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Details
LINDBERGH, Anne Morrow (1906-2001) and Charles A. Autograph manuscript, three-ring pocket notebook, diary 27 July 1931 - 11 October 1931. Small 8vo (3¼ x 5 3/8 in.), 50 leaves, some 77 pages covered with text, with pocket containing six introduction cards and a folded, 2 pp. carbon listing officers and men of Hermes, with autograph notations of C.A.L. in pencil. One page of notes in Charles Lindbergh's hand.
ANNE MORROW LINDBERGH'S DIARY OF THE PATH-BREAKING "NORTH TO THE ORIENT" FLIGHT AND A POIGNNANT REFERENCE TO THE "LINDBERGH BABY".
A dramatic contemporary record of Charles and Anne Morrow Lindebergh's 1931 flight from New York to Asia via the northern Canadian-Alaskan frontier. Anne was not just her husband's companion on this arduous journey, "She is crew," Charles explained, and her main task was manning the radio. Much of the diary recounts radio call signals of the people with whom she communicated by Morse code. The diary also fleshes out the names and details of episodes used in North to the Orient, such as the 1 August dinner with Canadian aviation officials in Ottawa, where Anne--still unsure of her radio skills--was told her companion at table would be "one of the famous experts on radio in the country. 'He is a man,' it was explained to me with cordial enthusiasm, 'who knows all there is to know in this field.'" This must have been the "Col. Steel--Radio" she identifies in the diary. Other guests included "Col. & Mrs. Macnider...McNaughton, Wilson, Mawdsley and Capt. Harding both Canadian Air Force." These were surely the dramatis personae in the jousting scene described in the book where the older airmen patronized the young Lindbergh over his flight plans. "'Why (very gently and politely)--why did you choose that route, sir?...there's no one there--no place to stay--only a Hudson's Bay post or a Mounted Police station.' There was a gleam in my husband's eye. That was not the way to discourage him. 'Well?' he said, smiling provocatively" (North to the Orient, 29-30). She records the many tight spots they escaped, including their dramatic rescue by the Japanese ship Shinshiru Maru 19 August: Petropavlovsk to Ketoi: "forced down by fog...[radio station] JOC sent word of SS Shinshiru Maru coming to assist us." 20 August: Ketoi Island: "(Could not start engine. Battery run down in trying to use starter. Could not use radio any more. Sent thru Shinshiru Maru radio). Shinshuru Maru towed us to other side Ketoi Is. Quieter. V. rough nite." 21 August: Shinshuru Maru towed us to Buroton Bay. C. worked on engine."
Then a crushing mishap: 2 October in Hankow "plane caught in current of Yangste in being lowered from HMS Hermes." Damage to the fuselage and wing forced the Lindberghs to end their plans to make a round-the-world circuit. Then greater tragedy struck. On 5 October Anne Lindbergh received word aboard the Hermes that her father, Dwight Morrow, had died in New York. She and her husband made arrangements for their plane to be shipped to Los Angeles for repairs, and they sailed to Vancouver and took commercial flights back to New York, arriving 23 October 1931. One of the most poignant entries, undated, comes near the end of the diary: "Baby's measurements 12 in. shoulders, 8½ sleeve, 9 in (trousers) waist-crutch." This was evidently made sometime after her return, and before the disaster that befell the family on 1 March 1932 when Charles Lindbergh, Jr. was kidnapped and then murdered.
ANNE MORROW LINDBERGH'S DIARY OF THE PATH-BREAKING "NORTH TO THE ORIENT" FLIGHT AND A POIGNNANT REFERENCE TO THE "LINDBERGH BABY".
A dramatic contemporary record of Charles and Anne Morrow Lindebergh's 1931 flight from New York to Asia via the northern Canadian-Alaskan frontier. Anne was not just her husband's companion on this arduous journey, "She is crew," Charles explained, and her main task was manning the radio. Much of the diary recounts radio call signals of the people with whom she communicated by Morse code. The diary also fleshes out the names and details of episodes used in North to the Orient, such as the 1 August dinner with Canadian aviation officials in Ottawa, where Anne--still unsure of her radio skills--was told her companion at table would be "one of the famous experts on radio in the country. 'He is a man,' it was explained to me with cordial enthusiasm, 'who knows all there is to know in this field.'" This must have been the "Col. Steel--Radio" she identifies in the diary. Other guests included "Col. & Mrs. Macnider...McNaughton, Wilson, Mawdsley and Capt. Harding both Canadian Air Force." These were surely the dramatis personae in the jousting scene described in the book where the older airmen patronized the young Lindbergh over his flight plans. "'Why (very gently and politely)--why did you choose that route, sir?...there's no one there--no place to stay--only a Hudson's Bay post or a Mounted Police station.' There was a gleam in my husband's eye. That was not the way to discourage him. 'Well?' he said, smiling provocatively" (North to the Orient, 29-30). She records the many tight spots they escaped, including their dramatic rescue by the Japanese ship Shinshiru Maru 19 August: Petropavlovsk to Ketoi: "forced down by fog...[radio station] JOC sent word of SS Shinshiru Maru coming to assist us." 20 August: Ketoi Island: "(Could not start engine. Battery run down in trying to use starter. Could not use radio any more. Sent thru Shinshiru Maru radio). Shinshuru Maru towed us to other side Ketoi Is. Quieter. V. rough nite." 21 August: Shinshuru Maru towed us to Buroton Bay. C. worked on engine."
Then a crushing mishap: 2 October in Hankow "plane caught in current of Yangste in being lowered from HMS Hermes." Damage to the fuselage and wing forced the Lindberghs to end their plans to make a round-the-world circuit. Then greater tragedy struck. On 5 October Anne Lindbergh received word aboard the Hermes that her father, Dwight Morrow, had died in New York. She and her husband made arrangements for their plane to be shipped to Los Angeles for repairs, and they sailed to Vancouver and took commercial flights back to New York, arriving 23 October 1931. One of the most poignant entries, undated, comes near the end of the diary: "Baby's measurements 12 in. shoulders, 8½ sleeve, 9 in (trousers) waist-crutch." This was evidently made sometime after her return, and before the disaster that befell the family on 1 March 1932 when Charles Lindbergh, Jr. was kidnapped and then murdered.