Kelly Read online

  The agreement with Hughes cost Lockheed dearly. It flawed our relations with American Airlines for years. It is interesting that AA doesn’t fly a Lockheed-produced aircraft to this day, having opted for the DC-10 over the L-1011. In the commercial airplane business, everyone knows what everyone else is doing—although the information may not have been offered directly. American asked us if we could produce a new passenger transport for them, with specifications basically those of the Constellation.

  Gross, Hibbard, and I met with C. R. Smith, then head of the line, Bill Littlewood, vice president and chief engineer—and a good engineer—and a few other American officials at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. We had to say that we could not build an airplane with that kind of performance although it went against the grain for all of us. And American Airlines knew damned well we were building such a plane.

  American went to Douglas for the DC-6 and was responsible in large part for pushing continuing development of that plane until the DC-7 was introduced and then the jet-powered DC-8. American’s decision in the ’50s to buy hundreds of turboprop-powered Electras—it was named for the first Electra—from Lockheed effectively kept the company from being an early entrant in the jet transport field. The commanding lead that Lockheed had with the Constellation was lost.

  Ironically, we may have explored the jet transport field too early. Before building the second Electra, we had invested $8 million in research and preliminary design of the Model L-199, a jet plane with four rear-mounted engines. Fuel consumption for the early engines was so high that it would require a huge airplane to fly across the ocean. Our design grew to 450,000 pounds for takeoff, and Gross decided that was just too big. Before turning thumbs down definitely, though, he retained a consulting firm for an opinion on the future of jet engines in commercial air transportation.

  The report was discouraging because it forecast that operating time on the jet engine would never exceed 35 hours between overhauls. Now we think in terms of 10,000 hours.

  Other orders for the Constellation followed TWA’s, and eventually the airplane flew for most of the major airlines of the world, including even American Overseas Airlines. Its identifying triple-tail and graceful lines were recognized at airports internationally.

  In its long production lifetime, the design was continuously improved and extended in performance and modified for a series of specific missions. The Constellation, and then the Super Constellation, appeared in more than 20 successively advanced airline versions, cargo models, and a series of early warning, patrol, and other specialized service-types for both U.S. Air Force and Navy. Some of the commercial liners on long-range flights did have berths for sleeping passengers. The fuselage was stretched and the wings extended.

  The last of the airliners, the Model 1649, still is remembered by air travelers for its luxurious interior. The planes had reclining seats with retractable footrests in standard cabin configurations. Had the turboprop engines for which this Super Constellation was designed been available, the series surely would have had an even longer life. But it could not compete with the coming jets. The last commercial Constellation was produced in 1959.

  There was a myth circulating for some years that Howard Hughes had designed the Lockheed Constellation. It was not discouraged by Howard, and certainly was not true. His specifications had consisted of half a page of notes on the size, range, and carrying capacity he wanted. It was not without some encouragement from us—I did not appreciate someone else’s taking credit for our work—that eventually both Hughes and Frye acknowledged the misconception in November of 1941. They offered to publish advertisements, but Robert Gross was satisfied that their letter stated: “… to correct an impression … prevalent in the aircraft industry … the Constellation … airplane was designed, engineered and built by Lockheed.”

  Hughes used to keep at least one Constellation parked on our flight line—he had one of just about every type of plane stashed away somewhere; and he would phone his favorite flight test engineer at Lockheed, Jack Real (now head of Hughes Helicopters), in the early morning hours about once a month, wanting to come over, climb into the cockpit, run up the engines, and just sit there awhile. Real would join him.

  The personal eccentricities that later were to become obsessions and make a tragedy of Hughes’ life had not yet manifested themselves—at least, not to us. Hughes and Real became good friends.

  While Hughes and I never again flew together, I heard from him directly during the period when he was developing his wooden Flying Boat, now a tourist attraction alongside the Queen Mary at Long Beach harbor in California.

