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For the Startup Influencer team, it has been another fascinating year of conversations and meetings with hundreds of inspiring stories of African entrepreneurs who have gone on to become African startups success stories while working at innovative African tech startups.Until now the usual top list of hottest African startups to watch always tended to be Africa’s largest showcase for technology's giants nevertheless it’s also one of the primary hubs for the scene's innovative upstarts and even though flashy booths from the likes of Google, Jumia, Intel, IBM, Andela, Flutterwave, Paystack, iRokoTV, Huawei and more typically generate buzz, it’s the bootstrapped or (initially bootstrapped) startups that tend to have riveting stories and even some of the most talked-about products, services & events. But which of these companies do we think have the brightest futures ahead of them? We hope you find our top list of hottest African startups to watch out for in 2019/2020 quite insightful.Here are 12 of the most inspiring African success stories we strongly recommend you should look out for.WEST AFRICASkillPatronSkillPatron - It’s not every day a bootstrapped startup from Nigeria makes the list of the continent’s top hottest African startups to watch – yet today in 2020 SkillPatron has.In the Nigerian tech scene (especially for Lagos based startups) venture capital is a hell of a drug and like we’ve seen with (now defunct) high fundraising startups like OLX, Kaymu, TracList, Konga, Efritin, InstantPickUp, SoRepairIt, SocialBamBam and thousands of other Nigerian startups who raised more than 2 million dollars throughout their life cycle it’s possible to overdose on VC, but for most Nigerian founders that is a champagne problem. Even cash fat startups like Andela, Renmoney, Payporte appear to be struggling at the moment.More often the primary question investors interested in the Nigerian tech space hear is “how do I get a VC to back my startup?” These Nigerian founders aren’t worried about how overcapitalization will make their IPO prospects trickier — Their primary aim is scrambling to get someone, anyone, to sign their first term sheet.Like elsewhere in the world there’s a widespread belief among Nigerian founders that venture capital is a precursor to success. VC especially foreign VC is a common denominator of the most successful tech startups, but it isn’t a prerequisite, especially at the early stages.At the moment it seems founders of successfully bootstrapped startups like SkillPatron are beginning to prove Nigerian entrepreneurs and to a larger extent African entrepreneurs can manage to go a long way quite a bit with little to no capital.It’s a given VC capital won’t make your company insightful, Founders who can’t creatively turn $1 into $10 shouldn’t be expected to be able to turn $1 million into $10 million.To further help illustrate how emerging African startups can move forward - at Startup influencer we have added a bootstrapped startup like SkillPatron to our top list of hottest African startups to watch in 2020 as a worthy example of companies that started with a few thousand dollars or even just sweat equity and went on to become one of the near-perfect blueprints of the fast-growing number of bootstrapped african startup companies and certainly a positive narrative as one the most inspiring stories of african entrepreneurs in the herald of a new decade.SkillPatron sprang into the mainstream spotlight in 2016, when the HR tech world discovered that this cool but disruptive startup had bootstrapped its way to big growth and profitability.There was some point in 2016/2017 when SkillPatron’s young 20-something Founder & CEO - Jake Adebayo, had an acquisition offer of $1 million in one hand and 6 term sheets from major VC firms in the other. He turned down the offer and decided to bootstrap the company himself alongside a couple of key employees.At the moment SkillPatron is pioneering a new labor model for a rapidly evolving workforce as an African startup that is changing how individuals get work done & how businesses operate by delegating strategic tasks to its team of highly trained “Project Managers’ who strive to provide their clients with help on some of their most crucially strategic tasks.Having just entered its second operational year, SkillPatron now has a turnover of well over a million US dollars with more than 500 enterprise clients & organizations including big names such as the United Nations, Vlisco, Samsung Nigeria, Krispy Kreme, Kodak Nigeria, Mitsubishi, Dominoes, Kuda Bank, Jumia Nigeria, iRokoTV, Uber, Wakanow, Filmhouse Cinemas, RenMoney, PiggyVest, Afrinvest, Enyo Oil, Chikki Foods, Cars45, several major banks, online betting companies and major cinema outlets in Nigeria to name a few.We won’t be surprised if SkillPatron still gets a featured spot on our next top list of hottest African startups to watch in the next 12 months.OKO FinanceThis is the first time a startup from Mali makes our list of the hottest African startups to watch in 2020. OKO aka OKO Finance was founded in 2017, OKO Finance develops affordable mobile-based crop insurance products to provide small holder farmers and horticulturalists with the financial security they need, regardless of unstable weather/climate trends.This African startup raised a pre-seed funding of US$300,000; but is now looking to raise US$1.5 million in order to grow more quickly. We are strongly confident they’ll get the backing as we look forward to seeing them scale their solution to more farmers and additional markets in the year 2020.Yobante ExpressIn this year’s top list of hottest African startups to watch in 2020 we’re really excited about Senegalese startup Yobante Express. This African startup has developed an innovative relay-based way of tackling last-mile deliveries and was founded in November 2018 as an online marketplace that connects local couriers with local commerce including combining the gig economy and machine learning to optimise domestic, inter-state cross-border and last mile deliveries. At the moment this African startup is delivering over 8,000 parcels and generating more than US$50,000 every month. It's worthy of note that this African startup expanded to South Africa in November 2019 and we have a feeling this startup will be pan-African before long.NORTH AFRICATrellaFor so many reasons Egyptian trucking marketplace Trella is our first rising star of 2019, having raised more than US$600,000 in a pre-seed funding round in addition to being selected for the Silicon Valley-based accelerator Y Combinator whilst concluding the year by acquiring their closest local competitor Trukt.Only founded last year Trella already operates a B2B trucking marketplace which connects shippers with carriers in real-time, with the goal of making the entire supply chain considerably faster and more reliable while reducing slack and exceptions.For Trella this year’s list of successes comes from a team that told Startup Influencer they are taking growth “step-by-step”, and not making any hasty moves – so we’re eagerly anticipating the next set of well-planned moves the African startup makes.EksabThis next African startup on our top list is also from Egypt as we’re betting fantasy sports platform Eksab will keep up its winning streak in 2020.At the moment Eksab is looking to tap into the MENA region’s love for football by providing users with exciting and engaging mobile social betting games with the aim of becoming the leading fantasy sports site in the region.This African startup in its first year processed more than five million predictions in addition to securing a six-figure seed investment from 500 Startups to help it scale its software product across the region.In view of this solid start to this African startup’s growth plans we’ll be keeping a keen close eye on Eksab over the coming months.KaounKaoun is an African fintech startup from Tunisia tackling the epic question of financial inclusion. The African startup’s first product called Flouci is a mobile and web app that allows users to create free bank accounts remotely; facilitating the process through an innovative Know Your Customer (KYC) system via smartphone.Like in Silicon Valley - critical component to any startup’s success, the team behind Kaoun is top-notch: co-founders Nebras Jemel, Anis Kallel, and Rostom Bouazizi put their studies in the United States – at Harvard University, University of Rochester, and Columbia University respectively – on hold to come back to Tunisia and build a fintech startup.This African startup launched in 2018 and has already raised funding from two angel investors,and secured key partnerships with two major Tunisian banks and the country’s National Digital Certification Agency. By all yardsticks this African startup is definitely worth watching.EAST AFRICAExuusThis African fintech startup from Rwanda has just had an exciting year in particular in that it has been busy honing its pitch to perfection.It is already common knowledge that this African fintech startup from Rwanda is doing a great job with forging the saving culture of traditional saving communities to come online in an effort to ease saving processes by helping low income communities become more financially secure.In February 2019 This African startup was one of 10 African startups selected to pitch live to an audience of over 600 attendees at the annual Africa Startup Summit held in Kigali carefully picked from more than 100 applicants from around the continent.The African startup was also named winner of Seedstars’ Rwandan event in 2019 securing it a place in the global final at which Exuus will pitch for up to US$500,000 in equity investment. We have no doubt they will stand a good chance of coming out on top of the contest.MPostMPost launched in 2015 it has taken this African startup quite a while to get going until recently things have really begun to hit an upward stride quickly..Robust and effective this African startup has developed a platform that enables the conversion of mobile numbers into official virtual addresses which also allows notifications to be sent to clients whenever they get mail through their postal addresses.This African startup participated in the Startupbootcamp AfriTech programme held in Cape Town in the fall of 2018 and has ever since raised about US$1.9 million in Series A funding rounds to bolster finance its expansion and further development of its proprietary platform.Stay tuned as we’ll be keeping our ears glued to the ground for more news from this exciting African startup.RideSafeWe'll be doing some conjuring here taking motorbike taxis along with affordable emergency response and then add on blockchain: You hodgepodge these together with a bucket of innovation and you get RideSafe.This African startup from Kenya offers an emergency response service for public motorcycle taxis.cabbies which utilise a micro-insurance financing model running on a decentralised blockchain application.This African startup has had quite a good year having raised US$100,000 in pre-seed funding from æternity Ventures after taking part in the Bulgaria-based æternity Starfleet Incubator for blockchain startup in addition to being selected to pitch at the African Startup Summit in Rwanda in February 2020.Keep your fingers crossed on this as we’ll be seeing big things from this African startup in 2020.SOUTHERN AFRICAFlexClubAs one of the hottest african startups in the southern tip of Africa it’s noteworthy to see how FlexClub fares in 2020, after a solid start since launching last year.This African startup from South Africa allows users to purchase vehicles which are then matched with Uber drivers who pay a weekly rental charge to the investor.This African startup has a solid founding team including two former Uber employees. At the time of this post this African startup has raised US$1.2 million in a seed round led by CRE Venture Capital and also featuring Montegray Capital, & Savannah Fund in the first quarter of 2019 amidst plans to grow its team and expand into new geographies.IntergreatmeAfrican Regtech startup Intergreatme can be credited as one of the first crowdfunding successes of Southern Africa after securing a whirlwind ZAR32.436 million (US$2.19 million) from 406 investors via the Uprise.Africa platform in May of 2019. Within six days it had already raised ZAR28.5 million (US$1.98m), with the Africamstartup limiting the raise to ZAR32 million which it managed in 2 weeks. This monumental raise was marred slightly by the fact the African startup later decided to reject a bulk of it after some investors failed compliance processes.Even at that the fact still stands that the startup is an attractive proposition, however and the tech world gets what all the hype is about. Intergreatme has developed a web and app platform that digitises verified personal information for over 25 million credit-active South Africans for streamlined use across businesses and other organisations.We can’t wait to see what the African startup does next, as we’re sure 2020 is going to be an immense year for this African startup.PineappleUnsurprisingly African Insurtech startup Pineapple is the third South African venture to make our watch list of hottest African startups to watch in 2020.Established in the second quarter of 2017 Pineapple allows users to get quotes and insurance on items with just the snap of a picture.This incredible African startup has been going from strength to strength since launching and raising seed funding as well as taking part in Google’s Launchpad Africa accelerator and the US-based Hartford Insurtech Hub’s accelerator.Then it so happened that in 2019 this African startup won the single biggest prize at the annual VentureClash challenge in the United States (US), securing US$1.5 million from a US$5 million prize fund. Without a doubt with the milestones rolling in, we’re sure 2020 will be a stellar year for this startup.There you have it! Our top list of hottest African startups to watch in 2020. ​

Yesterday, in answer to differently-worded questions that basically ask for the same information as this question does, I posted a long and documented answer, to which here I simply refer, without re-posting it yet again.As I mentioned at the end of my answer a few days ago concerning “Sherlock Holmes’” (author Conan Doyle’s) 1892 statement wishing for a united country of the British Empire and the United States, whenever I come to a question on Quora that concerns the principles animating the Americans in the American Revolution, invariably I find that there are already two short answers that just insult the Americans.I have spent ten years using our marvelous internet, enriched as it is by the forward-thinking generosity of governments, universities, and nonprofits, to fill it with scans of the original pages of the original documents from the libraries of hundreds of college and universities, that make it possible for anyone, for free, to do better and faster and more accurate research than has ever before been available to even the most prestigious scholars.Prior to undertaking this effort, I was an associate and then partner at Arnold & Porter law firm in Washington D.C., maintaining a large pro bono docket, in addition to being immersed in huge “document” cases brought against the United States government by more than 100 banks and bank investors. I have ten years’ experience researching through thousands of documents, and from them, building arguments that had to stand-up to challenge not from PhD review committees, but by the elite lawyers of the U.S. Department of Justice, motivated to protect the U.S. Treasury from claims that in aggregate constituted $100 billion, claims that the audited financial statements of the U.S. government noted were the only litigations facing the U.S. that, if lost, represented a material adverse threat to the balance-sheet of the United States. I was, as usual, “second chair” to the lead counsel in each case, as the central coordinator of all the 65-some law firms for all the different plaintiffs.In December 1997, the trial judge in the case issued a decision on the “contract liability” phase of the case (calculation of damages would come later) agreeing with the positions I had documented through this research, and castigating the Justice Department for borderline frivolous resistance. I was in Paris, France at the time, visiting my parents with my wife and children, and we all saw the decision reported in the International Herald Tribune. This was affirmed on appeal in 2001. See California Federal Bank, et al., v. U.S., 39 Fed. Cl. 753 (1197), aff’d, 245 F.3d 1342 (Fed. Cir. 2001).The position I took was that in the 1980s, to persuade new investors to come-in with their investment capital to rescue banks ruined in the 1980s by their cowboy managers, the government had made a binding contract deal with each of the banks and investor-groups (using a common form of contract with each bank or investor), and that in 1989 the government had enacted a federal statute that broke the contract deal, for which the government had to pay damages, providing that the banks could prove their individual losses (which turned out to be pretty hard to do; most banks got no award at the damages phase).The effect of the 1989 change in law was that in many cases, the government seized the money invested into the banks by the new investors based on the contract promises of freedom from government interference in the management of the banks, and threatened to seize the rest of the banks unless the new investors poured-in more of their own money into the banks - where that additional investment would be vulnerable to government seizure by any new change in the law.The government in the 1990s took the position that what the government had said in the 1980s was no contract deal; the government could ignore it and change the rules at-will. We resisted with documented arguments. We won.This, as it turns out, is the same kind of conflict that led to the American Revolution. The Americans said that they had received binding contract promises, in the form of charters, from all the kings and queens from James I through George II, promising elected representative law-making assemblies in each of the colonies, and that the Parliament of Great Britain, backed by King George III, was breaking the contracts, by asserting that no lawmaking by any of these elected assemblies was of any effect at all. The Parliament of Great Britain asserted a power to override everything done by all the elected assemblies, and even asserted a power to order the elected assemblies what laws they must enact, even if the people of the colonies did not want those to be their laws.The ministers of George III denied that any of the kings before George III had had the power to bind the government in contract in the future. They said that the Parliament of Great Britain was the “supreme legislature” and had all lawmaking power in America, despite all the elected representative law-making assemblies in all the colonies, promised the lawmaking powers, by the earlier kings and queens, in the charters.We will see this very clearly in the words of the Colony Minister, Lord Hillsborough, in February 1768, in a discussion with a future U.S. Senator in the First Congress, who then was an agent for the colony of Connecticut, visiting in London.This ties-in directly with my pro bono legal work. One of my pro bono matters was aiding The National Endowment for Democracy. The purpose of the NED is to promote democratic self-government in countries that do not have it. For some seven years I was “second chair” to partner Ken Juster of A&P, a former State Dept. appointee, who is now the U.S. Ambassador to India. The NED board is comprised of sitting U.S. Senators and Representatives, former Executive Branch policy appointees, and experts in democracy.One of the experts who sat on that board while I was there was Francis Fukuyama, author of a famous book that indicated that the administrative welfare state of the European model was the culmination of centuries of arguments concerning what is the best form of government.After I left the practice of law and began to do the research, I discovered what appears to me to be a fundamental problem with the Fukuyama position: it fails to take into account the irresistible element inside each person to be free to make his or her own decisions about the laws and the shape of government, and to be free to make decisions about how the individual will live his or her own life. There is an element in the conception of the administrative welfare state that seems to see the people as a kind of animal-herd that has to be managed, and whose highest goal is bodily health (medical care) and satisfaction of bodily needs and desires. If these can be but managed and provided reliably, government has done what it must do. Encouragement of the free, individual, inventive mind is an after-thought in this; it is treated as a detail whose effects have to be managed.This I found quite offensive, particularly as my prior-to-law career was being a producer of experimental, avant-garde live performance based in San Francisco in the 1980s, for ten years. Here were the quintessential inventive individual minds - and I was dedicated to seeing that their visions achieved reality. I had success here, too; we toured the U.S. and Europe to prestigious festivals, culminating in an invitation from the U.S. State Department - with it paying our expenses - to represent United States creativity and innovation behind the Iron Curtain in 1987, just as the movements that would bring that curtain down were growing. My last production in June 1988 played the Kennedy Center Opera House - but by that point I attended the show I had produced merely as a spectator, because I would be entering Georgetown University Law Center just a few months later. I had decided to move-on from theater to law, after seeing the unhappiness of the young and inventive persons who lived behind the Iron Curtain, at the festivals we had performed in. It was the oppressive, all-controlling nature of the governments that they lived under that was crushing their spirits and rendering them hopeless and depressed. I saw it and heard it from them, personally.Lately, Fukuyama’s position has been challenged by those who say the more controlling Chinese model is the true best form of government. But I think the flaw in Fukuyama’s vision comes from the opposite side: a fundamental misunderstanding of human nature. We are not just bodies, but minds; and the Fukuyama vision fails to accommodate the power of this.That is certainly what occurred to cause the American Revolution - as I have found repeatedly and without contradiction in all the original source documents.But this is an understanding of the American Revolution that discredits the increase of power in governments; and thus encounters a reluctance to report it or to teach it, because such a high percentage of our teachers, from the kindergarten level all the way up through the top-levels of post-graduate education, rely on government for their career-long income, and for the security of their pensions to the end of their lives. This is an unexpected consequence of the argument that all people have a “right” to education that must be delivered by the government.Of course it is best if everyone is well-educated.But the consequence is that almost all teachers, at all levels, are either directly paid by government, or rely on government subsidies - state-guaranteed tuitions, and government research grants. None of these people will be inclined to see merit in teaching that in the past, some very intelligent, very well-informed and well-educated people - indeed, almost all of the intelligent, well-educated Americans - rejected the increase in power of government. To teach this today would tend to lead to a weakening of the power of government today, and thus, to increase the risk that governments will not be able to deliver the cash promised to them in today’s paychecks and tomorrows pensions. When government is so much in debt as ours in, everyone who depends on government for their life-sustaining income is rightfully very nervous that the government might suddenly fail to meet its financial promises. In a time of threatening debt, ensuring that the government has ever-more money-collecting power is vital to everyone who lives on the government.Until the development of the internet, it has been impossible for anyone except those dependent on government income (directly paid or by guarantees of payments by others) to see the original documents. But now it is possible for persons outside the financial incentives of the system to see these materials.It then remains for someone competent in research to take the vast amount of time necessary to search out all the relevant material, and for someone competent in analytical writing to present the results of that research, with a competence that withstands the most challenging inquiry. Such a person I propose myself to be, having in the past withstood the challenge of elite Department of Justice lawyers, as confirmed by both a federal U.S. trial judge in 1997, and of the appellate U.S. judges in 2001.My works are very lengthy, because I include all the research to back-up what I say, and I note repeatedly that anyone can check my work. The results of my first five years of research, 2009 to 2014, are on amazon kindle in a massive unedited data-dump, basically, which no one else appears to find useful, but which I already know, and use to locate relevant material for questions such as this.In 2016–2017 I decided to focus on the reasons for the American Revolution, specifically by looking at those who later became officials in the federal government, and on what they did in relation to firearms in the period before the Declaration of Independence. This has been on SSRN since September 2017. Subsequently I have found and corrected many typographical errors, in an updated pdf that anyone may request from me.Now: as regards this specific answer, I will not re-post everything that I just posted twice on Quora yesterday. In summary, I established that beginning with Queen Elizabeth I, the Crown of England, and later the combined Crown of England and Scotland, established a policy unique among European monarchs, of making contract deals of the Crown with its own subjects. A key step in the process had been in 1215 with the Magna Charta, and then with the establishment of the House of Commons, which permitted those subjects who had money in the kingdom to intercept all Crown demands for money, treat them as mere requests, insist on explanations for the use of the money, and, if freely judging the uses to be good, and if freely judging that the money would be well-managed and thus applied to the stated purpose, they would “give and grant” their money.When James I succeeded Elizabeth, he inherited and adopted this long-established practice, that the Crown could make binding contracts with the subjects. Technology of ocean-sailing and economic developments coincidentally had progressed to the point that establishing colonies of English settlers in North America was not only feasible, but desirable.But, there not having been any traces of gold or silver discovered in North America, the British king had no incentive to send soldiers over to seize the gold; and thus, no incentive to send soldiers over at all. The gold and silver that motivated the King of Spain to send military missions into South America answerable to him did not exist in Britain regarding North America.And thus, beginning with King James I, the practice in Britain developed, that groups of subjects would conceive a colonization plan, either for economics or to serve as a religious refuge for dissenters, and they would come to him to seek a charter - which, by its own written terms, was a binding contract enforceable against future kings and queens.The settlers proposed to put their bodies and lives on the line in a wilderness, to develop it; but they insisted on having their own self-government, sot hat if they generated wealth through their efforts, they would have the power to protect it, more than the power that they would have in England or in Scotland. They were not going to leave civilization, risk death on the seas or in the wilderness of North America, then, having survived that, labor to build a wealthy land, only to have it all then taken-away by the government in London. They would not go unless they had a binding promise of self-government that would provide protection.And beginning with King James I, consistently through King George II, that is just what the kings promised.The settlers, in reliance on those contract promises, went out, and were successful. Or more substantially, their descendants were successful. The colonists were always thinking about their descendants; their documents are filled with their concern for “out posterity,” which was their term for their children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, etc. The king’s promises were perpetual, so as to protect “our posterity.”What developed was what the British Commonwealth is today: a collection of states, each independent of all others, but united by having one King or Queen. No one elected assembly or parliament, no one set of ministers, had any role in advising the king on what laws to make in any other state.The only exception to this was ocean-trade, which was managed from London; but the writ of power arising from this extended only to the landward-side door of the customs-house in each port, and along the coasts only as needed to ensure “no smuggling,” so that every product that was supposed to go through a customs-house did indeed go through customs-house.In 1760, with the death of King George II, his grandson ascended the throne as King George III. He was young and inexperienced, only 22 years old. Sensitive to the fact that his grandfather and great-grandfather had been German in birth and culture, he volunteered in his accession speech (otherwise drafted by ministers) “Born and educated in this country, I glory in the name of Britain.”In his first act of law, he designated virtually all of his independent income to Parliament, in exchange for an annual “civil list” payment from Parliament - and thus the king put himself solely financially under the control of the Parliament of Great Britain, apart from any connection he had to any other elected legislature in any colony. That property today is managed by an entity called, since 1955, “The Crown Estate,” and its website, on it history page, accessed today, says“Since 1760, the net income of The Crown Estate has been surrendered to the Exchequer by the Monarch under successive Civil List Acts, passed at the beginning of each reign.”In 1761, there was a national election for the House of Commons, which wikipedia today calls “one of the most undemocratic in British history.” There would not be another national election until May 1768.In 1760, the Parliament of Great Britain had taken-over control of the king, a naive young man seeking emotional acceptance from Britain, by means of monopolizing the king’s money; and then a year later a group of rich insiders took-over control of the Parliament of Great Britain. Thus these rich and greed-driven insiders now had control of the king.That is the reality of the situation.In 1763, with Britain’s spectacular victory over France and Spain simultaneously in the Seven Years War, North America was freed of French and Spanish troops and claims of power.In 1764, the ministers and the Parliament of Great Britain - without any legal-analysis forethought so far as I have found - announced that in 1765 it would enact a law disqualifying all the American colonial governments from issuing court decisions, enacting statutory laws, registering land-title changes, etc., unless these government actions were written on paper imported from Britain. The price of this paper would include a sales-tax, payable to the government in London, and symbolized by a stamp printed or impressed upon the paper.The basic concept was to turn the internal lawmaking of each colony into a matter of the ocean-trade - because everything internal to government in the colonies now would have to be done on an import product - the paper - and thus, within the power of London to rule.Each colony would have a government-appointed agent, known as the stamp-agent, who would manage the import and distribution of this paper.Colonial leaders in London, such as Benjamin Franklin, and such as a brother of Virginian Richard Henry Lee, official representatives of the colonies as registered agents, spoke against this law on policy grounds, but they lost, and in 1765 the Parliament of Great Britain enacted, and King George III assented, and this became law.Benjamin Franklin and Richard Henry Lee, and others, who had opposed the law on policy but had lost, then began to strategize how they or their friends could get the lucrative and powerful posts as the colonial stamp-agents.But to their surprise, a massive, continent-wide explosion of opposition to this Stamp Act occurred all over America.Because if this could be done with paper, it could be done with any tangible object. Imagine, for example, clothing. Parliament could announce that no judge could issue a decision, unless wearing clothing imported from Britain; no lawyer could argue a case, unless wearing clothing imported from Britain; no witness could take the stand and testify, unless wearing clothing imported from Britain; no legislator in any assembly could have his vote on a bill counted, or have his words in debate recorded, unless he was wearing clothing imported from Britain at the moment he voted or spoke; and even, that no one could register a complaint of crime of robbery or battery, unless, when the person suffered this bodily attack, the person had been wearing clothing imported from Britain - such that it was British-made cloth that the criminal’s knife or bullet penetrated, before penetrating the flesh of the victim.This is what one answer to this question refers to merely as better-management of the colonies, colonies that, according to that answer, heretofore had experienced the “benign neglect” of Parliament.In 1766 Parliament resentfully backed-down, but in so doing, enacted a sweeping assertion of power to all lawmaking in North America, known as the Declaratory Act.New ministers came in, whose attitude was that no colonial government was anything to be regarded in any way. In response to the American resistance, they then developed a legal theory, a conception of what government was, that said in any government, there had to be one supreme source of power, able to override all other supposed sources of power.One of those ministers, who came into the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies in January 1768, was born Wills Hill, son of the first Viscount Hillsborough, an Irish peerage. Unlike English or Scottish peers, Irish peers could sit in the House of Commons. In 1742, his father’s death made him second Viscount Hillsborough, but he kept his seat in the Commons (elected in 1741) until in 1756 he was made a Baron in the English peerage (Baron of Harwich) which moved him into the House of Lords. Later, in 1772, after his service as Colony Secretary, he would be rewarded for his conduct of that office - rewarded for the treatment that we are about to see that he gave the colonies - by being made Earl of Hillsborough in the English peerage. In 1789 he would be made Marquess of Downshire in the Irish peerage. Marquess being the highest title he earned (the next highest is Duke), this is how he is labeled on wikipedia today.In the documents of the time, he is always referred to as Lord Hillsborough (sometimes with one “l”).Wills Hill’s very first act on becoming Colony Secretary was to assert that there was then, and had always been from the beginning of time, a power in the government in London to veto every law made by any American colony, regardless of the language any king or queen had ever signed in any charter, an inherent power of government which had - until he obtained government power as Colony Secretary - been left unasserted due to what a prior answer here calls “benign neglect.”One of America’s best-educated and most respected lawyers, William Samuel Johnson of Connecticut, happened to be in London on Connecticut business (a long-running lawsuit over borders and Indian claims) and he had become Connecticut’s official representative in London on general matters.Johnson - later to become a U.S. Senator in the 1st U.S. federal Congress - promptly called on Lord Hillsborough to make the case that Hillsborough’s assertion of veto power violated the Connecticut Charter, and thus, that Hillsborough’s demand was unenforceable.Here is what Lord Hillsborough wrote, and then Johnson’s report to the Connecticut Governor of his meeting with Hillsborough, as reported in my September 2017 SSRN paper:>On 23 January 1768, in London, the new Colony Minister, Lord Hillsborough, addressed a circular letter to each of the governors of the American colonies (the copy I review is to John Penn of Pennsylvania, in the Pennsylvania Archives, but I presume the same letter went to each governor):“His Majesty having been graciously pleased to appoint me to be one of his principal Secretaries of State, and to commit to my care the dispatch of all such business relative to his Majesty’s colonies in America … your dispatches be for the future addressed to me. …“[A]ll possible facility & dispatch should be given to the business of his colonies, and as nothing can more effectually contribute to this salutary purpose than a frequent and full communication of all occurrences that may happen, and a regular and punctual transmission of all acts and proceedings of government, and legislature, and of such papers as have any relation thereto;“I have it in command from his Majesty to recommend this to your particular attention, his Majesty having observed with concern, that this essential part of the duty of his officers in America has scarcely any where been duly attended to, and in several colonies, particularly the Charter and Proprietary governments, almost entirely neglected.”>On 13 February 1768, in London, future 1stUS Congress Senator William Samuel Johnson wrote Connecticut Governor William Pitkin III in Connecticut at Hartford, to report in detail on his recent meeting with the new Colony Minister, Lord Hillsborough (Wills Hill). Governor Pitkin received this on April 18, 1768:“As soon as Lord Hilsborough publicly entered upon his office of Secretary of State for the American department [officially appointed February 27], I thought it my duty to wait upon his lordship and congratulate him upon his appointment to that important office, and to recommend the Colony of Connecticut to his lordship’s favor and protection. …“[H]e said, we were a very free Colony … we were very deficient in our correspondence, seldom writing to his Majesty’s Ministers … they were often quite in the dark about us, and seemed to have too little connection with that Colony.“I assured him, in answer, that I believed he might depend upon it that everything was communicated which the government there could imagine it fit to trouble the King’s Ministers with … from the nature of our constitution, his lordship would see that fewer occasions would occur of troubling the King’s Ministers with our affairs than in those governments immediately under the Crown, which must necessarily be, in some sort, actually administered by the Ministers themselves; and if in any cases real delays had happened [various excuses justified the delays].“He seemed pretty well satisfied with this apology, but then proceeded to a much more interesting subject. He had, he said, in his circular letter, requested that a copy or our colony laws should be sent him …. I told him, I believed the colony had several times sent over the printed law book; that I thought there was one or more at the Plantation Office, and imagined they might even be had in England.“He replied, however that might be, as his was a new office, it would be necessary that a copy should be lodged there; and he thought it the duty of government to send it, and transmit from time to time, not only the laws that should pass, but all the minutes of the proceedings of Council and Assembly, that they might know what we were about, how government was administered, and rectify whatever might be amiss.“I said, if his Lordship wanted a copy of our laws for his private perusal, or to remain in his office for the information of his secretary and clerks, or to be referee to whenever any affairs of the colony were under consideration, I did not doubt the colony would send him one of their law books … but if his Lordship meant to have the laws now in force there, and those which should hereafter pass, transmitted (as from the colonies immediately under the Crown) for the inspection of the Ministry as such, and for the purpose of approbation or disapprobation by his Majesty in Council, (which I saw very plainly was what he was driving at,) it was what the colony had never done, nor thought themselves obliged to do, and I was persuaded would never submit to; and if his Lordship would be pleased to attend to the charter granted us by King Charles II., I did not doubt he would be clearly of the opinion, that the colony were thereby vested with a complete power of legislation, and that their acts needed no farther approbation, nor were subject to any revision; and in point of fact, his Lordship well knew that those laws had never been re-examined here, that the colony had been for more than a century in the full exercise of these powers, under the eye and with the approbation of government here, without any the least check or interruption, except in a single instance [referring to actions by an agent, Edmund Andros, of about-to-be-deposed King James II, in 1687], in such times, and under such circumstances, as I believed his Lordship would not mention but with detestation, much less consider as a precedent.“He said, he had read our charter with some attention, and he knew what powers we had exercised under it; that it was very full and expressive, but there were such things as extravagant grants, which were therefore void; and however great a latitude of expression was made use of in it, still there might be a doubt, perhaps, what would really pass by it in legal construction; that he believed I would admit there were many things which the King could not grant, as the inseparable incidents of the Crown, &c.; and it might deserve consideration whether some things which King Charles had pretended to grant to the Colony of Connecticut were not of that nature, particularly the power of absolute legislation, which tended to the absurdity of introducing imperium in imperio, and to create an independent state.“I replied, that, for the purpose of his argument, I apprehended it was not necessary either to admit or deny that there were some prerogatives of the Crown so inseparably incident or annexed to it that they could not be granted away, (upon which subject some lawyers had, however, refined so much as to render themselves very unintelligible,) since nobody had ever reckoned the power of legislation among those inseparable incidents of the Crown; all lawyers were agreed, that it was a peculiar and undisputed prerogative of the Crown to create corporations, and that the power of law-making was incident to every corporation, at least in some degree … founded in the reason of things … that every corporation in England enjoyed it as really, though not so extensively, as the Colony of Connecticut, they to their particular purposes for which they were created, we to ours ….“That the colony charters were in several respects of a higher nature, and founded upon a better title than even those of the corporations of England, particularly that those here were mere acts of grace and favor, whereas those in America were granted in consideration of very valuable services done, or to be performed, which having been abundantly executed, at immense expense by the grantees, by the peopling and cultivation of a fine country, to the vast extension of his Majesty’s dominions, and the prodigious increase of the trade and revenues of the Empire, they must now be considered as grants upon valuable consideration, sacred and most inviolable. …“Parliament, as well as the Crown, having for more than a century acquiesced in the exercise of the powers claimed by it [the Connecticut government], this would amount to an approbation, so that the colony had now a Parliamentary sanction, as well as a title by prescription, added to the royal grant; by all which they must be effectually secured in the full possession and exercise of all their charter rights.“His Lordship endeavored to distinguish between the ordinary corporation powers (in which he would admit the power of making by-laws was included) and that legislative power exercised in the charter colonies, upon which he was pretty full; and I still endeavored to avail myself of those distinctions in favor of my argument, upon this principle, that the very creating of a corporation for the purpose of establishing a colony included in its idea the full power of legislation, the government of a colony being a more extensive and complicated object than that of a single city or town, and necessarily requiring more full and absolute powers, which it must therefore be injudicious to limit by comparing them strictly with those of corporations for inferior purposes.“Finally, upon this point, his Lordship said, these were matters of nice and curious disquisition, and required a longer time for full discussion than he could then well spare; he seemed, however, to yield the necessity of any royal approbation as requisite to the validity of our laws, but still insisted that (admitting the validity of King Charles’s grant) they ought to be regularly transmitted for the inspection of the Privy Council, and for disapprobation, if found within the saving of the charter, ‘repugnant to the laws of England;’ that those who claimed under the charter must admit the force of that limitation of their legislative powers, at least, and that alone would render it necessary that their laws should be transmitted and inspected here.“Upon which I begged leave to observe to his Lordship, that the colony did not apprehend that any extrajudicial opinion of his Majesty’s Ministers, or even of the King’s Privy Council, could determine whether any particular act was within that proviso or not; that this could only be decided by a court of law, having jurisdiction of the matter about which the law in question was conversant; that though perhaps we should not contend, but that, if the General Assembly [of Connecticut] should make a law repugnant to a statute of Great Britain, (not in the sense of diverse form [from], but flatly, and in terms contradictory to it,) such law, by the saving in the charter, might be void, yet a declaration of the King in Council would still make it neither more nor less so, but be as void as the law itself; because its being void or not depended merely upon the restraining clause in the charter, not upon any authority reserved to the Crown, or the Privy Council, to decide about it, from which they were by other words in the same charter clearly and expressly excluded; that therefore the only method which could be taken in such case must be for the persons aggrieved by such act to bring their action at law, in such manner as to bring in question the validity of such act of Assembly, when the court before whom the trial should be, could fairly and legally determine upon it; that this might be done in the courts of law in the colony, and I doubted not would be very fairly decided there, and leave no room for an application here, or, if the contrary should ever happen, the interposition here (if any) I conceived must be in the judicial only, not by any means in the official way.“As against the Crown, especially, the charter grant was completely, and to all intents and purposes, conclusive; King Charles II. had, for himself and his successors, absolutely granted all their power, by which the Crown must be bound, and forever estopped to say that there was any ground for the Privy Council, or any of the King’s Ministers, who were still but the delegates of the Crown, and acting in behalf of it, and by authority derived only from thence, to interpose in confirming or disannulling the laws of that colony, and consequently there could be no manner of [or] occasion for transmitting our acts to his Majesty’s Ministers, or for their giving themselves any trouble about them.“The judicial power of the Privy Council … his Lordship did not mention, nor indeed, as he had stated it, did it properly belong to the argument ….“As to the minutes of Council and Assembly … I told his Lordship that there were none kept, but only in short notes … perfectly unintelligible unless the colony sent their Secretary, after every session, to explain them ….“His Lordship said that we had a very particular method of doing business; that he had not seen these things quite in the light which I had endeavored to place them in, and he feared we were in danger of being too much a separate independent state, and of having too little connection with or subordination to this country, upon which our security and well-being depended; that, however, these things merited a farther consideration; he hoped, at least, the colony would send him their laws, and we might perhaps talk farther upon these subjects, upon some future occasion ….“[I] left him not well to find that he had entertained such ideas, and was in danger of such opinions, as you see, from the tenor of his conversation … [ideas which had] been revolving in his mind ever since he was at the Board of Trade… as this nobleman is now at the head of all American affairs… I imagined it might be of some use to acquaint you … to see what loose, mistaken notions those who are esteemed very great men (and really are so in many respects) are capable of entertaining of colony rights ….”When Lord Hillsborough asserted that the promises of King Charles the Second in the Connecticut charter were “extravagant grants, which were therefore void,” he effectively said that the promises in the charter were lies, and that Parliament and the ministers and the king could act as if those promises never existed, despite the truth of what Johnson asserted, that the promises “were granted in consideration of very valuable services done, or to be performed, which having been abundantly executed, at immense expense by the grantees, by the peopling and cultivation of a fine country, to the vast extension of his Majesty’s dominions, and the prodigious increase of the trade and revenues of the Empire.”It is true that Lord Hillsborough concluded this discussion by saying that “these things merited a farther consideration,” which might mean that he had not finally concluded that the charter promises were “extravagant grants, which were therefore void.” However, as we will see, and as Johnson wrote, there never was a “farther consideration” – Lord Hillsborough always spoke and acted as a man who had unshakably decided that the charter promises were “extravagant grants, which were therefore void.”There had never been a duty to send “a regular and punctual transmission of all acts and proceedings of government” from each colony for review by ministers chosen by the Parliament of yet another of the governments all under the same king. In the colonies in which the governor was appointed by the king (chosen by the ministers), the king might direct his governor to do this, but that would be a personal obligation of the individual, not of the colony itself as a legal entity. In the proprietary and charter governments of Connecticut and Rhode Island, there was no such individual in existence (the governors there not being appointed by the king) and thus no such duty attached even to specific individuals.Colony Minister Lord Hillsborough thus asserted a duty applicable to colonies as legal entities that did not exist and had never existed. On this false foundation, he then made a complaint that the supposed pre-existing duty “has scarcely any where been duly attended to, and in several colonies, particularly the Charter and Proprietary governments, almost entirely neglected.” Hillsborough thus made a basis of complaint about bad conduct by colony leaders that was a false complaint, because there had never been any such duty, and thus there was no neglect of duty.Making a complaint of bad performance of duties in the past is the usual path by which someone who wants to fire the current officials, and replace them with his own favorites, seeks to build the case for firing. And that is what Colony Minister Hillsborough was doing here.Concoct a new duty; assert that the duty had always existed; criticism the current office-holders for having failed to perform their duty in the past; and castigate and denounce them if they fail to begin now to perform that duty in the present or into the future; and then fire them. This is a standard manipulation technique, in which the subject of discussion is always the targeted person, and never the person who is trying to control and dominate that person.More fundamentally, when Colony Minister Lord Hillsborough spoke of the colonies as “his Majesty’s colonies,” he meant something far more significant than merely the polite formulations of words that are used when a democracy operates within the forms of royal government. When people referred to the Parliament of Great Britain as “his Majesty’s Parliament,” they did not mean thereby that the king owned Parliament and that he had a right to give unlimited orders to Parliament or to its individual members. The king could not command the individuals in the House of Commons or in the House of Lords how to vote on particular bills, or what to say about particular matters of public concern.Not so with the American colonies. When Colony Minister Lord Hillsborough used the words “his Majesty’s colonies,” he meant ownership and control – the right to give orders to the colonies as governments, and to the individuals within each colony government, and to all the individuals living within the colonies.The ministers in London would never have dared to speak and act in this fashion so long as the French and the Spanish had large armed forces on the continent of North America – and in fact they did not, except briefly during the reign of King James the Second, who by applying the same attitude within Britain itself, got himself overthrown and exiled. So long as France and Spain held large portions of North America, the leaders in London needed the active aid and support of the Americans, and thus, treated the Americans with respect.It was only after the expulsion of the French and the Spanish from Canada and from Florida in 1763 that the leaders in London began to feel that they could now command and order the Americans.In essence, what Lord Hillsborough asserted over America was the kind of power that William the Conqueror had asserted over England in 1066.The entire British history over 700 years, of limitations upon the sovereign, of rights of the subjects enforceable against the sovereign, and of the sovereign as a deal-maker with subjects, who honored the deals - all this, the London ministers and the Parliament of Great Britain threw-away in 1764, just as stated by Lord Hillsborough in January and February 1768, as quoted above.The American descendants of the original British colonists would have no more claim to that 700 years of British constitutional history than would the Natives of India, or the Natives of Africa.To stop this is the “main reason for the American Revolution” that this question asks for.

There are 67, 894, 397, 398, 459, 487, 376, 503, 978, 687 ways you can define the beginnings of “commercial aviation”.You will get different answers on how you define “commercial”.Is the first “passenger” ever carried a part of “commercial aviation”?Then, the Wright Flyer would qualify.ONE of the first passengers to ride in an airplane was Mrs Hart 0. Berg, who flew with Wilbur Wright at Le Mans, France, on October 7, 1908.Mrs Berg sat on the open framework of a Wright biplane and clutched a strut to keep from falling off.Her only defense against the wind was a string tied around her long skirt to hold it to her ankles.Maybe other women were afraid that the string might break.At any rate, few of them sought rides in this primitive transport.It took another 11 years and considerable improvement in airplane design to convince even a moderate number of persons that they should travel by air.ArgosyPARIS IN THE SPRING! A May morning of the year 1927. Imperial Airways’ newly launched “Silver Wing Service” give 18 passengers who boarded in London a dividend on their £9 (U.S. $44) ticket—a bird’s-eye view of the Eiffel Tower before a turn is made back to the northeast for a landing at Le Bourget.The aircraft is an Armstrong Whitworth Argosy, of which seven were built. All were named after cities. This one, the City of Birmingham, has been two and a half hours en route from London; headwinds of 30 kilometers per hour have caused her to fall behind schedule.Capt. 0. P. Jones is in command. He sits on the right side of the open cockpit and has been in radio communication with Le Bourget, which has reported a ceiling of 100 meters (300 feet) and visibility one kilometer (about half a mile).No matter; Captain Jones is pleased with the behavior of his wireless, which this morning allowed him to converse with Le Bourget from a distance of more than 50 miles. As for the landing, he will execute an L-K instrument approach, L-K standing for local knowledge. He will accomplish this one as handily as he has done so many before.The procedure is as uncomplicated as his aircraft: He will let down to the top of the overcast after searching out a thin spot or a small hole with something he recognizes at the bottom.Almost anything in the vicinity of Le Bourget will do; he knows by heart the compass course to the aerodrome from a church, a small factory, a certain road crossing, a rock quarry. And the land all around the aerodrome is conveniently flat and free of obstructions.Once on course, he will throttle back the Argosy’s three 385-hp Armstrong Siddeley Jaguar engines until his airspeed drops to 60.He will keep wings level with the aid of a new-style artificial horizon and keep a straight course down through the muck with his turn indicator.Warning of an incipient slip or crab will be signaled to him instantly from the feel and sound of the damp wind on his cheek—a sensitive instrument that long ago won his faith.Since his war service with the RFC, he has become quite proud of his cheek, and like his comrades on Imperial Airways is less than enthusiastic about future aircraft designs that show the pilot enclosed in a glass cockpit. “Bloody chicken coop!”If Captain Jones should miss his descent-distance plan slightly, the error is not serious.There are no runways at Le Bourget to trouble a man; like Croydon, you can land anywhere on the aerodrome, and on a still-wind morning like this, in any direction.White lines are marked on the green grass, and even in wretched visibility they inform a man whether he is landing too short or right on, or even suggest it would be wise to circle for another pass.No flaps, no spoilers, no retracted undercart to fret about. Just chop the throttles, ease the nose up and settle gently to the greens-ward at a nice 50 miles per hour.A final hissing as the wheels brush the grass, then a muffled thump.“Are we down?”When there is no wind, what could be sweeter than a wing loading of five pounds?The passengers are delighted with the City of Birmingham.While their American cousins who have managed to fly from one city to another in a small single-engine biplane are lucky to have a mail sack to sit on and a ham sandwich to chew while they mentally review their wills, these passengers enjoy a modest but tasty lunch.It is enhanced by a fine wine and served with the practiced skill of a steward who has learned his business caring for passengers aboard a blue-ribbon Cunarder.As a consequence, they are so full of zest and the joy of accomplishment they dare to attempt conversation over the high decibel count in the cabin.England, once lord of the seas, now promises to rule the skies, and the competition is weak. There is KLM with their Fokkers (very Spartan travel compared to an Argosy), France has her Air Union flying LE 021s, and the Germans are still in the Great War’s shadow with their single-engine Komet Ills.As the Argosy passengers survey the earth below and the curtained, candelabraed cabin that is their world aloft, and as they study the large airspeed indicator and altimeter placed in the cabin for their interest, they have reason to be smug about Britannia’s place in the aerial scheme of things.Soon they will have more inspiration, for by 1929, Argosys will be flying through to Egypt with such distinguished passengers as Sir Samuel Hoare, and Edward, Prince of Wales, shepherded by the same Capt. O. P. Jones.By November of 1929, Argosys will be showing the flag all the way through to Karachi, and the Air Ministry will have signed an agreement with Imperial Airways calling for a subsidy of £335,000 for the European and India routes. During the same year, GAPAN—the Guild of Air Pilots and Air Navigators—will be founded, “to further the efficiency of commercial aviation and to uphold the dignity and prestige of air pilots and navigators.”For the British, the promise of the skies is on every horizon. It is an ill-founded rumor that the sun will ever set on the empire. ❑Boeing got into the airplane business in 1916, several years before it was possible to round up enough hardy passengers to make a payload.Early Boeing commercial planes, like those of other American manufacturers, built to carry mail.The first big push to establish passenger-carrying airlines occurred in Europe.In 1919 several such lines were born, including predecessors of Air France and Lufthansa.America was off on a different tack, developing air mail routes.Foremost in this effort was the U. S. Post Office, which operated a number of mail planes.The Post Office had no interest in passengers.However, in 1925 it began entrusting the air mail to private enterprise. This resulted in rapid development of commercial aviation, including air travel.On April 4, 1927, the first scheduled flight of passengers over a contract mail route was made by Colonial Air Transport, between New York and Boston.Awarded CAM 1 between New York, Hartford, and Boston, Colonial Air Transport, unlike many of the early companies with airmail contracts, planned from the start to be more than just a mail carrier. This was reflected in the passenger capacity of their initial equipment which included two, single-engine Fokker Universals (4 passengers or 800 pounds of cargo) and two Fokker Trimotors (8 passengers or 1500 pounds of cargo). Beginning operation on June 18, 1926, C.A.T. carried only mail for the first six months. Consequently, when passenger service was inaugurated early in 1927, their pilots were familiar with the route and experienced in flying regular schedules in spite of the often marginal east-coast weather. While C.A.T. operated with 100% safety during this six-month "trial," there were 109 forced landings due to weather or darkness and 42 uncompleted trips. In these early days before instrument flying, pilots necessarily had to turn around or get down before losing visual contact ... a procedure that made flying a real adventure for passengers. During 1927, Colonial's first year of mail-freight-passenger operation, they completed 812 of 906 scheduled New York-to-Boston trips . . . carried 509 paying passengers, 20,895 pounds of mail, and 1,140 pounds of express. The daily eastbound flight left New Brunswick, New Jersey (terminus used for New York) at 6:00 AM and arrived in Boston at 9:05 AM. The westbound flight left Boston at 6:15 PM and arrived in New Brunswick at 9:15 PM. A scheduled intermediate stop was made in Hartford and, upon request, at Teterboro. The fare between New York and Boston was $35.00; baggage allowance, 30 pounds. In addition to their scheduled operation (primarily with the Fokker Universals), C.A.T. used their Fokker Trimotors to fly some 3,500 passengers on sight-seeing trips around New York. In April of 1927, after setting up beacon lights along their route, they also introduced a short-lived New York-to-Boston night flight. While their operation was not a big financial success, Colonial Air Transport managed to keep flying, safely and on regular schedules. In 1930 they became a part of American Airways . . . the predecessor to today's American Airlines.▲ Early in 1928—A Colonial Fairchild over the Mohawk Valley en route from Albany to Cleveland. Early Airlines Colonial Western Airways.This early airline was founded in May, 1927, by essentially the same syndicate that a year and a half earlier had started Colonial Air Transport, operating be-tween New York and Boston on C.A.M. 1. In organizing Colonial Western Airways to fly the mail over the 452-mile route of C.A.M. 20 between Albany and Cleveland, additional backers were brought in and a separate company incorporated. While nobody was getting rich in the air-line business, this second venture, like the first, was obviously a chance to invest in the future. An operations base for Colonial Western was set up in Albany and four aircraft were purchased. Since the new line planned to offer passenger service as soon as the route had been proven by flying mail schedules, three of the new planes were Fairchild FC-2 Cabin Monoplanes. Powered with Wright Whirlwind J5C's capable of developing 237 hp at 1950 rpms, the FC-2 featured folding wings for compact storage, a 4,000-pound gross weight, accommodations for four passengers and a 90 mph cruise. Its mail or passenger payload, exclusive of the pilot, was 800 pounds. The fourth plane purchased was a Pitcairn Mailwing with a 600-pound mail and express payload.▲ Pitcairn Mailwing. The Pitcairn PA-5 Mailwing was designed to carry air mail along the routes of the eastern United States. Efficient and economical, it helped build the route structure for what would ultimately become Eastern Air Lines. Actor Steve McQueen was known almost as readily for his roles as he was his love of cars, motorcycles and airplanes - including a rare PA-8 Mailwing, which was one of only six built by aviator Harold F. Pitcairn's company, Pitcairn Aviation in 1931. Harold F. Pitcairn left his imprint on early fixed-wing, autogiro, and rotary-wing aviation, as well as having spawned one of the country’s major airlines.Scheduled operation began on December 17, 1927, over the Buffalo-Cleveland leg, and at year's end the line could report a gross income of $365.40 for flying a total of 3,052 miles and carrying 329 pounds of mail. Full-scale operation began early in 1928 with six daily round trips per week. The westbound flight left Albany at 10 a.m. and arrived in Cleveland at 4:15 p.m. with intervening stops at Schenectady, Utica-Rome, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo. The eastbound flight left Cleveland at noon and arrived in Albany at 6:15. The one-way Albany-Cleveland fare was $60. While not noted for soundproofing or an abundance of headroom, Colonial's Fairchilds offered passengers relative comfort in a wicker seat or a rear settee, as well as an intimate flying experience. The pilot sat directly in front within shouting distance while the large side windows offered a wonderful view of the countryside below. In all, during 1928,Colonial carried 243 passengers ... and to pay the bills, a reported 45,309 pounds of U.S. mail. Like the parent Colonial Air Transport, Colonial Western Airways managed to keep flying until 1930 when they, too, became a part of American Airways . the predecessor of American Airlines.A passenger in those days often sat on a pile of mail sacks in an open cockpit and held a bag of mail in his lap. He wore a parachute and all the clothing he could get on, as protection against wind, rain, sleet, snow or sunshine. A trip under those conditions was an endurance test of flights and stops. Only the adventurous were interested.In 1927 Boeing joined the cheerful struggle for America’s air routes by building a fleet of 25 mail-and-passenger planes that were well ahead of all competition.These were the 40-As, biplanes powered by the new air-cooled Wasp engine.A 40-A could haul two passengers and 500 pounds of mail from San Francisco to Chicago in 30 hours.The 40-As were followed quickly by 40-B4s, with passenger cabins having four tightly fitted seats.In 1932, United Air Lines pilot Joe Smith has reached the venerable age of 23. (Captain Smith is now retired with 31,000 hours logged flight time.) The great Tex Rankin taught him to fly, and he has been at it four years, mostly over a route that has the worst flying weather in the United States, excepting Alaska.Because of the high terrain, it may thus be ranked along with the worst in the world, not excepting northern Europe, where at least the majority of clouds are not stuffed with granite.The route between Oakland, California and Seattle, Washington, officially designated Airmail Route 8, customarily produces every known meteorological phenomenon. There is fog to match any along the East Coast, winds exceeded only by the Alaskan breed, rain as a way of life, and ice like unto the cruel brand found along the Mason-Dixon Line. The United pilots who fly the run that was once Pacific Air Transport’s and Boeing’s can at least be grateful for the relative paucity of thunderstorms.Among Joe Smith’s comrades on the route are Virden, Miller, Tyler, Laughlin and Cunningham, names that will eventually identify senior royalty in the world’s largest air-line.None of them ever thought he would be called “Captain.”Dammit, a pilot was a pilot, and the sleeve with the stars that designate a thousand hours each was enough frill.Because of the high terrain, it may thus be ranked along with the worst in the world, not excepting northern Europe, where at least the majority of clouds are not stuffed with granite.There, sometimes torn between frustration and disappointment at their meager reward, they shot up the fancy wallpaper with their airmail .45s.When PAT was absorbed by United, the stock was honored, bullet holes and all.Even after the merger with United, the mail pilots of AM-8 share other mundane problems. Any clerk age 25 can buy $10,000 worth of life insurance for $151 per year. A mail pilot of identical age is obliged to pay $401 if he can find an insurer. Home, Metropolitan and Mutual, among most of the major concerns, flatly refuse to insure any man who flies “regularly.”Otherwise, things could be worse.Although the rest of the nation is aching through the curse of the great Depression, United is somehow meeting its payroll and even expanding.The Boeing 40-B-4 inherited from Boeing Air Transport is a fine flying machine, a man’s airplane, aging now, but still nearly without fault.It is ideally suited for the route, and as presently equipped with the new Boeing radiotelephone system, descents through the overcast create a much less severe pucker factor.An artful dispatcher standing on the hangar roof at either Oakland, Medford or Seattle can judge Smith’s whereabouts from the purr of his Hornet engine and direct him accordingly. “Turn due east and fly one minute, Joe . . . Okay, back to the east one minute .. . got you. Turn to 300 degrees now and start your descent. Okay? Level off at 1,000 . . . you’re coming fine, Joe. Now steady on 280 degrees and descend . . . you should break out about 500 feet with a good two-mile visibility underneath. Got ya! Welcome.”But flying needle, ball and airspeed is not common in the 40-8-4s or anything else. Once in a while a man is caught in solid cloud, and so literally sweats it out, he doesn’t need any additional heat in the cockpit. Or he fails to find a break, in which sad event large red cards are dropped along the route by searching comrades.IMPORTANTAn airmail plane has been lost in this vicinity. Anyone seeing or hearing a plane in this district during the hours of 8 a.m. to 12 noon Thursday morning, January 22, please telephone—It’s a long route, and shrewd pilots avoid bucking through on instruments. The best technique is to get right down on the ground if necessary—and stay there.One of the Boeing 40-B-4’s few faults is its relative blindness while taxiing, but in the air, visibility from the cockpit is satisfactory, providing you know what you are looking for.The fundamental truth to safe “contact” flying in bad weather is the ability to identify every stream, patch of forest, ranch and railway junction—instantly.Just hoping the hamlet that is momentarily visible straight down might be White Pigeon or Black Angus is asking for trouble.Convincing yourself it is such a place simply because it is due to appear means the beginning of your end if it happens to be some other hamlet.Later, while you are milling around entirely surrounded by bewilderment, you would do well to review your sins because they are soon to be reckoned.The cockpit of a mail plane is no place for a man who would lie to himself.Joe Smith and his comrades are acutely aware of the international human proneness toward wishful thinking.Like another United pilot named Jeppesen, they guard against uncertainty by keeping a special little book in the knee pocket of their flying suits.Each pilot is his own author, and he records certain facts about the route in his own way:“. . . AIRWAY BEACONS: Number 36b Marigold elevation-2,500 feet 37a Stagecoach-2,500 feet 37b Cowcreek-1,490 feet 38 Canyon Mountain-3,000 feet.”The book also contains personally drafted little diagrams of the new radio-range facilities, which have just been installed at a few of the major way points.The “legs” are drawn, the As and Ns marked, and the best s with their lengths and elevations.All of these notations have been meticulously compiled by the pilots themselves. Who else would do it?Yet, by far the most important aids to avigation are stored in the memories of the pilots.In the same fashion river pilots once knew every turn and eccentricity of a river, they know old MacDonald’s farm from Hansen’s spread.Although they may catch only a fragment of Mosby Creek, they will not confuse it with an unnamed creek to the north-east if only because there was no smell of sawmill smoke, and they immediately recognize Lake Fornicate because they christened it so.If they spy the loom of Mt. Adams there and Huckleberry Mountain puncturing the overcast off there, then the course must be “that way.”They are friends with the land beneath their wings.Later in the flight, down California way, even the calendar is verified, for the dependable Mrs. Post, who lives exactly eight miles north of Red Bluff Airport, invariably hangs out her laundry on Saturdays.There are many other friends below, usually quite unaware of their usefulness, but friends all the same.And when something happens to change the scene—a death, a sale, a remodeling—then it is soon known to the pilots of AM-8.All such air-ground friendships are not one-way even as the Northwest weather is not perpetually rotten.The summer sun is still high at five in the afternoon, when pilot Joe Smith, bound from Portland to Medford, Oregon, usually passes the fire lookout station on Quartz Mountain.During a previous trip, Smith had noticed something flashing from the same station and he thought, “That man is lonely,” so he left his regular course and buzzed the station.The ranger’s enthusiastic waving was enough to convince him all was well.Yet the thought of his isolation stayed with Smith, and the next trip he resolved to alleviate it.By now a custom has been established and a new friendship formed.Joe Smith buys a newspaper in Portland and soon afterward dives his 40-B-4 at the little clearing on Quartz Mountain.Tossing the paper this afternoon, he has risen higher than usual in the cockpit and one of the buckles on his helmet is loose.As the paper makes an arc for the target, his goggles are torn away by the slip-stream.A futile reach and Smith knows they are gone forever.It is going to be a long flight to Medford without their protection.Ten days later, Smith’s mail includes a mysterious package. It proves to be his lost goggles, which are not even scratched.