Jim, I was wrong, and you were 100% correct.  Floyd Bennet was
Byrd's Pilot, and flew a Fokker F-V11 over the Pole in 1926.  Here's a
little piece I cobbed out of my Fokker History file...
History --------
In November 1918, revolution broke out in Germany. Anthony Fokker, builder
of the famous Fokker fighters and father of the 'Fokker scourge' in World
War I was arrested by the revolutionary forces in his aircraft factory in
Schwerin. Weeks later he succeeded to flee into his home country, the
Netherlands. After the revolution broke down, he returned, but aircraft
production in Germany was forbidden by the Versailles Treaty of 1919.
Fokker built a new factory, the Nederlandse Vliegtuigenfabriek Fokker near
Amsterdam, and managed to smuggle the remains of his Schwerin factory
from Germany to the Netherlands. Aircraft parts and machines were transported
in six large freight trains under the eyes of the Allies. From those parts,
the first Fokker F.I passenger transports were built, soon to be followed
by the famous F.II. The single-engined F.II stood at the beginning of a
very successful series of Fokker airliners, culminating in the Fokker F.VII.
The first five F.VII built in 1924 were a disappointment. The performance of
the single-engined plane with its typical high cantilever wing was good, but
the engine was not powerful enough and the passenger capacity (6) was too
small to be of commercial interest.
The improved F.VIIA, with Gnome-Rhone, Bristol, or Packard engines of
400 to 450 hp, enlarged passenger capacity and a smaller wing became a
phenomenal success.
In 1924 the Dutch airline KLM was looking for a plane that was able to
continue its flight even when one engine failed. Fokkers answer was to
put two additional engines to the F.VII in separate engine nacelles below
the high wing, creating the F.VII-3m. And this type made aircraft history.
F.VII-3m flew in nearly every country, in nearly every larger airline of the
world and even some air forces, including the US. It was the most famous
plane of its era, comparable to the Super Constellation a quarter of a
century later, or to the B747 fifty years later. It was the plane which
opened the first really long-distance routes to air traffic. In 1925 a
Fokker V.II won with ease the Ford reliability contest. Henry and Edsel
Ford were so impressed, that they acquired the winning plane for Commander
Richard E. Byrd's north polar expedition. Years later Ford itself produced
a very similar looking aircraft, based on the Fokker F.VII design - the
Ford Trimotor.
The Fokker F.VII was used for most of the more spectacular long-distance
flights of the era, only to be outclassed in popularity by the tiny Ryan
of Lindbergh. Famous flights of the F.VII, and its military version, the
C-2A:
1925: winner of the Ford reliability contest.
1926: Floyd Bennett of the Byrd Expedition flies over the north pole.
1927: Hegenberger and Maitland fly the 'Bird of Paradise' in 25 hours from
      Oakland to Wheeler Field, Hawaii.
1927: Balchen and Byrd cross the Atlantic in 43 hours in the 'America'.
1927: first regular air traffic route from the Netherlands to Batavia in
      the Far East.
1928: Kingsford Smith crosses the Pacific for the first time - 12,555 km
      within 88 hours, with stops at Honolulu, Suva and Brisbane.
1928: Barnard and Alliott fly from Great Britain to India and back.
1928: Amelia Earhart is the first woman to fly across the Atlantic - as
      passenger.
1928: Kingsford Smith crosses the Tasman Sea from Australia to New Zealand.
1929: Spaatz, Eaker, Quesada and Halvorsen of the US Army fly the C-2A
      'Question Mark' nonstop for over 150 hours with in-flight refueling.
1930: Kingsford Smith lands the 'Southern Cross' in San Francisco, finishing
      his tour around the world.
Two of these famous aircraft are included in this package, Byrd's 'America'
and Kingsford Smith's 'Southern Cross'.
The 'America' was a modified C-2A, the Army version of the F.VII. Compared
to the standard version, it featured a enlarged cockpit, enlarged wings
(Big-wing Fokker), enhanced fuel capacity, and Wright J-5 Whirlwind engines.
Sponsored by Mr. R. Wanamaker, the 'America' was built for the first Atlantic
crossing, to be undertaken by Commander Byrd. Beaten only by some weeks by
Charles Lindbergh, Byrd and his crew - Balchen, Acosta and Noville - took off
from Roosevelt Field on June 29, 1927. After more than 40 hours of flying,
they arrived over the coast of France, off course and lost in thick fog.
They mistook a lighthouse for the airport of Le Bourget and spent valuable
fuel trying to correct this mistake. When they ran out of fuel, they had to
ditch their plane in the English Channel, off the coast of Ver-sur-Mer, after
43 hours and 21 minutes. The wreck of the plane was shipped back to the US.
Some sources say that the 'America' was restored later on, but these sources
appear contradictory.
The names 'Sir Charles Kingsford Smith' and 'Southern Cross' are undividably
intertwined in aviation history. Australian-born Smithy, as Kingsford Smith
was called by his friends, was already famous for his daring long distance
flights, when he and Charles Ulm decided to try the first crossing of the
Pacific. In 1927 they bought a Trimotor-Fokker from the Australian polar
explorer Sir Hubert Wilkins, without engines and instruments. They modified
the plane for increased range, using 237hp J-5 Whirlwind engines, stuffed
it with the newest radio and navigation equippment and named it the
'Southern Cross'.
On May 31, 1928, the 'Southern Cross' took off from San Francisco. 27 hours
later they landed in Honolulu. Another 34 1/2 hours to the Fidshi Islands.
On June 10, 1928, the mighty Pacific was defeated when Kingsford Smith
landed the 'Southern Cross' in Brisbane.
But the 'Southern Cross' story was not yet finished. Struggling hard against
adverse weather conditions, Kingsford Smith took her over the Tasman Sea to
reach New Zealand, and continued later to England. From England he crossed
the Atlantic in east-west direction for New York. In 1930 the Fokker F.VII
'Southern Cross' reached San Francisco, closing the circle around the world.
The 'Southern Cross' was conserved and put to exhibition. If anyone knows
where she is located now, please tell me.
Four years later, in 1934, Charles Kingsford Smith disappeared without a
trace over Burma, on another record-breaking flight in a Lockheed 'Altair'.
In 1937 a wheel of his Lockheed was found in the Andaman Sea off the coast
of Burma.
                That's all I have.  Clear Skies!
                        Christopher
... "Appearances often are deceiving." ÄAesop (550 BC)
--- PCBoard/2 15.30
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