  The project actually had been proposed by Henry Kaiser, who chose wooden construction because material was plentiful while aluminum was in critical supply for war production. Hughes embraced it enthusiastically; he had the plant and people available. He took to telephoning me—I remember specifically one 8:00 a.m. call on a Sunday, because it was unusual. Hughes generally telephoned only late at night or very early in the morning. He said, “Kelly, we’re going to build a nacelle like this.… What do you think of it?” I made my comments, as I usually did, and after about two hours managed to escape and go about my own activities.

  He did this on several occasions, on different subjects. Each time, I discovered, he then would call Gene Root, chief aerodynamicist at Douglas at that time, and say, “Gene, Kelly says.… What do you think?”

  Then he would phone George Shairer at Boeing with “George, Kelly said … and Gene said … What do you think?” So he had a three-way consultation.

  Hughes had an excellent design team on that boat, and also on his FX-11. The FX-11 he later crashed on its first flight at night over the city of Beverly Hills and was hurt quite seriously. The plane was a twin-boomed fighter-reconnaissance plane, as was the P-38. To this day, Hughes’ claim that the P-38 design was based on his FX-11 will appear in print from time to time. The FX-11 first flew in 1946. By the end of 1944, Lockheed already had built and delivered for military service some 10,000 P-38s!

  The Flying Boat was a sleek design, about as good as the state of the art at the time would allow but far from being capable of carrying 750 people across the ocean efficiently and economically. It was heavier in wood than it would have been in metal, and a lot of its potential payload disappeared right there.

  Hughes was determined to fly that boat to say that it had been done. Its first and only flight, with Howard at the controls, was a mismatch of common sense and responsibility. He had aboard about 32 people, not crew members but newspaper people and other guests who thought they were going for a high-speed taxi test. As he taxied down the harbor, he lifted the boat about 100 to 150 feet, and flew about a mile. If the airplane had gone out of control it would have been a tragedy. These people had not intended to go flying, particularly on a first flight.

  While this determination to prove himself in aviation sometimes led to seemingly heedless action, it also spurred him to seek a forward-looking passenger transport for his airline—a decision from which air travelers all over the world would benefit in safer, faster, and more enjoyable flying. Hughes deserves credit for that. And his commitment to purchase the advanced airliner that became the Connie put Lockheed into the big time of commercial aviation.

  What the Constellation was to air passenger traffic, the C-130 Hercules later was to the air-cargo business. Introduced as a military plane, it was the first design specifically for that purpose. During World War II and after, bombers or troop carriers had been converted for cargo. It was the first transport designed from the drawing board up to take advantage of new turboprop engines—jet engines driving propellers. They promised speeds of 300 to 500 miles per hour at altitudes to 45,000 feet.

  With the engines and its special design, the C-130 was a major development in cargo aircraft. It would fly higher and faster and more economically than existing military transports and was tremendously versatile.

  The fuselage was so low—only 45 inches from the
ground—that loading was easy under any conditions. A section of the aft fuselage dropped down to become a loading ramp. The airplane converted easily and quickly from personnel carrier to hospital ship, from flying a load of heavy machinery to dropping paratroopers.

  It was designed to land and take off from short and rough runways. It even operated from a carrier in a demonstration of performance. The plane was designed in what was to be known as Lockheed’s “Skunk Works” but assigned to Lockheed’s Georgia company for production. Later commercial versions were developed there. The plane has been a workhorse around the world. Many of its most effective features later were adapted to the much larger C-5A, designed at the Lockheed-Georgia Company.

  11

  The Jet Age—and the First “Skunk Works”

  SINCE 1940, LOCKHEED HAD BEEN AFTER the Air Corps to build a pure-jet-powered airplane.

  The potential of jet power had interested us for some time, particularly as we encountered the effects of compressibility on the P-38 fighter, first on the propeller, then on the wings. We decided there had to be a major change in the power-plant configurations for our fighter aircraft. During World War II, we had been able almost to double the power of the P-38, yet succeeded in increasing the speed only by about 17 miles per hour.

