Today -100: May 16, 1918: Of air mail

The first air mail service anywhere (for a whopping 24¢) begins between New York and Washington via Philadelphia. It takes 200 minutes, despite the first pilot, after being seen off ceremoniously by the president and first lady, getting lost on the way to Philadelphia and having to land and breaking his propeller in the landing, so that his mail had to continue by truck, so only the Philadelphia-DC mail actually made it to its destination by air. Or, as the post office measures such things, close enough.

Hearst’s New York American and New York Evening Journal get an injunction against the town of Mount Vernon, NY’s plan to ban the Hearst press. It’s unclear (to me) whether German-language papers, also banned, are protected by the injunction.

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