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The Cleveland National Air Show also began in 1964. National Air Races were run by U.S. Air Race, Inc. from 1995–2007. The company was founded by famed World Race Gold Medalist Marion P. Jayne and after her death from cancer in 1996, was run by her daughter Patricia Jayne (Pat) Keefer, 1994 World Race Gold Medalist.
The Thompson Trophy race was one of the National Air Races of the heyday of early airplane racing in the 1930s. Established in 1929, the last race was held in 1961. The race was 10 miles (16 km) long with 50-foot-high (15 m) pylons marking the turns, and emphasized low altitude flying and maneuverability at high speeds.
Unusually, a former combat foe was invited to join the club: Ernst Udet, the highest-scoring German flying ace to survive World War I. Known as a fun-loving playboy, Udet performed aerobatics at the National Air Races in Cleveland in 1931 and '32, Los Angeles in '33, and again in Cleveland in '38.
At the 1931 National Air Races, Bayles and the Gee Bee Model Z, christened the "City of Springfield," cleaned up, first winning the $7500 Thompson Trophy prize with an average speed of 236.239 miles per hour (380 km/h), then the Shell Speed dash with an average of 267.342 miles per hour (430 km/h), breaking the speed record for the course, then ...
September 7 – Herbert Clayton Wells loses his life during an air contests in Ottumwa. [24] September 7 – Lowell Bayles wins the 1931 Thompson Trophy in the Gee Bee Model Z racer at the National Air Races in Cleveland, Ohio, with a speed of 236.24 mph (380.19 km/h).
The 1929 National Air Races included the first official women-only event, the Women's Air Derby, a cross-country race from Los Angeles to Cleveland, Ohio. In 1931, he convinced businessman Vincent Bendix to sponsor the Bendix Trophy Race, a transcontinental speed dash open to men and women. Henderson was awarded the L'Ordre de 'Etoile Noire de ...
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The original Bendix Trophy on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.. The Bendix Trophy is a U.S. aeronautical racing trophy. The transcontinental, point-to-point race, sponsored by industrialist Vincent Bendix founder of Bendix Corporation, began in 1931 as part of the National Air Races.