  Independently, we developed a preliminary design for an airplane that would approach Mach 1—the speed of sound. It would be powered by a jet engine designed by a Lockheed consultant, Nate Price, a designer of great vision and knowledge of thermodynamics, materials, and mechanical design. We proposed to the Air Corps that Lockheed be permitted to build a prototype. The response was negative. We were told to devote our energies to solving the problems with the P-38 and other immediate wartime projects. In retrospect, of course, that was short-sighted.

  But in 1941, when the British installed Frank Whittle’s jet engine in one of their small fighters, the Gloster Meteor, and demonstrated the speed potential, that attitude changed. The Air Corps commissioned use of the engine in the Bell P-59, originally designed as a propeller-driven airplane. When the jet-powered version flew in 1943, the performance was hardly better than that of the piston-powered P-38 and P-51.

  Again we proposed to build an airframe and jet engine in a very short span of time. This time the Air Development Center was receptive.

  The Germans by this time already had a number of jet-powered Me-262s in combat, and these planes were much faster than anything we had. They were well into the jet age while we were just starting. The Me-262 was a very good airplane, designed by Willy Messerschmitt, whose talent I respected.

  One argument against our pursuing jet power had been that the airplanes were fuel-hungry and lacked range. The Germans didn’t have very far to go to reach England because they could take off from occupied territory in Holland and France, while the U.S. had to consider the large expanse of territory to be covered in Europe and in the Pacific. From Great Britain, we had to get to Berlin to be effective.

  Within a week of hearing from Wright Field, I was back again in Dayton to present our design.

  “We’ll give you a contract for the airplane, Kelly, and for Nate’s engine as well,” said Gen. Frank Carrol, commanding officer of Wright Field. “But you’ll have to use the British engine in the first airplane because we need it—and all the jet fighters you can build—as soon as possible to use against the Me-262. Your new engine couldn’t possibly be ready for service in time.”

  Since I had promised to build a jet airplane within 180 days, I asked, “When will we get a contract? When will the time start?”

  “You will have a Letter of Intent this afternoon by 1:30 p.m.” he replied. “There is a plane leaving Dayton for Burbank at two o’clock. Your time starts then.”

  And it did. The date was June 8, 1943. Gen. H. H. “Hap” Arnold, himself, had approved the contract.

  Back in Burbank, I knew I was in for a rough time. Lockheed already was producing 17 P-38s, four B-17s, and enough Hudsons, Lodestars, and PV-1s to total 28 airplanes each day. That was with three shifts a day, six days a week, and some work on Sundays. There were no spare engineers. There was no spare machinery and no available space.

  When I showed Robert Gross a contract for our first jet fighter, he expressed some doubt that much would come of it. But he and Hibbard always were open to new ideas and backed me in many critical times.

  “You brought this on yourself, Kelly,” Gross stated. “Go ahead and do it. But you’ve got to rake up your own engineering department and your own production people and figure out where to put this project.”

  For some time I had been pestering Gross and Hibbard to let me set up an experimental department where the designers and shop artisans could work together closely in development of airplanes without the delays and complications of intermediate departments to handle administration, purchasing, and all the other support functions. I wanted a direct relationship between design engineer and mechanic and manufacturing. I decided to handle this new project just that way.

  Absolutely the only place we could think to put the new work was adjacent to the wind tunnel. We already had a shop there to build the tunnel models, so this was the beginning of our machine shop. To get more tools, we had to buy out a small local machine shop. We found a lot of Wright engine boxes left over from deliveries for the Hudson bomber. They were just taking up space in the storage area and were made of good, heavy wood. We cleared the space and used the boxes to build the walls of our production area. For the roof, we rented a circus tent.

