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I'm looking for information and photographs of pilot Morehouse to include on his biography page. If you have some you'd like to share, please click this FORM to contact me.
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THE SILAS AMOS MOREHOUSE COLLECTION
DOCUMENTS
The Morehouse Collection contains 18 documents across decades and covering a variety of topics. They include letters, news articles and certificates. Key to the documents that follow is this 10-page chronological summary of Morehouse's flying and military careers (PDF 8.5mB). I have arranged his documents more or less chronologically so if you open the PDF and compare it with the dates on the documents, you can give the documents context.
For example, the document below appears to be a magazine cover from 1925. It celebrates flight student's first solo. If you look at page 7 of the PDF, you will see Morehouse graduated from primary flight training at Brooks Field, TX in March 1925.
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Below is a Liberty magazine photograph showing Morehouse, his first wife Ethel (nee: O'Daniel; married October 24, 1925) and their daughter Martha Jo born April 1, 1928. The airplane in the background appears to be one of the Fokker F-10s that plied the route from Los Angeles to Oakland during the late 20s and early 30s.
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Morehouse knew Charles Lindbergh, and the personal letter below was sent by Lindbergh on July 18, 1929.
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Below is his Tranport pilot certificate T399 issued March 19, 1930. Morehouse landed at Peterson Field on April 7, 1930 during what was the very first cross-country flight by a 4-engine aircraft. He flew the new Fokker F-32 from Teterboro, NJ to Los Angeles. He would have had this certificate in his pocket that day. This cross-country flight is documented in his pilot logbook and on page 7 of the PDF you can download above.
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Below Morehouse and a mechanic stand in front of a Fokker F-32 on the muddy landing field in Albany, NY. According to his logbook for March 1930 (q.v.), he made two round-trip flights to Albany in the day before he embarked on the trip to Los Angeles. The second panel describes some of the passengers who accompanied Morehouse from Teterboro to Los Angeles. The photo described is found on Morehouse's bio page, third photo down.
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At about the time Morehouse flew the F-32, he was Chief Pilot for Western Air Express. The following undated article was published about then, written by Ernie Pyle, who would become well-known as a war correspondent in Europe and the Pacific over a decade later during WWII.
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Below are two examples of radio station documentation in Morehouse's name. During his career, pilots were required to have in their aircraft a radio license, which vouched for their competence in the use of aviation radios. The requirement was eliminated in 1996 for aircraft operating domestically.
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Below, his radio permit for 1940.
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On November 8, 1934 Morehouse teamed with Eddie Rickenbacker in an Eastern Airlines DC-2 to capture the tran-continental speed record for transport aircraft. They succeeded in doing it in 11 hours, 51 ninutes and 15 seconds, Los Angeles' Burbank Airport to Floyd Bennett Field, NY. Below is an undated news article that is probably ca. November 9, 1934. A Morehouse pilot logbook at the link documented the flight.
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Below is a Christmas letter from Eddie Rickenbacker. If you are a fan of Rickenbacker correspondence, many examples can be found at the Lee Lysle Willey Photograph & Document Collection. These samples include a number of Christmas greetings.
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Several ilot certificates and identification cards were among his Collection. The one below, from 1938, identifies Morehouse as competent to fly by the Department of Commerce. Nowadays pilots are only required to carry their pilot certificate while exercising the priviledges of pilot in command; a separate ID card is not necessary.
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Six-months later a temporary card was issued for mechanic's certificate 3226, below. Endorsed every two years, his actual certificate for 1940 is just below.
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Below is his mechanic's certificate from August 19, 1940. He was a certificated mechanic for many years. At 5'10" and 210 pounds, he was a stocky man.
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Next is a pair of War Department ID Cards from 1945 and 1949. If you compare these dates with the chronology download, you'll find that Morehouse was stationed at what I think was the Corps of Engineers North Atlantic Division in Manchester, NH in June 1945. On October 10, 1945, he was separated from military service ("inactive" punched across the card) and resumed his job with TWA.
According to the chronology, he ended his active flying career January 10, 1946 with over 16,000 flight hours in civil and military aircraft. He terminated his employment with TWA December 31,1947, and was appointed USAF Reserve Lieutenant Colonel. His 1949 identification card, below, was issued March 14th in association with his appointment with the American Mission for aid to Turkey. The "Maintenance Supervisor" role corroborates his non-flying status.
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Following is the back side of the cards above. It appears he made an active effort to lose weight.
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From December 1945 to August 1946, Morehouse was assigned by TWA to Italy, and the undated news article below is from that time.
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On July 3, 1947, Morehouse received his 20-year service pin from TWA. The erratum in the left column describes the same award conferred upon Jack Frye and Paul Richter. Both are Register signers. You can read a gentlemanly 20-year congratulatory letter from Frye to Richter at the Richter link.
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THIS PAGE UPLOADED: 02/06/19 REVISED: