Henry J. Ogden, Pioneer Army Flier, Dies at 85

Henry J. Ogden, one of the last of that sturdy band of Army fliers who first circumnavigated the globe by air, has died in Laguna Niguel. He was 85 when he died Friday of heart complications.

He was co-pilot of the Douglas biplane named Boston when that plane and three other Army Air Corps amphibians took off April 6, 1924, from Seattle.

Three of the two-man crews returned 175 days later, on Sept. 28, to the adulation of an America just beginning to take seriously the advent of the air age.

The journey, organized by Gen. Billy Mitchell in an effort to convince the military that flight was a viable force in peace or war, involved 363 hours and 7 minutes of actual flight time, at an average speed of 72 m.p.h.

And it was not without its interesting moments.

Maj. Frederick Martin was in charge of the expedition but his plane, the Seattle, crashed in Alaska. Martin and his co-pilot managed to walk away from the wreck. Ogden’s plane also crashed, near Iceland, but there was a backup available--the Boston II--and the journey resumed.

The third and fourth planes, the Chicago and the New Orleans, completed the flight without incident, landing in formation with Boston II in Seattle.

After the cheering and the honors (from the United States, France and Japan) died down, Ogden left the military to manufacture three-engine planes in Los Angeles, later organizing the Ogden Shuttle, a small airline that ferried freight, mail and passengers from Palm Springs to Ensenada and La Paz in Baja California.

He next joined Lockheed as the head of that firm’s reassembly plant in England, where planes sent there under pre-World War II lend-lease were put together to fly against Germany.

After the war he became Lockheed’s vice president in charge of airplane servicing, retiring in 1965.

Survivors include his wife, Olga, daughters Gail, Louise and Anneliese, two brothers and a granddaughter. A longtime friend and Ogden’s pilot on the historic flight, retired Maj. Gen. Leigh Wade, also survives. He was the last of the six men to land in Seattle that September day in 1924.