  Somehow I got together 23 engineers, counting myself. I simply stole them from around the factory. I wanted people whose work I knew. Assistant project engineers were W. P. Ralston and Don Palmer, my good friend from college who by that time had joined Lockheed. The single-engine transport on which Vultee had staked its future—and on which Don was working—could not compete with Lockheed’s Electra, Boeing’s 247, and Douglas’s DC-2—all twin-engine models. Art Viereck was recruited to head the shop. We had our own purchasing department and every function we needed to operate independently of the main plant. This became the first “Skunk Works.”

  How did it get that name? I’m not sure. But in the strict secrecy of wartime, and simply for efficiency and to avoid distractions, we allowed no one who wasn’t working on the project to wander in and out. The legend goes that one of our engineers—and I’d guess it was Irv Culver, a brilliant designer—was asked, “What the heck is Kelly doing in there?”

  “Oh, he’s stirring up some kind of brew,” was the answer.

  This brought to mind Al Capp’s popular comic strip of that day, “ ’Lil Abner,” and the hairy Indian who regularly stirred up a big brew, throwing in skunks, old shoes, and other likely material to make his “kickapoo joy juice.” Thus the Skunk Works was born and named.

  When the Air Corps decided to move, it moved fast. Nine days after our go-ahead, we had a mockup conference at the Skunk Works with Col. M. S. Roth and Maj. Ralph Swofford, who became our project liaison officer. There were only six people from the military involved and two or three of us from Lockheed. We had approval to proceed that night. Six days later we had our government furnished equipment—guns, radio, wheels and tires, etc. At every stage of the work, we had excellent cooperation from Wright Field and the officers involved with the project. The job could not have been completed on such a tight schedule without it.

  Pressures on everyone in our plant became intense as we counted off the contract days on a big scoreboard calendar. We had scheduled the work on the basis of a 10-hour day, six-day week. No one worked on Sunday. We had to enforce that rule because even with it the sickness rate during the last few weeks went as high as 50 percent daily. It was midwinter, and we had poor facilities in which to work and almost no heating. We could not afford to lose even one of our small supervisory staff to illness.

  The airframe was never a problem, but the engine was. It didn’t arrive until seven days before we were ready to fly—we’d been work
ing with a wooden mockup to design its installation. It didn’t help that the De Haviland engine expert sent over to help us had to spend time in a local jail. Guy Bristow had arrived secretly with the engine on an Air Corps plane without the usual travel papers. He made the mistake of jaywalking on Hollywood Boulevard and when the police cited him and discovered he had no draft card and wasn’t even a citizen, they detained him. When we discovered his plight, we had to call on the Air Corps to negotiate his release.

  During a final engine run-up before the first flight scheduled for the next day, there was a tremendous bang. I was standing between the two engine ducts, watching the operation, and I almost lost my pants down the intake. The ducts had collapsed, pieces of metal had gone into the engine, and the compressor housing had cracked. The engine was beyond repair—the only engine we had. We had to wait for another.

  Finally, on day 143, the plane was accepted by the Army Air Corps and ready for flight. We had beaten the schedule of 180 days. On the morning of January 8, 1944, the XP-80 flew for the first time. We had named the plane “Lulu-Belle”—we always nicknamed our “firsts.” Milo Burcham was at the controls at Muroc Dry Lake, now Edwards Air Force Base. It was the first American fighter to exceed 500 miles an hour—502 mph was top speed.

  By this time the Air Corps had General Electric working on a bigger and more powerful version of the Whittle engine. Development was moving fast. Having proven our design with the first XP-80, we were asked to do the job over again with an airframe about 80 percent larger to accommodate the new GE engine. We were given a contract to build two such airplanes.

  In 132 days, we built the first of these YP-80As. We gave it a coat of slick lacquer paint, off-white in color, so its nickname was the “Gray Ghost.” It had heavier armament, carried more fuel with extra wingtip fuel tanks, and added about 80 miles an hour to the speed of our first jet.