By Eric Olsen
Paul Augspurger never thought of himself as an aviation pioneer. After all his generation produced the Wright Brothers and Charles Lindbergh and launched America’s airmail service whose pilots risked their lives flying the mail cross-country, using rivers and railroad tracks to navigate. These were the real pioneers exploring the newly discovered world of flight. Paul Augspurger may not have been an aviation pioneer, but he certainly made a contribution.
Paul owned a car dealership in the little town of Woodburn, Indiana, a small speck on the map in the northeast corner of the state. And though he wasn’t risking his life as a trailblazer, aviation was always on Paul’s mind. On any given day, neighbors could spot him on the sidewalk in front of his car dealership staring at the sky, no doubt imagining himself soaring high above the ground darting in and out of the clouds.
Paul was a leading citizen in his hometown, a successful businessman and volunteer firefighter. He was always ready to come to the aid of a neighbor in need, but he wasn’t what you’d call a warm, cuddly man. Some would say he was cantankerous. “He didn’t suffer fools gladly,” says Roberta Meinzen, Paul’s granddaughter, “but he loved to talk and that made him a good car salesman”.
Paul’s success on the ground fueled his obsession with the sky. In 1935, at the height of the Great Depression, he bought an airplane, an Arrow Sport model F, a low wing monoplane powered by an 85-horsepower flathead Ford V-8 engine. Despite the weight of that cast iron V-8, the Arrow Sport, designed as an army trainer, was fully aerobatic and Paul loved putting it through its paces. He’d take off from a local farm field and fly over town, performing aerobatics for the entertainment of his friends and neighbors below. Three of those friends, a local farmer, a sheriff’s deputy and the town druggist were so impressed by the air show each bought an Arrow Sport for himself. Only one hundred Arrow Sports were built and four of them resided in Woodburn, Indiana.
On Sundays the four friends would put on air shows and give airplane rides to local kids. One of those kids, Bob Wearley recalls his first flight with Paul. “Riding in an open cockpit at dusk high above the ground, it seemed like we were hanging in the air,” he says. “I was hooked.” Bob would grow up to be a career pilot in the Air Force and later fly 747 jumbo jets for a commercial airline. Bob credits that first airplane ride with Paul Augspurger for inspiring him to become a pilot.
Paul flew his Arrow Sport for most of the year, but when the snow began to fall he’d pull the wings off his plane and store it at his car dealership. One winter he overhauled the flathead V-8. When it was done, he tied the plane down outside his shop and ran the big engine to break it in. Paul may not have been an aviation pioneer for the history books, but he did introduce the joy of flight to his hometown and his passion for flight changed the course of at least one life.
Paul’s granddaughter thinks that legacy is worth honoring. Roberta Meinzen is a generous and enthusiastic supporter of the National Airmail Museum at Fort Wayne, Indiana’s Smith Field. She’s contributed to the museum’s building fund and is donating photographs, logbooks and other memorabilia. The museum will preserve Paul’s story along with those of other men and women aviators who answered the call of that wild blue yonder and took the lucky ones with them.