Dr. Seuss Knew a Thing or Two About Lindbergh
By Frank Gormlie
A week and a half ago or so, the San Diego Union-Tribune published a bunch of “rare, never-before-published photographic images of Charles Lindbergh on his way to becoming Charles Lindbergh,” while he was training in San Diego, photos that had been “hiding in storage for 90 years.”
It was of course in mid-May, 1927, that Lindbergh made the first-ever nonstop solo airplane flight across the Atlantic Ocean from New York to Paris, a total of 3,610 miles and he made it in 33 hours. The flight certainly “turned him into one of the most famous and admired people on Earth,” … for a while at least.
And voters in San Diego were so taken in by the young pilot and his local connections, that they passed a bond issue to pay for construction of an airport that would be called Lindbergh Field. And local enthusiasm and identification with the famous dude who flew “The Spirit of St. Louis” manufactured here in San Diego has apparently not waned – even though a few years later during the years leading up to World War II, Lindbergh’s fame would be severely tarnished.
I scanned the May 7 article by John Wilkens for a paragraph about Lindbergh’s later controversies and found none, not a word – not even a hint.
So to help give the historical record more balance, we too have found old-forgotten photos – and cartoons about Charles Lindbergh. Here’s some.
In October 1938, Charles Lindbergh was presented by Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring, the Order of the German Eagle with Star, for his contributions to aviation. This was the second-highest award that could be granted to a non-citizen of the German Reich between 1933 and 1945.
Here, Lindbergh examines the sword
Oh, yeah, Lindbergh was a friend and ally of Adolph Hitler and the Nazis in Germany. He was anti-Semitic; and a leader of the America First Committee that worked to keep the US out of the war.
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Here are a few cartoons ….
Dr. Seuss Knew Who Lindbergh Was
Another famous person identified with San Diego is Dr. Seuss (Theodor Seuss Geisel) – he had a few things to say and draw about Charles …
Here a few more from other artists …
Maybe, just maybe, we should start thinking about changing the name of San Diego’s Lindbergh Field.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Heroes are people who do amazing things and have great character. All Lindbergh ever did was fly a small plane across the Atlantic, clearly an amazing feat for his day. But, that was only 33 hours of his life, the rest of which showed he did not have great character and was in fact a bigot and a racist. This man should not be considered an American hero. Except by Republicans of course.
Hi Geoff. I am in total agreement with your post. But I do feel inclined to comment on your second sentence, where you write that “All Lindbergh ever did was fly a small plane across the Atlantic, clearly an amazing feat for his day.” Your choice of words seem to equate what he did with little more than a carnival act, stupendous as it was. It was more than that, sir. What he accomplished was a mindblowing, staggering human achievement. Imagine being locked in a small dark closet with no forward vision and being told you could not fall asleep, not even for 60 seconds, for close to two days. And now imagine having to do so while flying three thousand miles across the ocean through DEAD RECKONING to reach the opposite shore, the stars your only guide. When I first read his autobiograhical account of his flight, “The Spirit of St. Louis”, Lindbgergh became my hero, my God–which only went to make my disillusionment that much more profound when I read his speeches and his later book “Autobiography of Values,” in which he blamed the war on Roosevelt and the Jews. As a Jew myself, I felt like I’d been betrayed. In addition to racist, Lindbergh was pro-Fascist. He and his wife thought Hitler a great man. In a letter to Roosevelt, he resigned his commision in the American armed forces–but refused to return a medal awarded him by Hitler. Even after the war, he apologized for nothing he had said. All by way of saying that one must never equate an act of courage with heroic character. While he did indeed once perform the former, he was never the latter. Such remains the tragedy of Charles A. Lindbergh.
Reminds me of all the statues of Confederate “war heroes” in the south. Although they are slowly coming down, there are a lot of white folks that worship those war criminals. A Lot of Trump supporters, for sure.
I agree, good analogy.