Texas' First Airmail and Passenger Service

The first mail planes were biplanes. National Air Transport won Contract Air Mail route 3, Chicago to Dallas, on November 7, 1925, and Curtiss built ten Carrier Pigeons to fly it. Flashback Dallas credits Richard Dobie, brother of writer J. Frank Dobie, as the first pilot to fly mail from Kansas City to Dallas, on May 12, 1926. Overnight service began February 1, 1928, over a route marked with gas lights every few miles and rotating beacons between them, and it was projected to save a day.

What the plaque says

Texas' First Airmail and Passenger Service Love Field witnessed two "firsts" in Texas aviation history. National Air Transport (later became United Air Lines) on May 12, 1926, inaugurated first airmail service in Texas, and on Sept. 1, 1927, flew the first passengers and express. The flights were to Chicago. The first airmail packets, weighing a total of 1,556 lbs., were dispatched in two single-engine monoplanes, "Miss Dallas" and "Miss Fort Worth," for a 12-hour flight. At the same time, "Miss Chicago" was on its way to Dallas with 275 lbs. of mail and parcels, including apparel for two clothing stores and a shipment of diamonds; total value $100,000. The first passenger service began at 8 a.m., with departure of a full load of three. About an hour earlier, another plane with two passengers and the first load of express left Chicago for Dallas. These early flights cut rail time by 15 hours, though it took almost 12 hours to fly the 990-mile, 7-stop trip, which cost 10 cents per mile. Each passenger was allowed 25 lbs. in baggage, with overweight charged at a dollar a pound. Air express shipments were limited to 200 lbs. and $5,000 valuation. Early travel, communication and transportation series; erected by Moody Foundation - 1965

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Dallas Museum of Art — 4.6 mi
  A city art museum that began as the Dallas Art Association in 1903, grew up in Fair Park, and has stood in the Arts District since 1984 under a forty-foot barrel vault.
• The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza — 4.8 mi
  A plow-company warehouse of 1903, identified by the Warren Commission as the building Oswald fired from, now a museum on its sixth and seventh floors above Dealey Plaza.
• Dallas Heritage Village at Old City Park — 5.8 mi
  Dallas's first city park, laid out around Browder's Spring in 1876, now a museum of historic buildings moved here from across North Texas, among them Millermore, a cotton planter's mansion.
• African American Museum, Dallas — 6.4 mi
  Founded in 1974 at Bishop College, a free Fair Park museum holding the Sepia photograph archive, African art and A. Maceo Smith's papers, and the story of the Hall of Negro Life.

More markers nearby

• Love Field — steps away
• Oath of Office of President Johnson — steps away
• Garvin Memorial Cemetery — 1.5 mi
• Cochran Chapel Cemetery — 1.5 mi