“I found them hanging in the branch of a tree—”.The Boeing 40-8-4 was not only an efficient and air-kindly craft; it arrived on the aviation scene at just the right time less a year.The original design known as the Model 40-A was inspired in 1925 by the Post Office Department, which needed a replacement for the venerable Liberty-powered DH-4s. The Post Office bought one and the design was shelved.Approximately one year later, with the marvelous caprice of so many Government agencies, the Post Office suddenly advertised the transcontinental airmail routes for private bid. Boeing Air Transport, heedless of dire financial warnings, won AM-8 and revived their own 40-A design to do the job.To meet the operational deadline, 24 aircraft were built in six months.That the work was well done happened to be a very good thing for Boeing, since the advent of the type also marked a monumental change in the U.S. aircraft industry.Hitherto there had been no Governmental control over the construction of aircraft. As of January 1, 1927, the Department of Commerce took over strict regulation of airworthiness and registration.The Boeing 40-A model was furnished Approved Type Certificate Number 2.While they were at it, the Boeing engineers decided to hedge their gamble and make room for two paying passengers in a small cabin forward of the cockpit. New type designation: the Boeing 40-8-2. Later the cabin was enlarged to accommodate four people, who were obliged to be cozy whether they were so inclined or not.Thus the famous 40-B-4.The basic Model 40 design seemed blessed from the very start. The type went directly into service without the usual lengthy ceremonies involved in testing a prototype.The fine Pratt and Whitney Wasp engine had just become available for the earlier models, and soon afterward came the beautiful Hornet engine, which in itself contributed mightily to the progress of American commercial aviation.Overall construction was welded steel tubing, dural and fabric covering.A total of 39 were built, the last in 1932. It had such attributes as a tailwheel, three-bladed propeller, hand-operated wheel brakes, two-position rudder bar, and an airspeed and altitude indicator for the interest of the passengers.The quality of construction may be solemnly weighted against a certain shoddiness to be found in some later aircraft.Two Canadian-built 40-B-4s survived to fly in World War II!Pressed into military service by the New Zealand Government, both were lost in action during the New Guinea campaign.Two others still exist, one in the Ford Museum, Dearborn, and the other at The Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago.▲ Airlines and their aircraft types: 1936And don’t forget Germany!1915: A certain Prof. Hugo Junkers, formerly a successful heating engineer, has become intrigued with the possibilities of using aircraft for advantage in the war and later for the coming peace when Germany rules the western world.Some say he is a little crazy because he has formed a company to manufacture an all-metal flying machine.Metal fly?Obviously, Herr Professor Junkers has slipped into senility at age 56.It is hardly surprising that no one will donate precious aluminum for such a mad enterprise.Look at the lightness of properly built aircraft like the Eindeckers.Both critics and friends strongly recommend that the Professor take counsel with the young Dutchman Tony Fokker before venturing further into the science of aeronautics.Yet a first aircraft is something like a first child, and Hugo Junkers has no intention of sharing parentage.He proceeds to build his creation alone, using sheet iron for skin and iron tubing for frame.The wing is of cantilever design, an innovation that only magnifies the madness of the scheme, and fears are openly expressed for the life of young Lieutenant von Mallinckrodt, who is to fly the silly thing.On a gray December day when German children are already being warned that because of the war, Christmas must be most frugally observed, von Mallinckrodt becomes airborne in the world’s first all-metal aircraft.Designated the 1.1, it is the sire of innumerable Junkers aircraft, one of the most notable being the Junkers Ju.52/3m.Twenty years later, when the washboard-ugly Ford Trimotor reigns as queen of the skies in North and Central America, the Junkers 52/3m will begin its distinguished career and soon be flying in regions where the Ford is totally unknown.Professor Junkers’ ubiquitous three-engine flying machine will eventually be affectionately known by pilots the world over as Iron Annie.Soon after the successful flight of his first aircraft, Junkers actually does join with the enterprising young Dutchman to form a new company, Junkers-Fokker Werke A.G.It survives until 1919, when the Versailles Treaty terminates all German military aircraft production.Before the boom falls, Professor Junkers’ transport version of the Junkers 10 manages to make the first commercial flight of an all-metal aircraft, between Weimar and Dessau.The manifest lists one passenger.Only a few years pass before Germany is back in the air, with Professor Junkers leading the way.He is working on a flying-wing design and has actually produced the Junkers F.13 with the now-standard Junkers construction of corrugated Duralumin skin and metal throughout.Not only does the F.13 find favor in Europe, but six are purchased by—of all institutions—the United States Post Office, which intends to use them on the mail service between New York, Chicago and Omaha.Several F.13s are sent off to China, where the German-controlled Eurasia Aviation Corporation is solid proof of Teutonic interest in the future of Far East aviation.To exploit that interest, two Junkers G.24s fly from Berlin to Peking via Siberia and return without incident.The aircraft can carry nine passengers and is a great success on the European circuit.The year is 1926, and Germany is on the rise again.Two years later, a Junkers christened Bremen flies the first east-west transatlantic nonstop flight, between Baldonnel, in Ireland, and Greeneley Island, off Labrador, making the trip in 36 and a half hours.Enter ex-Corporal Adolf Hitler (Iron Cross), whose views on the future of Germany, and particularly German aviation, do not agree with those of Prof. Hugo Junkers.Junkers is forcibly “retired with honor,” but not before his firm has produced the three-engine Junkers Ju.52.It is not long before the 52s are flying all over the world, and for good reason.Their performance cannot be duplicated by any other contemporary aircraft, operation is economical, and their overall construction is so hell-for-stout they are ideally suited to the very rough going found in the boondocks of Asia, Africa and South America.In China, where the China National Aviation Corporation operates what is possibly the most colorful flight service in the world.The Junkers Ju.52 is more comfortable and far more efficient than the American-built Stinsons and Loening amphibians that are also on the CNAC roster.You can stuff more than 20 Chinese into the cabin, or heave up a satisfying load of ammunition for an anxious warlord, or remove his body from the field if he is no longer functional.CNAC pilots are a recalcitrant, swash-buckling lot of internationals who make their own rules and promptly proceed to break every one of them.They drink when they are thirsty and are not particular about how much time elapses before they make the next ascension.The likes of the two Americans, Sloniger and Caperton, who have come to China with the intention of selling Curtiss-Wright products, are quite at home among as rambunctious a covey of aerial adventurers as has ever been assembled under one corporate flag.Even the future-eyeing Pan American, which has contrived to buy the American interest in CNAC, cannot tame their new and merry band of pilots.All self-respecting CNAC pilots do a little personal smuggling, but then smuggling is a way of life throughout China.They are thoroughly familiar with the rules of “squeeze” when applied to their own benefit, and their attitude toward their official employers, their Chinese hosts and their passengers is haughtiness crossed with good-natured condescension.(This reputation will hardly be diminished by their exploits while flying the Hump during World War II in DC-2s and -3s.)On one matter only are all CNAC pilots in fervent agreement.For their money—which is not inconsiderable—you cannot build a better airplane than a Ju.52.Unless a man dives it straight into the ground, walking away from a forced landing is almost a certainty.Among other attributes, they are pleased with the way the 52s get off the ground despite the occasional overloads and the nearly perpetual steaming heat in the south of China.Yet beautiful women and fine aircraft must always hold certain tricks to make them interesting, and as so often happens after first infatuation, a man may discover the fault is the direct result of a quality, a contradiction he missed on first appraisal.One of the reasons for the 52's agreeable flying nature is the employment of the “double wing” concept: Full-span flaps—the outer portions of which operate differentially as ailerons—are set below and quite apart from the trailing edge.The separation between the two sets of airfoils is considerable, so much that when viewed from below, the Ju.52 appears to have a second wing trailing along behind the main span.The immediate result is great aerodynamic efficiency in the ailerons, and lateral control is excellent.Ernst Zindel, the original designer of the single-engine 52, was not a pilot, so he was ignorant of a nuisance called “ice.”Alas, European pilots flying 52s soon learned the hard way that their normally benign bird could become an absolute beast after only a few minutes in ice.The separation between wing trailing edge and aileron/flap leading edge provided an ideal trap for ice accumulation, and there was double jeopardy in the result.Even if the pilot was foresighted enough to keep wagging his wings and thus avoid a complete lock, there was nothing he could do about the form in which the ice accumulated.Unfortunately, it often produced a negative-lift effect and a complete reversal of control response.Deutsch Lufthansa customarily named their Ju.52s after famous German airmen of World War 1.There was the Manfred von Richthofen, the Oswald Boelcke and the Ernst Udet.As tragedy struck time and again, new 52s were christened with the names of Lufthansa pilots whose final plea for a DF bearing had been followed only by permanent silence.The villain was invariably ice.By 1928, Professor Junkers’ enterprise had produced more than a thousand aircraft.There was no such matching production anywhere in the world, and the feat was continued right into World War II, when the Junkers complex employed a peak of 140,000 persons.Junkers Ju.52s had been heavily involved in the Grand Chaco War and the Spanish Civil War.In all, 4,832 Iron Annies were built, and although thousands were lost in World War II, they refused to become extinct or even moribund when that conflict ended.Air France and the French Air Force used the 52s that were built in France during the occupation.The British used 52s to smooth their reentry into the airline business after the war, and 52s were similarly valued in Scandinavia, Portugal, Greece, Poland, South Africa and South America.Forty years after the Iron Annies first took the sky, the Spanish Air Force kept a few operational!The story doesn’t end here; it is only beginning!