{"id":5911854,"date":"2026-07-17T11:48:45","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T09:48:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/john-macready-test-pilot-first-transcontinental-flight-1923\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T16:04:30","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T14:04:30","slug":"john-macready-test-pilot-first-transcontinental-flight-1923","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/john-macready-test-pilot-first-transcontinental-flight-1923\/","title":{"rendered":"The Test Pilot of a Hundred Firsts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><style>.et_pb_title_container h1.entry-title { padding-top: 40px !important; }<\/style><\/p>\r\n<p>Before there was radar, before there were reliable instruments, before anyone had crossed the United States without landing, there was a quiet Army lieutenant named John Macready \u2014 a man who spent the early 1920s collecting aviation \"firsts\" the way other people collect stamps.<\/p>\r\n<p>He set the world altitude record. He flew the first crop-dusting mission in history. He made the first nonstop flight across America. He was the first man to bail out of a stricken aircraft at night. And he is the only person ever to win the Mackay Trophy three times. Almost nobody remembers his name.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f5f5f5; padding: 20px; border-radius: 8px; margin: 24px 0;\">\r\n<p style=\"margin: 0 0 10px; font-weight: bold; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: .03em; color: #111;\">QUICK FACTS<\/p>\r\n<table style=\"border-collapse: collapse; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.5;\">\r\n<tbody>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 12px 6px 0; font-weight: 600; color: #333; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\">Pilot<\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 0; color: #444;\">Lt. John A. Macready, U.S. Army Air Service (1887\u20131979)<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 12px 6px 0; font-weight: 600; color: #333; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\">Signature flight<\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 0; color: #444;\">First nonstop US transcontinental flight, 2\u20133 May 1923<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 12px 6px 0; font-weight: 600; color: #333; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\">Aircraft<\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 0; color: #444;\">Fokker T-2, single Liberty 12 engine<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 12px 6px 0; font-weight: 600; color: #333; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\">Distance<\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 0; color: #444;\">~2,470 miles in 26 hours 50 minutes<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 12px 6px 0; font-weight: 600; color: #333; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\">Route<\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 0; color: #444;\">Roosevelt Field, New York to Rockwell Field, San Diego<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 12px 6px 0; font-weight: 600; color: #333; vertical-align: top; white-space: nowrap;\">Honours<\/td>\r\n<td style=\"padding: 6px 0; color: #444;\">Only three-time Mackay Trophy winner; world altitude record (1921)<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<\/tbody>\r\n<\/table>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top: 22px;\">The man who kept doing things first<\/h2>\r\n<p>In September 1921, Macready climbed a Packard-Le P\u00e8re biplane to nearly 40,000 feet on bottled oxygen, setting a world altitude record over Dayton. A month earlier, he had flown the world\u2019s very first purpose-built crop-duster, spraying an insecticide over a grove of catalpa trees \u2014 quietly inventing agricultural aviation.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin: 0 0 24px;\"><img data-opt-id=942180811  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" style=\"max-width: 100%; height: auto; border-radius: 6px;\" src=\"https:\/\/ml5psubhxdln.i.optimole.com\/cb:0e0_.b970\/w:auto\/h:auto\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/07\/john-macready-first-crop-duster.jpg\" alt=\"John Macready and the first crop duster\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" \/>\r\n<figcaption style=\"font-size: 13px; color: #777; text-align: center; margin-top: 6px; font-style: italic;\">John A. Macready (right) beside the world\u2019s first crop-dusting aircraft in 1921 \u2014 just one of his many firsts. Photo: Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n<p>Then he set his sights on the biggest prize of all: flying nonstop from coast to coast. With Lieutenant Oakley Kelly he tried twice from west to east, and failed both times \u2014 beaten by fog and a labouring engine. On one aborted attempt, Macready\u2019s patience ran out.