Robert Edwin Peary
Rear Admiral Robert Edwin Peary (1865 – 20 February 1920), famous Arctic explorer, was president of the Aerial League of America in 1919.[1]
Having spent most of his life an explorer, Peary got involved in aero in 1913, consulting with Henry A. Wise Wood and Henry Woodhouse on aerial transportation and commerce. The issue was brought to the Aero Club of America, which appointed Peary head of the Committee on Aeronautic Maps and Landing Places. "His committee initiated and popularized the idea of the employment of aircraft for various utilitarian purposes, and did so at a time when few people believed that aircraft would ever be anything more than toys and when even their value for military purposes outside of scouting was doubted."[2]
Peary was an important promoter of American aerial military "preparedness" before American entry into the war. In 1915 he, with John Hays Hammond, organized the National Aerial Coast Patrol Commission, based in Washington.[2] Peary wrote:
History has brought down to us from 600 B.C. Themistocles' dictum, "He who commands the sea, commands all. This dictum was true until the advent of practical aircraft, then it was changed and now we have the new dictum, "He who commands the air, commands all."[3]
He sponsored independent development of this commission before the federal government had agreed to it.[2][4]
He went on tours:
Admiral Peary, who was 64 years old, was a pioneer in the national and aerial preparedness movements and, beginning in 1915, he travelled through the United States and Canada addressing organizations on their patriotic duties and urging speed in preparedness. In some of these tours, which he conducted entirely at his own expense, he travelled for weeks, getting only scant sleep, being overwhelmed with work connected with national preparedness, and worrying in his anxiety to make people realize the necessity of haste in preparedness.[2]
He was involved in some international-level aero diplomacy, as in the case of his exchange with Cuban President Mario Garcia Menocal arranging the the Third Pan-American Aeronautic Congress.[5]
References
- ↑ "First Trans-Continental Aerial Derby to be Most Extensive Contest Ever Held", Aerial Age Weekly, Vol. X, No. 27, 15 September 1919; p. 9.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 "Admiral Peary's Death", Flying, Vol IX, No. 2, pp. 122, 133.
- ↑ Robert E. Peary, "The United States Aerial Coast Patrol", in Textbook of Naval Aeronautics, ed. Henry Woodhouse, 1917; p. 171.
- ↑ "Robert E(dwin) Peary", Encyclopedia Antarctica (Vilhjalmur Stefansson, Dartmouth), 1947–51.
- ↑ "Cuba to Spend $15,000,000 in Aeronautics: Third Pan American Aeronautic Congress, Exposition and Contests To Be Held at Havana, February 21–March 1st, 1920. Aerial Age Weekly, Vol. X, No. 5, October 13–20, 1919; p. 155. (Ultimately it seems the conference was held in Atlantic City and not in Havana as supposed here.)
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