Home of American Barnstormer Walt Pierce & the
Double Trouble Wing Walking Team
"Walt is ICAS #14, flying airshows since 1963.
His memory of events and people is phenomenal and a national asset. Pierce has flown many many airshows across the Carolinas, known many of the airshow greats and continues to carry on the tradition of the
Barnstormer."
Quoted from Hugh Oldham's Proairshow site.
Here are just a few links to get you started with discovering our rich American Barnstorming history...
"A barnstormer often was part stunt pilot, part showman, part grease monkey, part entrepreneur." quoted from Barnstorming pilots always drew a crowd by Joe Earle (The Wichita Eagle, December 3, 1984)
For a look at a very historic "airshow" of sorts, take a look at this amazing footage from 1909 of Wilbur Wright & his Flying Machine.
Wing Walkers - U.S. Centennial of Flight
Barnstormers - at PBS Kids
Mabel Cody's Flying Circus - at AirMinded
Lillian Boyer - "Empress of the Air"/Heroes of the Sky at the Henry Ford Museum
Clyde Pangborn - a biography of Clyde Pangborn, 1918-1958
See our fansite for archival video clips of Golden Age Wing Walkers and Daredevils.
More on Walt's Aviation & Airshow History...
Walt joined the U.S. Air Force on his 17th birthday. Too young to be an Aviation Cadet, he was sent to Amarillo AFB to attend aircraft maintenance school on the Boeing B-47. At Walker AFB, New Mexico, training continued on the brand new B-52 and the arriving KC-135. During that time he received his pilot’s license. When honorably discharged, Walt was a flight mechanic on the C-119C "Flying Boxcar" at Kelly Field, Texas.
USAF Cadet, Walt Pierce.
About our History...
Toll-free: 866-450-1930
This photo shows the crop dusting operation at Seminole, TX where Walt worked in the 1960s. Walt flew the Stearman in the '67 airshow season - it included a dual routine with Don Pittman and Gene Soucy in their Pitts Specials.
Wing walking and the United States Air Force... bound together since 1918!
While there are a variety of reasons given for the US Army Air Service's Lt. Ormer Locklear's first walk out on the wing in 1918 at Barron Field, Texas, the New York Times reports in an August 4, 1920 article that he had originally begun wing walking because,
"He conceived the idea that it would be possible to mount machine guns on the
wings of a plane. Army officers said it would be impossible to manoeuvre with a
man’s weight on the extreme edge of the wings, and some of his first “stunts”
were done to demonstrate that a plane so weighted could be manoeuvred.”
According to the US Centennial of Flight Commission,
"Although Locklear could have been court-martialed for such antics, his
commanding officer encouraged him, instead, to perform more "stunts" because
they boosted his colleagues' moral, and their confidence in the soundness of
their Jenny biplanes, which were suffering a rash of accidents at the time."
In short, the early USAF saw wing walking as a fantastic and successful recruiting technique!
Additionally, Locklear was the first person to transfer from one plane to another in flight. This is what inspired and led to the world's first air-to-air refueling in 1919; Wesley May, with a five gallon can of gasoline strapped to his back, transferred from a Standard flown by Frank Hawks to a Jenny piloted by Earl Daugherty ("Chewing Gum, Bailing Wire, and Guts" by Bill Rhode, 1970).
Walt and his sister in 1958 when he had the Piper PA-12 with a partner. Walt's job was assistant crew chief in the 40th bomb squadron, 6th bomb wing at Walker AFB, NM. He also had his old day job from his pre-USAF days at the airport in his hometown. The patch on his jacket is the 6th bomb wing..