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f8f9fa; border-left: 4px solid  #1565c0; padding: 20px 22px; margin: 18px 0 24px; border-radius: 0 8px 8px 0; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.7; display: flex; gap: 20px; align-items: flex-start;\">\r\n<div><em>\u201cWhen Kelly and I stepped out of the T-2 in Indianapolis, we did not do much talking about transcontinental non-stop flights. We were through. Any man who was foolish enough to want our job was welcome to it. Never, never again for us!\u201d<\/em>\r\n<div style=\"margin-top: 10px; font-size: 14px; color: #555;\"><strong>Lt. John A. Macready<\/strong> \u2014 recalling the aborted 1922 attempt, in National Geographic<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top: 22px;\">2,470 miles without stopping<\/h2>\r\n<p>They did not stay \"through\" for long. On 2 May 1923, they took off the other way \u2014 east to west, into the prevailing headwinds, from Roosevelt Field on Long Island. Their aircraft was the Fokker T-2, a big single-engine transport crammed with extra fuel. The two men took turns flying, crawling through an internal tunnel to swap between a hidden rear station and the cockpit, passing notes on a string because they could not hear each other over the Liberty engine.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin: 0 0 24px;\"><img data-opt-id=651568748  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" style=\"max-width: 100%; height: auto; border-radius: 6px;\" src=\"https:\/\/ml5psubhxdln.i.optimole.com\/cb:0e0_.b970\/w:auto\/h:auto\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/07\/1923-transcontinental-flight-chart.png\" alt=\"The 1923 transcontinental route\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" \/>\r\n<figcaption style=\"font-size: 13px; color: #777; text-align: center; margin-top: 6px; font-style: italic;\">The route of the first nonstop flight across America, 2\u20133 May 1923: New York to San Diego, into the wind, in under 27 hours. Image: Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n<p>Night fell over the Midwest, and with it came the loneliness that every long-distance aviator of the era dreaded.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f8f9fa; border-left: 4px solid  #1565c0; padding: 20px 22px; margin: 18px 0 24px; border-radius: 0 8px 8px 0; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.7; display: flex; gap: 20px; align-items: flex-start;\">\r\n<div><em>\u201cFlying into this murky night was about the same as plunging into ice-cold water with a long swim ahead.\u201d<\/em>\r\n<div style=\"margin-top: 10px; font-size: 14px; color: #555;\"><strong>Lt. John A. Macready<\/strong> \u2014 on the 1923 night crossing, in National Geographic<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n<p>They swam through it. Somewhere over the country Macready even made the first in-flight engine repair in Air Service history, replacing a faulty switch to keep the Liberty running. After 26 hours and 50 minutes and 2,470 miles, the T-2 settled onto Rockwell Field in San Diego. America had been crossed without a single stop for the first time. The aircraft they flew hangs today in the Smithsonian.<\/p>\r\n<p>Macready went on to make the first night emergency parachute jump in 1924, served again in the Second World War, and lived to 91. He belongs in the same breath as Lindbergh and Doolittle \u2014 a pioneer who did the impossible so often that the world simply stopped being surprised. He deserves to be remembered.<\/p>\r\n<p><em>Sources: National Air and Space Museum; National Museum of the USAF; HistoryNet; This Day in Aviation; Wikipedia.<\/em><\/p>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background: #f0f4ff; border-left: 4px solid #5C91FF; padding: 16px 20px; margin: 32px 0 8px; border-radius: 0 8px 8px 0;\">\r\n<p style=\"margin: 0 0 8px; font-weight: 600; color: #333;\">Related Posts<\/p>\r\n<p style=\"margin: 4px 0;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/harold-harris-first-emergency-parachute-jump-1922\/\">The First Man Saved by a Parachute<\/a><\/p>\r\n<p style=\"margin: 4px 0;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/jetflights\/first-transatlantic-flight-nc-4-1919-not-lindbergh\/\">The First Transatlantic Flight Wasn\u2019t Lindbergh \u2014 It Was the NC-4 in 1919<\/a><\/p>\r\n<\/div>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>John Macready set the altitude record, flew the first crop-duster, and made the first nonstop flight across America \u2014 then history forgot him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":5911534,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[665,666,664],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5911854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aviation-world","category-history-and-legends","category-military-aviation"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>John Macready: First Nonstop Flight Across America<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In 1923 John Macready and Oakley Kelly flew the Fokker T-2 nonstop across America for the first time, 27 hours from coast to coast.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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