Moye Stephens: Aviation Pioneer and Adventurer

 | Aviation History  | 0 comments  |  Print This Post  |  Email This Post

Moye W. Stephens’ introduction to aviation was the Dominguez Aviation Meet, the American West’s first airshow, held near Los Angeles in 1910. ‘1 was not quite 4 when my parents took me to the event, Stephens later recalled, but my mother was to comment later that it left its mark on her son. That experience would lead him into a life of aviation pioneering and adventure — and on a remarkable journey around the globe.

Stephens made his first flight when he was 17, in a Curtiss OX-5-powered Standard J-1 (a version of the Curtiss JN-4 Jenny). From that time on, he had to fly. Tall and self-confident, the Hollywood High School senior talked an airport manager into letting him work in exchange for flying lessons, serving as a combination grease monkey and beast of burden. Each hour’s work would earn one minute of instruction — all in the air.

Stephens left for Stanford University in 1924 with his pilot’s license and, for a time thereafter, was able to fly only during summer vacations. He bought his first airplane in 1926, a Thomas-Morse S-4C Scout, with the $450 he earned from his first job as a pilot — flying in Cecil B. De Mille’s Corporal Kate with movie stunt pilot Leo Nomis, who sold him the plane. He also flew in Howard Hughes’ Hell’s Angels and gave flying lessons at Clover Field in Santa Monica the following summer and after graduating in 1928. One of his pupils was millionaire shipbuilder Captain G. Alan Hancock, who a few weeks before had sponsored Charles Kingsford-Smith’s record transpacific flight in Southern Cross (see Art of Flight in the May 1999 issue of Aviation History). Stephens bought Hancock’s OX-5 Travel Air 2000 with a loan from Hancock and used it to instruct future aviation entrepreneurs John K. Northrop (Northrop Corporation), Jerry Vultee (Consolidated-Vultee/Convair) and Cliff Garrett (Garrett AiResearch), all of whom were then working for Lockheed Aircraft Company in Burbank.

Stephens reluctantly returned to Stanford in September and started law school. Then an unexpected phone call in January gave him an excuse not to follow his father into the family law firm. Maddux Airlines offered him a full-time flying job.

For Maddux, Stephens flew an 11-passenger Ford 4-AT TriMotor on a gambler’s run from Los Angeles to San Diego and on to the Aguacaliente Casino across the Mexican border. There were no navigation aids, no reliable weather reports, no radio set and no airfield lighting except car headlights in emergencies. Checkout consisted of `riding shotgun’ on a trip to San Diego and another to Alameda, Stephens recalled, during which I handled the controls in the air; a quick circuit of Glendale’s Grand Central Air Terminal in the left-hand seat with the Chief Pilot observing…my take-off and landing — my first in a multi-engined aircraft-followed by three quick solo circuits. The next day: presto! — airline captain on a regular run with a load of unwittingly trusting souls in the passenger compartment and a mechanic riding shotgun. Stephens loved it. Six months later he was flying a 14-passenger Ford 5-AT TriMotor for Transcontinental Air Transport (TAT), forerunner of today’s Trans World Airlines.

A call in September 1930 from Major C.C. Mosley, a World War I pilot and the founder of Western Airlines, ended Stephens’ airline career. Richard Halliburton, a well-known adventure-travel writer and speaker, decided that in 1930 an adventure not in the air is obsolete, and he wanted to fly into the most remote and exotic parts of Africa and Asia to gather material for his next book. He would need a skilled and resourceful pilot, and Mosley had recommended Stephens. Halliburton planned to take two years and circle the globe. There would be no salary, but all expenses would be covered.

Stephens’ fellow fliers, who had elected him president of the Professional Pilots Association in 1929, considered him crazy to consider the offer. TAT would grant only a year’s leave of absence, so he would lose his seniority with the company. But Stephens felt the airlines were run by accountants and government regulation all pervasive. Halliburton, on the other hand, was offering a round-the-world expedition — a virtual flying carpet!

Help HistoryNet by bookmarking to

Tags: Adventurers & Trail Blazers, Aviation History, Historical Figures, People

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.