.’

On June 23, 1931, Post, accompanied by Harold Gatty as navigator, took
off from New York to make a world circuit in record time. The first stop
was Harbor Grace, Newfoundland. From there, the fourteen-stop course
included England, Germany, Russia, Siberia, Alaska, Canada, thence to
Cleveland, and finally to New York on July 1, 1931. The circuit was
completed in 8 days, 15 hours, and 51 minutes. Halls admiration for his
pilot manifested itself in the gift of the Winnie Mae to Post.

Wiley Post spent the following year exhibiting the plane and conducting
various flight tests. The airplane was groomed with an overhaul of the
engine, and a radio compass and an auto pilot were installed. Both these
instruments were at the time in their final stages of development by the
Army and Sperry Gyroscope Company.  On July 15, 1933, Post left New
"The Winnie Mae of Oklahoma", as she is today at
the Udvar Hazy Museum in Washington DC
York City.  Closely following his former route but making only eleven stops, he made a 15,596-mile circuit of the
earth in 7 days, 18 hours, and 49 minutes.

Post next modified the Winnie Mae for long-distance, high-altitude operation. He recognized the need to develop
some means of enabling the pilot to operate in a cabin atmosphere of greater density than the outside atmospheric
environment. Because of its design, the Winnie Mae could not be equipped with a pressure cabin. Post therefore
asked the B. F. Goodrich Company to assist him in developing a full pressure suit for the pilot. Post hoped that by
equipping the plane with an engine supercharger and a special jettisonable landing gear, and himself with a
pressure suit, he could cruise for long distances at high altitude in the jetstream. On March 15, 1935, Post flew from
Burbank, California, to Cleveland, Ohio, a distance of 2,035 miles, in 7 hours, 19 minutes. At times, the Winnie Mae
attained a ground speed of 340 mph, indicating that the airplane was indeed operating in the jet stream.

Wiley Post died shortly afterward in the crash of a hybrid Lockheed Orion-Sirius floatplane near Point Barrow,
Alaska, on August 15, 1935. His companion, humorist Will Rogers, also perished in the accident. The Smithsonian
Institution acquired the Winnie Mae from Mrs. Post with a special appropriation from congress in 1936,

During its high-altitude flight research, the Winnie Mae made use of a special tubular steel landing gear developed
by Lockheed engineers Clarence L. Kelly’ Johnson and James Gerschler. It was released after takeoff by the pilot
using a cockpit lever, thus reducing the total drag of the plane and eliminating its weight. The Winnie Mae would
then continue on its flight and land on a special metal-covered spruce landing skid glued to the fuselage. During
these flights, Post wore a special pressure suit, the world’s first practical pressure suit and an important step on the
road to space. The suit was the third type developed by Post and Russell S. Colley of B. F. Goodrich Company. It
consisted of three layers: long underwear. an inner black rubber air pressure bladder, and an outer cloth contoured
suit.  A special pressure helmet was then bolted on the suit. It had a removable faceplate that Post could seal when
he reached a height of 17,000 feet. The helmet had a special breathing oxygen system and could accommodate
earphones and a throat microphone. The suit could withstand an internal pressure of 7 psi. Bandolera-type cords
prevented the helmet from rising as the suit was pressurized. A liquid oxygen container, consisting of a double-
walled vacuum bottle, utilized the natural "boil off" tendencies of supercold liquid oxygen to furnish gaseous oxygen
for suit pressurization and breathing purposes. This early full pressure suit is the direct ancestor of full pressure
suits used on the X-15 research airplane and manned space voyages. The Winnie Mae, its special jettisonable
landing gear, and Post’s pressure suit are in the collection of the National Air and Space Museum.
The jettisonable gear was displayed with the
plane before the move to the Udvar Hazy Air
Museum at Dulles Airport in Washington DC.
A brand new Lockheed Vega 5C Special.  
This model was designated "Special"
because of the modification made by Wiley.
Click on hangar for home page
Model: 5B Lockheed Vega
Construction: Cantilever wings, monocoque fuselege
Materials:  Laminated spruce, mohagany, birch
Power: 425-horsepower Pratt & Whitney Wasp engine
Wing span:  41 feet
Length:  27 feet, 6 inches
Gross weight: 4,200 pounds
Top Speed: 180 mph
A famous 1930s song, I Can't Get Started, begins with the words "I've been around the world in a plane." The
song's lyricist surely had Wiley Post, Harold Gatty, and the Winnie Mae in mind when he penned those lines. Post a
famous Oklahoma pioneer aviator, Gatty a first-rate Australian navigator, and the Lockheed monoplane, The
Winnie Mae of Oklahoma, did circumnavigate the globe in the early summer of 1931.

The year before when the German dirigible Graf Zeppelin circled the globe in 21 days, 7 hours and 34 minutes,
aviator Wiley Post felt challenged. Furthermore, he believed the future of air travel lay not with lumbering dirigibles
but with speedy airplanes. "Speed has been the keynote of all transportation developments since the beginning of
the wheel-and-axle days," Post wrote in his book Around the World in Eight Days, "What I was ready and anxious to
prove was that a good airplane with average equipment and careful flying could outdo the 'Graf Zeppelin' or any
other similar aircraft, at every turn on a flight around the world."
"I''ve been around the world in a plane..."
A Winnie Mae look-a-like at
Kermit Weeks Fantasy of Flight,
Polk City Florida.