Page 55 - Demo

National Air Mail Week Covers of Indianaof his siblings or their children could have been on hand. Joe Mendenhall, my Grandpa Mendy (who wasn%u2019t technically my grandfather) was a rural mail carrier whose route was in a different part of the county from the airport. So he was probably out, as usual, delivering mail to dozens of isolated farming families. Grandma Mendy was far more interested in philately than Grandpa, even though he was a mailman. She had two sisters living in Fowler, so it%u2019s possible they got together to take part in the festivities.There was one person I would meet much later who was definitely at the ceremony%u2014Ralph %u201cPete%u201d McNeeley. He can be seen in the photograph on the previous page, stooping at the left end of the front row. Back then, Pete was a Fowler Postal Clerk, and when I met him in the early 1960s, he was still working there. As one of the town%u2019s most avid stamp collectors, he showed me his albums. He also gave me a number of his duplicate postal covers, including a NAMW cover from the Fowler event. It was signed by Postmaster McGrath and the pilot. I placed it with a number of covers I collected as a child, where it remains today.It is undoubtedly true that everyone who showed up for Fowler%u2019s air mail celebration was filled with anticipation at seeing pilot Harold Carroon take off in Adrian Gilbert%u2019s Arrow Sport two-seater airplane. Which he did at precisely 9:15 a.m. against a strong headwind with four large canvas pouches containing 2,051 letters. All together, they weighed 52 pounds.After leaving Fowler, Carroon headed to Attica, where he touched down at 9:30 to drop off one pouch of mail, and pick up two for Indianapolis. He then flew to Crawfordsville to drop off and pick up additional letters, postcards, and parcels. By the time he arrived at the Indianapolis Airport at 11 a.m., he had accumulated 102 pounds of mail. He was told his load was the largest of the 42 deliveries received so far.But that wasn%u2019t the end of National Air Mail Week in Fowler. At 4 p.m., Pilot Richard Meyer flew from Indianapolis and deliver ed mail to Lafayette, before landing at Fowler. He touched down with the town%u2019s first batch of mail to be received by airplane.As it turns out, I had a family connection to the Fowler Airport involving one of my dad%u2019s older brothers, my Uncle Frank. Not long after earning his pilot%u2019s license, Frank leased several acres southeast of Fowler, where he built two runways with a hanger amid rows of growing corn. He and Harold Carroon (who had given Frank his first flying lessons) talked about opening a flying school there. However, their airport didn%u2019t last for very long.In 1934, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) built another airport, also with two runways, on Dr. Clark%u2019s farm northeast of Fowler. Although it resulted in his facility closing, Frank and the town built two hangers at the new field%u2014but his idea of running a flying school never materialized. It was at this new airport that the NAMW flight of 1938 took place. It closed in 1940 and, today, nothing remains.A Hometown Celebration (continued)Harold Carroon in the 1930s.