The year before when the German dirigible Graf Zeppelin circled the globe in 21 days, 7 hours and 34 minutes, aviator Wiley Post felt challenged. Furthermore, he believed the future of air travel lay not with lumbering dirigibles but with speedy airplanes. "Speed has been the keynote of all transportation developments since the beginning of the wheel-and-axle days," Post wrote in his book Around the World in Eight Days. "What I was ready and anxious to prove was that a good airplane with average equipment and careful flying could outdo the 'Graf Zeppelin' or any other similar aircraft, at every turn on a flight around the world."
Post enlisted the aid of Australian navigator Harold Gatty, a man who had laid out charts for Post's victory in the 1930 Los Angeles-Chicago Air Derby. The Lockheed Vega Winnie Mae belonged to Post's employer F.C. Hall, an Oklahoma oil man. Hall not only encouraged Post but also paid for the gas and made the arrangements for the Winnie Mae's many stops along the route.
Post and Gatty climbed into the Winnie Mae just before dawn on June 23, 1931, at Roosevelt Field Long Island. At 4:56 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time the Winnie Mae's wheels lifted off the ground on a West to East circumnavigation of the globe.
On the journey's first leg the Winnie Mae set a record for the run from New York to Harbour Grace, Newfoundland -- 6 hours 51 minutes. The plane averaged 150 miles and hour for the 1,153 miles. Post and Gatty quickly refueled and took off on the tough Atlantic crossing. The North Atlantic upheld its inhospitable reputation; heavy fog and rain clouds dogged them through the day and continued as darkness closed around the Winnie Mae. Gatty could not see the stars to make a fix, so Post flew by dead reckoning. Gatty wrote in the log -- "Flying Blind."
Nevertheless, Post and Gatty made record time and finally, just after dawn, they broke through the clouds and saw land dead ahead. Post swooped down on the first airfield he saw. As the plane taxied to a stop a group of Royal Air Force(RAF)pilots ran up to the Winnie Mae. Post asked, "Is this England, Scotland or Wales?" "Sealand
