When 31-year-old Douglas Groce Corrigan took off from Brooklyn’s Floyd Bennett Field on July 17, 1938, in a modified Curtiss Robin, he carried two chocolate bars, two boxes of fig bars, a quart of water and a U.S. map with the route from New York to California marked out. Corrigan, who had spent three years trying to get permission to fly from New York to Dublin, had been told that he could fly nonstop from New York to California, but an ocean crossing was out of the question. It was a foggy morning. Corrigan flew into the haze and disappeared. Twenty-eight hours later, he landed in Dublin and instantly became a national hero.

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Texas-born Douglas Corrigan had flown for the first time when he was 18, taking a 10-minute sightseeing ride in a Curtiss JN-4D Jenny at a Los Angeles airfield operated by B.F. Mahoney and Claude Ryan. The ride, which cost him $2.50, changed his life, setting him on a course that would lead to disappointment, danger, excitement, fame and even a movie deal. Although he had hoped to become an architect, after that 1925 flight his dreams changed.

He went back to the airfield a week later and took a flying lesson. After that, he started going to the field every Sunday, taking a lesson and then hanging around for the rest of the day, helping the mechanics.

Corrigan first soloed on Sunday, March 25, 1926. He later said that he looked back on that Sunday as the most important day of his life.

Ryan and Mahoney soon closed down their operation in Los Angeles and opened Ryan Aeronautical Company in San Diego, where they offered young Corrigan a job. When he arrived, it seemed as though the factory’s future was pretty shaky. The building contained half a dozen unfinished airplanes–unfinished because the orders for them had been canceled. Then a telegram arrived from Charles A. Lindbergh, who wanted to know if Ryan Aeronautical could build a plane capable of transatlantic flight. Ryan and Mahoney responded that they could have such an aircraft ready within two months, and it would cost about $10,000. Lindbergh liked the price as well as the time frame. He headed for San Diego to check out the Ryan factory.

In February 1927 Corrigan saw Mahoney talking to a tall young man. Corrigan, along with a mechanic, was sent out to the field to get one of the aircraft started so that the lanky youngster could test-fly it.

As they were walking out to the plane, the mechanic explained, ‘This is that fellow from St. Louis that wants to fly from New York to Paris.’ Corrigan glanced back at Charles Lindbergh and said: ‘Gosh, he looks like a farmer. Do you suppose he can fly?’

They started up a Ryan M-1, but Corrigan didn’t think the engine sounded very good. ‘That’s all right,’ said Lindbergh, and he promptly climbed into the plane. He took off, flew around the field for a few minutes, headed upwind and did nine consecutive loops, finishing up with a wingover. Watching him, Corrigan and the mechanic agreed that Charles Lindbergh could, in fact, fly. And Lindbergh decided to have Ryan build Spirit of St. Louis.

During the two months it took to construct the aircraft, designated the NYP by Ryan, Corrigan and the rest of the crew often worked well past midnight. Corrigan himself assembled the wing and installed the gas tanks and the instrument panel. Lindbergh also spent a considerable amount of time at the factory, supervising the construction.

Corrigan later recalled that everyone at Ryan Aeronautical seemed motivated by Lindbergh and his goal. Apparently, Lindbergh was equally impressed with his new associates, writing of the Ryan crew, ‘They’re as anxious to build a plane that will fly to Paris as I am to fly it there.’

Ryan managed to meet Lindbergh’s deadline, completing the aircraft in time for him to fly Spirit of St. Louis from San Diego to St. Louis in May 1927, and then to New York City. From there, of course, he set off for Paris.

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