Bendix Trophy

The Bendix Trophy, this one is on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.

The Bendix Trophy is a U.S. aeronautical racing trophy. The transcontinental, point-to-point race, sponsored by industrialist Vincent Bendix founder of Bendix Corporation, began in 1931 as part of the National Air Races. Initial prize money for the winners was $15,000. The last Bendix Trophy Race was flown in 1962.

The trophy was brought back in 1998 by AlliedSignal, the then current owner of the Bendix brand name (which later merged with Honeywell), to "recognize contributions to aerospace safety by individuals or institutions through innovation in advanced safety equipment and equipment utilization."

The current awards of the Honeywell Bendix Trophy for Aviation Safety includes a scale reproduction of the original Bendix Trophy design and a citation.

The race

The purpose was to interest engineers in building faster, more reliable, and durable aircraft. Bendix competitors flew from Burbank, California, to Cleveland, Ohio, except for two years when the contest began in New York and ended in Los Angeles.

Famous competitors for the trophy included James Harold Doolittle, who won the first race, and several women. Amelia Earhart was the first woman to enter the Bendix, taking fifth place in 1935. In 1936, Louise Thaden and her copilot Blanche Noyes won the race. Laura Ingalls finished second. In 1938, Jacqueline Cochran, arguably the greatest female aviator of all time, took home the trophy. Paul Mantz was the only pilot to ever win the Bendix three consecutive years, from 1946 through 1948.

The race was not run during World War II. Postwar winners were frequently military veterans from the United States Army Air Forces: the 1956 winner, Capt. Manuel Fernandez, Jr, was the third ranking Korean War USAAF ace. By the 1960s, American interest in air racing declined. This was probably due to an increased focus on the space race during this time. Lt. Richard F. Gordon, Jr., the winner in 1961, went on to become an astronaut with NASA.

Mister Mulligan

Mister Mulligan (Howard DGA-6) was the only airplane ever designed for the specific purpose of winning the Bendix Trophy. Commissioned and flown by Ben Howard in the 1935 race. The plane was designed and developed by Ben Howard and Gordon Israel, who went on the become an engineer for the Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation. Mister Mulligan was designed to fly the entire length of the race nonstop and at high altitude. Neither had ever been done before. Howard and Israel, who co-piloted, won the trophy, changing how long distance airplanes were designed.

The second place plane in the 1935 race was actually a faster airplane, but had to make refuelling stops, which cost enough time to prevent Roscoe Turner from winning the race. The time difference was only 23.5 seconds between first and second place. The winning difference in speed, over the total distance was less than 0.2 mph (0.32 km/h). "Mr.Mulligan" 238.70 mph (384.15 km/h), compared to Roscoe Turner's 238.52 mph (383.86 km/h).

Mister Mulligan not only won the Bendix but also the Thompson Trophy when flown by Harold Neumann in 1935. Instead of a cross-country distance race, the Thompson was a closed-circuit race around pylons, a type of race for which it was not particularly well suited. Entered again in the Bendix in 1936, the Mister Mulligan was completely destroyed when the craft lost one of the propeller blades, resulting in a forced landing, 40 miles (64 km) north of Crownpoint, New Mexico; this crash landing almost killed Howard and his co-pilot wife, Maxine.

