21 Hours

The past year has cast several shadows on the fame of Henry Tindall ("Dick") Merrill, whom no less an authority than War Ace Eddie Rickenbacker calls the "best transport pilot in the U. S." Last summer Dick Merrill flew Crooner Harry Richman to England, was forced down in Wales (TIME, Sept. 14). On the return trip he cracked up in Newfoundland, got embroiled in a tawdry, name-calling squabble with Richman, to whom he no longer speaks (TIME, Sept. 28). Back on his regular run for Eastern Air Lines, Dick Merrill next made news by wrapping his ship around a mountain, miraculously without injury to his eight passengers (TIME, Dec. 28 et seq.). Last week. Pilot Merrill finally got into the headlines with news of a more successful sort.

Taking off from New York's Floyd Bennett Field with Co-Pilot John S. Lambie in a twin-motored Lockheed Electra which once belonged to Harold S. Vanderbilt, he buzzed uneventfully to England, landed at North Weald. 15 mi. from London, to get his bearings, then went on to Croydon. His time: 21 hr. 3 min. His purpose: to fly pictures of the Coronation back to the U. S. He did not take with him newsreels of the Hindenburg disaster because London did not want that tragedy to punctuate its Coronation gaiety.

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