Harold E. Thompson

Harold E. "Tommy" Thompson (1921-2003) of Hobart, Indiana, was a helicopter aviation pioneer. [cite web|url=http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10E15FD3B58177B93C5A9178ED85F4D8485F9|title=HELICOPTER SETS MARK; Averages 122.75 Miles an Hour Over a 100 Kilometres|publisher=The New York Times|accessdate=2008-01-23|last=|first=] He was the first man to intentionally loop a helicopter, set three international helicopter speed records, and was the first man to land a helicopter in the courtyard of The Pentagon. Thompson was a veteran of 3,500 hours in single-engine propeller fixed-wing aircraft and 3000 more in helicopters.

Life & Work

Having spent 2 years at Purdue University, Thompson enlisted in the US Army Air Corp in 1942, married his childhood sweetheart, Carolyn Kramer, and won his wings the next year. Thompson served as a P-47 instructor until January, 1945, when he earned an assignment to the Army's first helicopter class at Chanute Field, Illinois, and later was assigned to the Bridgeport, Connecticut, plant of Igor Sikorsky, who pioneered helicopters in America.

After the war, "Tommy" as he was known, got a job as one of Sikorsky's three test pilots--in the trial and error days. The plant produced six helicopters a month, mostly hand built. Engineers tinkered with new designs, and the test pilots tried them out. Most of the early models had slow, sluggish controls - some flew as expected, but some didn’t. Thompson was also Igor Sikorsky's personal pilot. By 1949, Tommy was an experienced helicopter pilot. He'd been through some forced landings and crashes but had not been seriously injured.

Records Set in the S-52

In 1949 Sikorsky engineers developed the Sikorsky model S-52 helicopter. "It was a sharp, responsive dream," Tommy recalls. "After trying some mild acrobatics, I figured it would loop."

10 Loops

Until Thompson's flight in the S-52 no one had dared try to loop a helicopter. As Sikorsky's chief test pilot Jimmy Viner pointed out, "Any of 10 things can go wrong--all fatal,be sure you know what you're doing." Tommy did--erratically at first, then perfectly--10 loops in all, as a movie camera recorded the flight for history.

Air Speed Record

In S-52 that year he went to the Cleveland air races, where he set the first of three international speed records that he was to achieve in the choppers.

Flight Instructor

When he wasn't testing helicopter, breaking records in them, or delivering them, Tommy was teaching others how to fly helicopters. His students included Admiral Arthur Radford; Pat Handy, first woman to fly solo in a helicopter; Rodman Wanamaker, Eastern department store tycoon, and several foreign trainees.

The Last Flight

Tommy's career came to an abrupt halt on a spring day in 1950, when test pilot Thompson took an admiral aloft at the Navy's Lakehurst, New Jersey, base. Suddenly, a shaft snapped, and the tail rotor came apart.

Thompson skillfully kept the craft from spinning around, the usual result of such an accident. The helicopter landed hard, crushed the landing gear and tilted, while the spinning overhead rotor chewed up the ground and disintegrated. Tommy crawled out with nothing worse than a cut cheek. The admiral was shaken, but game: "All in a day's work, eh, boy?"

Tommy however had walked away from more than 20 forced landings and now his fifth helicopter crash. Figuring he'd stretched the law of averages too far, he replied, "Maybe for you, sir, but not for me". It was at that time that Tommy knew that he couldn't stop and knew that it was an addiction. He knew that if he kept flying that he would continue to push the envelope further and further. That night, when he got home he talked to his wife and refrained from flying again in a helicopter until 1979.

After Thompson's flying career came to a halt, he relocated back to Hobart, Indiana and began working with his father delivering fuel oil for the Standard Oil Company. Thompson spent his winters after retirement in Tucson where one of his sons moved and started a family. As fate would have it in 1979 Thompson visited the Tucson Convention Center where a large helicopter convention was taking place. He immediately was recognized for his feats during the convention and given the opportunity to pilot one of Sikorsky's S-58s. Later, Thompson was called several times to his old stomping grounds in Bridgeport as a special guest and speaker. Currently Thompson is honored at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC outside the entrance to the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. Thompson can be found on Panel #37, Tablet #1, Column #1.

Tommy died in October 2003 in Hobart,Indiana.

References