Seattle Now & Then: Sand Point Airfield, fall 1924

Clay Eals

2 years ago

(Click and click again to enlarge photos)

THEN: A portion of a cheering crowd of 40,000 greets the unveiling of the First World Flight monument during the Sept. 28, 1924, landing of the round-the-world achievement at then-Sand Point airfield. (Frank Jacobs, Seattle Star, National Air and Space Museum)

NOW: In a rare moment of traffic calm, standing in front of the First World Flight monument at the intersection of Northeast 74th Street and Sand Point Way are centennial organizers (from left): Elisa Law, executive director, Friends of Magnuson Park, and celebration co-chairs Ken Sparks (holding 1924 Douglas biplane model) and Frank Goodell. (Jean Sherrard)

Published in The Seattle Times online on Sept. 19, 2024
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on Sept. 22, 2024

Success of First World Flight in 1924 drew monumental fanfare

By Clay Eals

Its base covers just 6 square feet of ground. Its alluring feature, a pair of eagle wings, hovers 15 feet up, far above eye-level. And while the wings are elegant, they don’t instantly signify aviation.

Those factors may help explain why few Seattleites probably have appreciated or even glimpsed the monument at Magnuson Park (formerly Sand Point Naval Air Station) that celebrates a Seattle-to-Seattle achievement dubbed the First World Flight.

THEN: Heralding the return of the First World Flight is this portion of the Sept. 29, 1924, front page of The Seattle Times. (Seattle Times online archive)

The feat was truly monumental — a cadre of pilots in open-cockpit biplanes enduring storms, snow, crashes and rescues while touching 22 countries in a 175-day, 74-stop sojourn, as recounted in “Now & Then” last spring. It began with a Sand Point take-off on April 6, 1924, and culminated at the same airfield when 40,000 cheered the odyssey’s final landing 100 years ago this Saturday, Sept. 28.

It’s a centennial worth celebrating, and a doozy of a bash is planned.

THEN: This aerial shows a portion of present-day Magnuson Park, with four red dots pinpointing the locations of the monument over the years, based on research by volunteer Lee Corbin. (Courtesy Friends of Magnuson Park)

But first, the monument. Created by Seattle sculptor Victor Alonzo Lewis and unveiled upon the round-the-world flyers’ return, the marker had three other locations near the airfield from 1924 to 1938. Today, it anchors a narrow median at the park entrance, hemmed in by signs and a small tree.

At Northeast 74th Street, with drivers heeding traffic signs and a signal and passing beneath the park’s weathered brick overpass or entering busy Sand Point Way, small wonder that few gaze skyward to view the granite-and-bronze marker’s backlit wings. Sadly, it’s more a faceless near-irrelevance instead of the tribute it’s meant to be.

NOW: Displaying promotional signage at the Magnuson Park entry kiosk are First World Flight centennial organizers (from left): Elisa Law, executive director, Friends of Magnuson Park, FriendsofMagnusonPark.org, and celebration co-chairs Ken Sparks (holding a 1924 Douglas biplane model) and Frank Goodell. (Clay Eals)

Elisa Law and a contingent of aviation buffs respect the monument but also look past it for different ways to herald the First World Flight. Friends of Magnuson Park, directed by Law, aims to convert an onsite empty ex-gas station to a visitor center. The Friends also want to otherwise elevate the stature of the 1924 feat. As Law says, “We should have it written at Sea-Tac Airport: Home of the First World Flight.”

Centennial festivity, however, comes first.

The Museum of Flight plans displays and programs Sept. 26, 27 and 29, and the Swedish Club hosts a Sept. 27 dinner, all in support of the big day: Sept. 28. That’s when from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Magnuson Park is the site of a vintage aircraft flyover, a Navy band performance, pilot storytelling, historic film screenings, an exhibit, plus a rare chance to experience the adjacent National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration’s outdoor Seattle Sound Garden. Details are at FirstWorldFlightCentennial.org.

The day honors a marvel that started and ended here. If you go, look for the monument!

Poster designed by Elisa Law, executive director, Friends of Magnuson Park.

WEB EXTRAS

Big thanks to Elisa Law and Lee Corbin for their invaluable help with this installment!

To see Clay Eals’ 360-degree video of the “Now” prospect and compare it with the “Then” photos, and to hear this column read aloud by Clay, check out our Seattle Now & Then 360 version of the column.

Below, you also will find 5 additional photos and 15 historical clips from The Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer online archive (available via Seattle Public Library), Newspapers.com and Washington Digital Newspapers, that were helpful in the preparation of this column.

Here, as well, is a KOMO-TV story from 1987 about the flight: