From the Archives: 1931 air delivery of the Los Angeles Times
This publicity photo was staged about a week before the actual flight. A closeup look at the front page reveals it’s a copy of the July 12, 1931, Los Angeles Times.
The image accompanied a brief story in the July 27, 1931, Los Angeles Times that reported:
Swooping down through a densely wooded section, Allen Russel, local pilot, made the first landing in the resort section of the high Sierras when he set his plane down at Pine Flat Meadows yesterday.
Russel, who is attached to the Trojan Flying Club of the United Airport, dropped into camp with a bundle of Los Angeles Sunday Times, at 7:30 o’clock in the morning, the first newspapers to be delivered by plane in the Sierras.
Another trip will be made to the resort by Russel in his Timm monoplane for the purposes of surveying the Myers Land Company high Sierras resort, El Capinero, so that additional space may be laid out for a permanent landing field for plane travel to and from Los Angeles.
The small community of Pine Flat is located in Tulare County 175 miles from Los Angeles. The Sierra mountain community is at 3,800 feet elevation.
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