History
Miss Pittsburgh's first owner was Clifford A. Ball, formerly an automobile dealer. He acquired several planes as a compensaiton for unpaid storage charges at the Bettis Field, an airport near McKeesport in which he had controlling interest. They made their first airmail flight around noon, April 21, 1927, on a 121 miles long route from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to Cleveland, Ohio. Post Office Department awarded Ball the Contract Air Mail No. 11 for this flight, and he expanded his airmail service (Skyline Transportation Company), buying two other Waco 9 aircraft (Miss Youngstown and Miss McKeesport). His company kept on acquiring more airfcaft; it was renamed into the Cliff Ball Mail Line; later bore names of Pennsylvania Airlines, Pennsylvania Central Airline, Capital Airlines and finally became a part of United Airlines.
As Waco 9 became obsolete, Miss Pittsburgh found its way to Florida, where the airplane was being used for advertising in 1960s. Eventually is broke down in New York. In 1993, the OX 5 Pioneers located the plane in the Rhinebeck NY Aerodrome. With the support of the Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics the group raised money to have the airplane returned to Pittsburgh. After renovation, it is displayed at the Pittsburgh International Airport Landside Terminal.
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Famous quotes containing the word history:
“When the coherence of the parts of a stone, or even that composition of parts which renders it extended; when these familiar objects, I say, are so inexplicable, and contain circumstances so repugnant and contradictory; with what assurance can we decide concerning the origin of worlds, or trace their history from eternity to eternity?”
—David Hume (1711–1776)
“When the landscape buckles and jerks around, when a dust column of debris rises from the collapse of a block of buildings on bodies that could have been your own, when the staves of history fall awry and the barrel of time bursts apart, some turn to prayer, some to poetry: words in the memory, a stained book carried close to the body, the notebook scribbled by hand—a center of gravity.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)
“Properly speaking, history is nothing but the crimes and misfortunes of the human race.”
—Pierre Bayle (1647–1706)