New York | A legend in 33 hours: Lindbergh died 50 years ago

Lindbergh’s machine was 8.43 meters long with the 237 hp Wright Whirlwind nine-cylinder radial engine. The aviation pioneer said of his century flight: “Sometimes I was flying ten feet above the sea, sometimes I was 10,000 feet high. But I didn’t hit a single boat while flying. ” It was only a few times that he saw the lights of ships at night. “I didn’t sleep for a minute and I didn’t take any caffeine or other stimulants I brought with me.”

Lindbergh was not the first transatlantic aviator

The American was not the first transatlantic airplane: as early as 1919, a dozen crews from Newfoundland had attempted to fly across the sea between America and Europe. One crew crashed immediately after takeoff and three others had to go down. John Alcock and Arthur Brown flew from Newfoundland to Ireland in a modified Vickers Vimy bomber on May 14 and 15, 1919. The first non-stop crossing of the Atlantic took 3,032 kilometers and 16 hours. and 27 minutes. But hardly anyone talks about it today: Lindbergh’s fame surpassed everyone and everything – until today.

Born in 1902, Lindbergh presented himself publicly as a carefree big boy and a warhorse, a first-rate aviator, a master technician and anything but a gambler. The fact that he survived the flight was due – apart from the quality of the engine – to his unparalleled physical strength and mental strength. Lindbergh was never suspected for a moment; he counted hourly and said to himself: he continued.

That was Lindbergh’s real achievement. He had to deal with several problems: the wings and the engine blocked his forward view – a periscope allowed him to see during take-off and landing. There was no radio or radio on board.

Hundreds of thousands of French people are cheering for Lindbergh

But there was no need for today’s media – at least not to report the impending sensation in Paris. “We had already heard from Cherbourg that Lindbergh had flown over the coast at about 8:30 p.m. (…) At 10:15 pm I heard the faint sound of a plane. An uncontrollable crowd had been waiting for Lindbergh for over an hour – it was unbelievable,” said Fernand Sarrazine on May 21, 1927. He was chief mechanic at Paris Le Bourget Airport.

The landing followed soon after. 200,000 French people cheered Lindbergh. Charles Lindbergh, who became a hero at the age of 25, married the millionaire’s daughter Anna Morrow in 1929. But after the kidnapping and murder of his 19-month-old son in 1932, a shadow fell on the family’s life . German carpenter Richard Bruno Hauptmann was executed in 1936 for the crime – he had protested his innocence until the end. Lindbergh had five more children with his wife.

Lindbergh lived a double life

Lindbergh later became one of the most prominent spokesmen of the reactionary “American First Committee” movement with racist and anti-Semitic views. Lindbergh, the idol of a generation, became increasingly lonely. After being promoted to brigadier general and becoming a director at a US airline, he moved with his wife to a small Hawaiian island in the last years of his life – and became bitter there. Aviation pioneer died in 1974 aged 72.

But that should not be the case yet. Almost 30 years later, in August 2003, the “Süddeutsche Zeitung” revealed that the American was leading a double life, largely unconsciously, for 17 years until his death. In 1957, Lindbergh met and fell in love with hat maker Brigitte Hesshaimer, who was 24 years his junior in Munich. Her children Dyrk, Astrid and David only knew their father under the pseudonym “Careu”. And the secret remained hidden even from Lindbergh’s biographer.