Beaird Inductee Narrative

On April 6, 1924, four Douglas World Cruiser aircraft operated by the United States Army took off from Lake Washington near Seattle on what would become aviation’s first around-the-world flight. The 26,000-mile flight included seventy-two refueling stops and would ultimately take six months to complete. During the course of the 175-day journey, the Army pilots spent approximately fifteen days aloft, achieving an average enroute speed of seventy miles per hour.

Just six weeks after the Army fliers completed their world record flight, Henry G. “Hank” Beaird was born in the small farming community of Headland, Alabama. In 1924, the aviation industry was only beginning to evolve beyond the notion of barnstormers, daredevils and stuntmen. For many in Alabama, aviation remained somewhat of a mystery, and only a few lucky residents of small communities like Headland had ever seen an airplane in flight. The sound of an airplane engine overhead would bring people running outside of their homes hoping to catch a glimpse of the flying machine. On the day of his birth in November of 1924, it would have been impossible to imagine that young Hank Beaird would one day make aviation history by setting eighteen world speed records while circling the globe in less than three days in an airplane with no propeller.

Hank Beaird’s journey into aviation history began in 1942 on a football field at Alabama Polytechnic Institute in Auburn. On that day, the pilot of a Lockheed
P-38 twin-engine military fighter buzzed the field, forcing the team and spectators to dive for cover. Reaching the end of the field, the pilot raised the nose of the fighter and performed several aileron rolls during as the aircraft climbed into the autumn sky. Later in the day, Beaird listened intently as the pilot of the fighter addressed a group of young men to encourage them to enlist for service in the Army Air Forces. After witnessing the brief air show earlier in the day, the eighteen year-old Beaird needed little encouragement.

Beaird’s military career took him first to Thunderbird Field in Arizona for primary flight training in the PT-17 Stearman. After completing basic and advanced training, Beaird was deployed to the Pacific Theater of Operations, assigned to an Air Commando Unit. During his sixteen month tour of duty, Beaird flew a number of fighter and bomber aircraft, including the P-38 Lighting, the same type of aircraft that forced him to dive for cover on the football field in Auburn only a year earlier.

Returning home after the war, Beaird enrolled at the University of Alabama to study aerospace engineering. Graduating in 1949, Beaird traveled to Grand Prairie, Texas to join Chance-Vought Aircraft as an Aeronautical Engineer. The move from Alabama to Texas was the first in what would ultimately result in Beaird and his family living in seventy separate homes in fifty-seven different cities during his aviation career.

During the early days of his career as an aeronautical engineer, Beaird discovered that he was unable to keep his feet planted firmly on the Texas prairie. He quickly joined the Texas Air National Guard flying the North American P-51 Mustang and the Republic F-84 Thunderjet.

In 1952, Beaird became the Chief Engineering Test Pilot for the Republic Aviation Corporation, a decision that would significantly transform the course of his aviation career. Shortly after joining Republic, Beaird again packed his belongings and traveled to Edwards Air Force Base in California, the world’s foremost aviation flight test center. Beaird’s career at Edwards began with testing numerous variants of the Republic F-84 jet fighter, including an experimental model that had two embedded turbine engines driving a three-bladed propeller. The aircraft, the XF-84H was originally designed to combine the speed of jet aircraft with the long range, low fuel consumption and low landing speed of conventional propeller-driven aircraft. Affectionately known as the “Thunderscreech” because of the loud noise produced by the engine and propeller, the XF-84 was the fastest propeller driven airplane ever built. Beaird and his fellow test pilots ultimately made twelve flights in the aircraft, eleven of which ended in emergency landings.

In the days before complex computer software programs removed much of the uncertainty from flight-testing new aircraft, engineers would develop a promising concept and a prototype would be constructed to test the design. It was then the responsibility of the project test pilot to verify that the new design would achieve the desired performance parameters. Each time a new aircraft design was tested, Beaird and his fellow test pilots had to be prepared for every eventuality.

This was especially true during flight test of military aircraft that were designed to be extremely fast, yet unstable for increased maneuverability. In 1957, Hank Beaird was at the controls of a new design, the Republic F-105 Thunderchief. The Mach 2 aircraft was designated to replace the F-84 Thunderstreak, an aircraft previously test flown by Hank Beaird. The Thunderchief was the largest single-seat, single-engine fighter-bomber ever constructed. The aircraft was longer than most of the bomber aircraft used during the Second World War and had a higher gross takeoff weight than a fully loaded B-17 Flying Fortress.

Beaird’s first flight in this massive fighter-bomber was a harrowing experience that resulted in a wheels-up landing due to a failure in the landing gear system. During a later flight, the massive Pratt and Whitney YJ75 engine of the F-105B lost power at 45,000 feet. Beaird attempted to restart the engine using procedures developed by the manufacturer. When the engine failed to light, Beaird decided to restart the engine his own way. He lowered the nose of the huge aircraft to more than sixty degrees below the horizon and accelerated to increase the possibility of a relight. After losing 38,000 feet in the attempt, the engine restarted an altitude of only 7,000 above the ground. Hank Beaird’s reaction to the episode was typical, “It was all in a day’s work.”

