- Alvin M. Johnston
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"Tex Johnston" redirects here. For the baseball player, see Rankin Johnson, Sr..
Alvin M. "Tex" Johnston Full name Alvin M. "Tex" Johnston Born August 14, 1914
Admire, KansasDied October 29, 1998 (aged 84) Nationality American Aviation career First flight 1925 Famous flights Boeing 707 and B-52 test flights Awards 1946 Thompson Trophy Alvin M. "Tex" Johnston (August 18, 1914 – October 29, 1998) was a American jet-age test pilot for Bell Aircraft and the Boeing Company.
Contents
Early years
Johnston was born August 18, 1914 in Admire, Kansas to farmers Alva and Ella Johnston. He made his first flight in 1925, at eleven years old, when a barnstormer landed near his home. That day, he decided to become a pilot. He received mechanics and pilot instruction, soloing at age fifteen. After graduating from high school, Johnston began barnstorming himself. Later he returned to school for engineering, but dropped out in 1939 before he finished the required courses to get his degree.
He married his wife DeLores in 1935.
He was a civilian instructor for the Civilian Pilot Training Program. Once the United States entered World War II, Johnston transferred to the U.S. Army Air Corps Ferry Command. [1]
Test pilot
In December 1942, Johnston moved to Bell Aircraft as a flight test engineer. He flew the P-39 Airacobra and the XP-63 during the prototype phases. He also flew the first US jet, the XP-59 Airacomet. Johnston earned his nickname "Tex" because of his penchant for wearing cowboy boots and a Stetson hat on the flightline.[2]
After World War II ended, he bought two surplus Airacobras and modified them to enter and win the Thompson Trophy at the 1946 National Air Races. He set a world speed record of 379 miles per hour (610 km/h).
Johnston helped design and flew the rocket propelled Bell X-1 on May 22, 1947.[3]
He became a test pilot for Boeing in July 1948. He flew the B-47 Stratojet and piloted the first flight of the Boeing B-52 Stratofortress prototype.[4]
Johnston is best known for performing a barnstormer-style barrel-roll maneuver with Boeing's pioneering 367-80 jet in a demonstration flight over Lake Washington outside of Seattle, on August 7, 1955.[5] The maneuver was caught on film and was frequently shown on the Discovery Wings cable channel in a three-minute short as part of the Touched by History series, while the channel still aired. Called before then Boeing president Bill Allen for rolling the airplane, Johnston was asked what he thought he was doing, and responded with "I was selling airplanes". He kept his position as a test pilot, and got in no legal troubles for his actions. Along with his cowboy style of dress, such maverick behavior is said to have inspired the creation of Dr. Strangelove's Maj. T.J. "King" Kong character, who, in rodeo style, rode a balky nuclear weapon to its target.[2]
From 1960 to 1963, he was assistant program manager for Boeing's X-20 Dyna-Soar program in Seattle, Washington.
From 1964 to 1968, he was manager of the Boeing Atlantic Test Center in Cocoa Beach, Florida, working two Boeing's programs, Minute Man missile and Lunar Orbiter designed for Apollo missions. He also worked managing Saturn and Apollo programs with NASA.
In 1968 Johnston left Boeing to manage Tex Johnston, Inc., Total-In-Flight-Simulator Inc. and Aero Spacelines (manufacture and certification of an outsized cargo airplane known as the Guppy).
In 1975, he became director and chief pilot of Stanley Aviation Corporation, focusing on personnel escape systems (ejection seats). Johnston was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 1993.[6]
Family and death
In 1991, Johnston wrote his memoirs Tex Johnston: Jet Age Test Pilot with writer Charles Barton.
Johnston developed Alzheimer's disease in the 1990s and died in 1998. He is survived by his wife DeLores and three children.
References
- ^ Jackson, Kenneth T.; Karen Markoe, Arnie Markoe (1998). The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives. United States: Simon and Schuster. pp. 295–296. ISBN 978-0-684-80663-1. http://books.google.com/books?id=7QsOn9_NviAC&printsec=frontcover&dq=The+Scribner+Encyclopedia+of+American+Lives.
- ^ a b Sam Howe Verhovek, Jet Age: The Comet, the 707, and the Race to Shrink the World, c. pp. 48-49
- ^ "NASA - Dryden History - Historic Aircraft - X-1 Flight Summary."
- ^ "Boeing: News Feature - B-52 50th Anniversary - First Flight."
- ^ Thompson, R.G. (May 1, 1987). "Dash 80 - The story of the prototype 707". Air & Space Magazine. http://www.airspacemag.com/history-of-flight/Dash_80.html. Retrieved March 14, 2009.
- ^ "Alvin "Tex" Johnston". National Aviation Hall of Fame. http://www.nationalaviation.org/johnston-alvin/. Retrieved 6 April 2011.
Further reading
- Johnston, A.M. and Barton, C.. Tex Johnston: Jet Age Test Pilot. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Press, 2000. ISBN 1-56098-931-9.
External links
Categories:- 1914 births
- 1998 deaths
- People from Lyon County, Kansas
- American aviators
- American test pilots
- National Aviation Hall of Fame inductees
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