Winners

Propeller Class
Year	Start Location	End Location	Pilot	Plane	Speed (MPH)	Time (H:M:S)	Prize
1931	Burbank	Cleveland	Maj. James H. Doolittle	Super Solution	223.06	09:10:21.0	$7,500
1932	Burbank	Cleveland	Capt. Jasper H. Haizlip	WW-44	245.00	08:19:45.0	$8,750
1933	New York	Los Angeles	Roscoe Turner	WW-44	214.78	11:30:00.0	$4,050
1934	Burbank	Cleveland	Doug Davis	WW-44	216.24	09:26:41.0	$4,500
1935	Burbank	Cleveland	Ben Howard	DGA-6	238.70	08:33:16.3	$4,500
1936	New York	Los Angeles	Louise Thaden Blanche Noyes	C-17R	165.35	14:55:01.0	$4,500
1937	Los Angeles	Cleveland	Frank W. Fuller Jr.	SEV-2S	258.20	07:54:26.3	$9,000
1938	Los Angeles	Cleveland	Jacqueline Cochran	SEV-2S	249.11	08:10:31.4	$9,000
1939	Los Angeles	Cleveland	Frank W. Fuller, Jr.	SEV-2S	282.10	07:14:19.0	$9,000
1940	No races during this period due to World War II
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
1946	Los Angeles	Cleveland	Paul Mantz	P-51	435.50	04:43:14.0	$10,000
1947	Los Angeles	Cleveland	Paul Mantz	P-51	460.42	04:26:57.4	$10,000
1948	Los Angeles	Cleveland	Paul Mantz	P-51	447.98	04:33:48.7	$10,000
1949	Rosamond Dry Lake	Cleveland	Joe DeBona	F-51	470.14	04:16:17.5	$10,000
Jet Class
Year	Start Location	End Location	Pilot	Plane	Speed (MPH)	Time (H:M:S)	Prize
1946	Van Nuys	Cleveland	Leon W. Gray	F/P-80A	494.78	04:08:00.0
1947		Cleveland	Leon W. Gray	F/P-80A	507.26	04:02:00.0
1948		Cleveland	Ens. F. E. Brown	FJ-1	489.53	04:11:00.0
1949		Cleveland	Vernon A. Ford	F-84E	529.61	03:45:51.0
1950	No race this year due to Korean War
1951	Muroc Field	Detroit	Col. Keith K. Compton	F-86A	553.76	03:27:00.0
1952	No race this year due to Korean War
1953	Muroc Field	Wright-Patterson Air Force Base	Maj. William T. Whisner, Jr.	F-86F	603.55	03:05:25.0
1954			Capt. Edward D. Kenny	F-84F	616.21	03:01:56.0
1955	Victorville	Philadelphia	Col. Carlos Talbott	F-100C	610.726
1956	George Air Force Base	Tinker Air Force Base	Capt. Manuel Fernandez, Jr.	F-100C	666.66
1957	Chicago	Andrews Air Force Base	Capt. Kenneth Chandler	F-102A	679.00	02:54:45.0
1958	No award these years
1959
1960
1961	Los Angeles	New York	Lt. Richard F. Gordon, Jr. Lt. Bobbie R. Young	F4H-1	869.74	02:47:00.0
1962	Los Angeles	New York	Capt. Robert G. Sowers Capt. Robert MacDonald Capt. John T. Walton	B-58A	1,214.17	02:00:56.8

Honeywell Bendix trophy for Aviation Safety recipients

Year	Recipient	Company
1998	Capt. David A. Fleming Capt. Edward D. Mendenhall Capt. Edmond L. Soliday	British Airways Gulfstream Aircraft United Airlines
1999	Leonard M. Greene	Safe Flight Instrument Corp.
2000	James F. Bothwell	STAT Medevac
2001	No award this year
2002		Gulfstream Aerospace Corp.
2003	Peter F. Sheppard	UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch
2004		Dassault Aviation
2005	Earl F. Weener, Ph.D.
2006	No award this year
2007		Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation
2008		The Mode S Radar Tools Project, U.K. National Air Traffic Services
2011		National Air Transport System (NATS) and Airbox Aerospace [1]

References

• "The Major Trophy Races of the Golden Age of Air Racing" by David H. Onkst, US Centennial of Flight Commission, retrieved January 6, 2006
• "The Bendix Trophy", Air Racing History, retrieved January 6, 2006
• "The Quest for Speed Bendix Air Races 1931 to 1949" From Air Trails, September 1950
• Artifacts - Bendix Trophy Smithsonian Institution Online Exhibit
• 1954 USAF Serial Numbers entry number 2096
• Astronaut Bio: Richard F. Gordon, Jr., (Captain, USN, Ret.)
• United States Air Force Aviation AeroWeb History
• Howard DGA-6 Mister Mulligan at the Arkansas Air Museum
• Service History of the Shooting Star
• Up From Kitty Hawk 1944-1953
• The National Air Races
• TIME Magazine Archive Article -- Scoreboard -- Sep. 14, 1953
• Seattle native Dick Gordon orbits the moon on November 18, 1969.
• Matthews, Birch J., Wet Wings & Drop Tanks: Recollections of American Transcontinental Air Racing 1928-1970. Atglen, Pennsylvania: Schiffer Publishing Company, 1993. ISBN 978-0-88740-530-3.

External links

• The Honeywell Bendix Trophy for Aviation Safety at Flight Safety Foundation homepage
• Kenny's Long Shot about Kenny's 1954 Bendix Trophy run