Following an intensive testing program, Hank Beaird piloted the first flight of a production F-105B on May 14, 1957. During the course of the flight test program, Beaird and his fellow test pilots managed to work out all of the problems that had plagued earlier designs of the aircraft. The F-105, affectionately known as the “Thud” would serve with distinction in Southeast Asia and earn a reputation as a tough, sturdy aircraft that would always bring its pilot home. Before leaving the testing program at Edwards, Beaird would fly most of the fighter aircraft in the United States Air Force Inventory.

In 1963, Hank Beaird became the Chief Engineering Test Pilot for Lear Jet Industries, a position that would ultimately make Beaird one of the most recognized and respected test pilots in the world. During his involvement with the testing and certification of the Lear Jet, Beaird developed a close relationship with aircraft designer Bill Lear. According to Beaird, “Lear was the smartest man I ever worked for. He would tell you all sorts of lies that two years later would come true.”

The early days of the Lear Jet program were exciting, yet demanding. “Twenty-five hour days” were the norm as Beaird and his team worked to complete the seemingly infinite number of details required for aircraft certification. On October 7, 1963 Beaird was at the controls of the prototype Lear Jet on its first flight. Ultimately, Hank Beaird would spend more than 7,000 hours in the cockpit of the Lear, setting numerous world records in the process.

Undoubtedly, the most remarkable flight flown by Hank Beaird was the global record flight of the Lear Jet Model 24. According to Beaird, Bill Lear learned that television personality Authur Godfrey planned to make an around-the-world flight in a competitor’s aircraft. Within thirty-six hours, Lear had arranged for all of the necessary permits for an around-the-world flight in a Lear Jet piloted by Hank Beaird. Departing Wichita, Kansas on May 23, 1966 Beaird and his crew flew a distance of 23,000 miles in 50 hours and 20 minutes, landing back in Wichita only 65 hours and 41 minutes after their departure, setting eighteen new world speed records in the process. These records were a testament to the many advances in aviation since the 175-day army world flight forty-two years earlier, advances made possible because of test pilots like Hank Beaird.

Before leaving the Lear Jet program, Beaird promised Bill Lear that if Lear ever built another airplane, he would come back and fly it. That opportunity presented itself in 1980 when Hank Beaird became the Director of Flight Operations for Lear Fan Industries. Beaird stated that the Lear Fan was a lot like the XF-84, except the propeller was in the back. Sadly, Bill Lear passed away before Hank Beaird made the Lear Fan’s maiden flight.

Continuing his work with advanced design concepts, Beaird’s next stop was OMAC - The Old Man’s Aircraft Company. The OMAC 1 aircraft was a canard design powered by a single-engine pusher turboprop. In describing the aircraft’s characteristics, Beaird compared it to his favorite design of all - the Lear Jet. He stated, “It’s a great little airplane. No, it isn’t a Lear Jet, but in its class, it is going to be just as significant.”

Known by his fellow test pilots as “The Big Orange” because of his fondness for orange soda, Hank Beaird’s list of peers reads like a virtual Who’s Who of test pilots and astronauts, including Scott Crossfield, Gordon Cooper, and Deke Slayton. Gordon Cooper, the first astronaut to make two orbital space flights, described Beaird as “not letting emotionalism get involved in flying, he doesn’t fly off the handle or let his ego get in the way like some others do.” Moya Lear, wife of designer Bill Lear said “Hank is easygoing, a dear man, so capable and with so much integrity. The whole industry respects him.” It was this level of respect among his peers that resulted in Hank Beaird becoming a founding member and Fellow of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots, an organization dedicated to the pursuit of flying safety world-wide. Today, the society has grown to more than two thousand members.

In 1983, Beaird completed his autobiography “Livin’ It Up” a personal narrative of his experiences as a test pilot. “Livin’ It Up” was unique not only in its subject matter, but also because it was one of the first works to be produced as a book-on-tape. Beaird has also co-authored a book on Mach 2 fighter aircraft titled “Test Pilot” and edited three books on Bill and Moya Lear.

In more than fifty years and 17,000 hours of flying, Hank Beaird set twenty-three world-records and logged eight first flights of newly designed aircraft. In 1983, the national publication Aviation Convention News selected Beaird as one of the Top Newsmakers of the Year for his many contributions in the certification of the Lear Jet, unquestionably the most recognizable corporate aircraft in the world. Beaird has tested and flown fighter aircraft from the P-51 Mustang to the F-16 Fighting Falcon; transports from the Douglas DC-3 to the Boeing 747; and bomber aircraft from the B-17 Flying Fortress to the B-52 Stratofortress.

Henry G. Beaird’s life and career have spanned the history of aviation. It is a notable achievement in itself to have experienced the remarkable advances in aircraft technology and design that have taken place over the course of his life. But notable achievement has never been enough for Hank Beaird. Not only has Beaird experienced the history of aviation, more importantly, he played in integral role in transforming aviation into an essential element of our everyday world.

Legendary aircraft designer Bill Lear once said of Hank Beaird, “His engineering capabilities plus his coolness makes him the one man who I would want to be at the controls of any aircraft I were in, especially if it were in any kind of trouble.” But experiencing trouble in an airplane is what defines the life of a test pilot. It is because test pilots like Hank Beaird face trouble on a routine basis that aircraft become safer to operate with each passing year. Whoever penned the old aviation axiom “There are old pilots, and there are bold pilots, but there are no old, bold pilots” did not know Hank Beaird. Fortunately for aviation, Henry G. Beaird is an old, bold pilot.