Frank M. Hawks, ca. 1931

Frank Hawks was born March 28, 1897 at Marshalltown, IA.  He died on August 23, 1938 when a Gwinn Aircar he was flying struck power lines and crashed at East Aurora, NY (follow this link to see an image of the Gwinn Aircar on this site).  See Nancy Harkness for two images of her with Hawks and the Aircar.

He learned to fly at 18.  He packed 214 point-to-point aviation records in his 23-year flying career.  Do the math.

After finishing high school Hawks became interested in flying when a barnstormer came to town.  The price for a flight was $25, but Hawks posed as a news reporter and went up for nothing.  He came clean and became “ground crew” for the ship.

He attended the University of California for two years and left to join the air service in hope of serving overseas.  He did not.  Rather, he was detailed instead as an instructor at Love Field, TX.  He retired from the army with the rank of captain, then barnstormed over the country, flew mail and payrolls and stunted with air circuses.

Hawks landed once at Tucson on June 6, 1927 flying a Ryan B-1 Brougham, NC3009. He carried a single passenger, D.W. Campbell. Based in Houston, TX, they were eastbound from San Diego, CA to Houston and then on to Washington, DC. They wrote in the Remarks column of the Register, "Enroute to Washington".

The Ryan they were flying was used by Hawks in the 1927 Ford Reliability Tour. The Tour that year did not pass through Tucson, although the 1928 Tour did. Hawks participated in that Tour also flying Texaco's Ford trimotor NC3443, Tour #2. While Hawks did not sign the Register when he visited with NC3443, we know he was there because of a motion picture film. Follow this link to see the film of the 1928 Tour landing at Tucson. You will see Hawks' Ford Trimotor just briefly, and be able to note the registration number, NC3443, under the left wing. Technically, Hawks landed at Tucson at least twice (but see his glider experience, below).

Below is an image of the Ryan in 1927 Tour livery (#22). Hawks and his passengers (among them his wife) placed 8th in the event that took place June 27-July 12, 1927. It is easy to believe the flight during which he signed the Register at Tucson was a ferry east in preparation for the Tour. Image from page 58 of Forden's unique and useful reference in the left sidebar.

Hawks acquired fame in 1929 when he flew the Lockheed Air Express from Los Angeles to New York non-stop in 18 hrs. 21 min.  That was the fastest transcontinental time to-date.  Later he flew the 2,700 miles from NY to LA non-stop in 19 hours and returned to NY the next day in 17 hrs. 36 min., breaking his previous record.

In August 1930, in a Beech Mystery Ship named "Texaco 13", Hawks flew east-west in 14 hrs. 50 min. 3 sec. and west-east in 12 hr. 25 min. 3 sec., beating his own 1929 records. Both flights were made with intermediate fuel stops. An image of him during his Texas Company tenure is in the Charles Cooper Photograph and Document Collection.

Frank Hawks is well represented on the web, with over 750 Google hits as of the upload date of this page.  Because of this, I choose to illustrate his flying life via links to information that already exists, rather than reinventing the wheel here.  For a general biography, refer to this link.

In April 1930, Hawks, with pilot J.D. Jernigan, Jr., flew through Tucson with Jernigan towing Hawks in the “Texaco Eaglet” glider.  That flight, with a photograph of both the glider and tow plane, is summarized here.  Neither Hawks nor Jernigan signed the Register when they landed at Tucson April 1.

A 15-minute moving picture film of early Lockheed history is available here.  Frank Hawks is shown very briefly entering a cockpit.  What’s interesting about this film clip is that other Davis-Monthan Register pilots are shown, including Art Goebel, Amelia Earhart, Ruth Nichols and Charles Lindbergh.

Good technical and operational information on the Gwinn Aircar is available here.

News coverage and an obituary in Time Magazine can be found here.

As mentioned above, he participated in the 1928 Ford National Reliability Tour. Tour planes descended on Tucson during the late morning of July 10. You may see a film clip on this website of that activity here.

Hawks flew other aircraft, with other pilots of the Register. See especially NC7162, Walter Beech, Hub Fahey and James Dickson. The Davis-Monthan Airfield Register reveals a tight "club" of Golden Age aviators.

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Dossier 2.1.96

UPLOADED: 05/15/07 REVISED: 02/13/08