BERTRAND BLANCHARD ACOSTA

Santa Monica Evening Outlook (CA), August 18, 1929 (Source: newspapers.com)

 

Bert Acosta, Ca. 1927 (Source: Web)

 

Bert Acosta, right, appears to have lived life "fully." His exploits with airplanes and domestic entanglements, with other women and jail, with liquor and the law, were national legend in his own time.

For example, flying any aircraft without a valid pilot certificate was, and still is, a serious offense, prohibited by federal law. Acosta defied the law and the result of his arrest in Bridgeport, CT was reported at left in the Santa Monica Evening Outlook, August 18, 1929. Other examples are below.

Acosta was born January 1, 1895 in San Diego, CA. The 1900 U.S. Census, his first, listed him at age four living in San Diego with his mother, Blanche (28), older brother Frederick (7) and younger brother, James (1). His father, Miguel, a mining engineer, was not in the household (Blanche was coded as "M," married, so his father was probably alive at the time).

 

Bert, Jr. (L), Helen, Allyn, Ca. Late 1920s (Source: ancestry.com)

 

I found no Census information for 1910 or 1920. However, I found a marriage record that states, in 1917, Acosta married Marie Louise Brumley Kelsey (1886-1962). According to ancestry.com, they had two daughters, Bertina (1918-1970) and Gloria(?).

I don't know when they divorced, but they did, and then Acosta married Helen Belmont Pearsall. She and Acosta had two sons, B.B. Acosta, Jr. (1922-1993), and Allyn Lee Acosta (1924-1997). The children and Helen are pictured, left, from ancestry.com.

Allyn Lee Acosta, Grave Marker, 1924-1997 (Source: ancestry.com)

 

Allyn's grave marker in Hawaii is at right. He seems to have taken a more stable road than his father. I saw another Allyn Acosta record that said his death date was 1927. If anyone knows which is correct, please let me KNOW.

Acosta's induction into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 2014 was accompanied by the online biography at the link. The arc of his career peaked during the teens and 1920s.

Bert Acosta, Jr. & Anita Higgins, Date Unknown(Source: ancestry.com)

 

 

The city directory of 1926-1927 for Freeport, NY documented Acosta living on Long Island at 62 Harrison Avenue, Freeport. He lived with Helen, but none of his children were mentioned in the directory. Acosta's occupation was listed as "aero eng." In April 1927, he set an endurance record of 51 hours, 11 minutes, and 25 seconds. His copilot was fellow Register pilot Clarence Chamberlin. On July 11, 1927, just months after Lindbergh's trans-Atlantic flight, Acosta acted as pilot for "America" the Fokker C-2 trimotor owned by Richard Byrd. The "America," Acosta, Byrd, George Noville and Berndt Balchen flew from New York to just off the coast of France before ditching in the ocean in foggy weather.

Bert, Jr. and his wife, Anita Higgins (1927-1962) are at left. The children of Bert, Jr. and Anita published a newsletter about the Acosta family in 2008 that appeared for download at ancestry.com. It is availble to you at the link (PDF 1.6mB). A photograph of the "America" is exhibited on the final page of that document.

A U.S. immigration record documented Acosta's return from France aboard the S.S. Paris on September 18, 1928. I do not know why he traveled to France in 1928. None of his family was with him aboard ship.

The following biographical sketch appeared, below left, in this REFERENCE from 1928. It reports his educational background. It may be a coincidence, or may be the result of his brushes with the legal system, but his biography appeared in none of the other references I consult routinely for Golden Age pilot biographies. Regardless, his accomplishments to 1928 were impressive and varied.

Bert Acosta, 1928 Biography (Source: Link)

 

As prolific an aviator as he was, Bert Acosta signed only one Register. He appeared in the Pitcairn Field Register on Friday, February 8, 1929. He flew an unidentified Fokker and carried Floyd Bennett Field pilot Emile H. Burgin as his sole passenger. He identified their home base as New York, NY.

As well as the lack of an airplane registration number, he left us no mention of his itinerary or any reason for their flight. I have seen photographs of him in the open cockpit of a Fokker Universal. It might be the Universal that he flew to Willow Grove.

On almost a daily basis, landings, departures and other activities at local New York airports were big news during the Golden Age. Newspapers published a running status of arrivals, departures and events, like the column below that appeared in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (NY), February 21, 1929, just a couple of weeks after Acosta and Burgin landed at Willow Grove.

An interesting finding in this article is that Acosta had lost his pilot certificate a year earlier, which would have been ca. February 1928. He would have been breaking the law again if he identified himself as the pilot in command of the Fokker he brought to Pitcairn Field. It could be that Burgin was agreed to be the legal pilot and he allowed Acosta to fly. Indeed, one Web source reports that he was grounded for five years from 1930-35 after a drunken stunting spree with an expired license. Both Acosta and Burgin are mentioned in this article. Note also mention of Register pilot Jimmy Doolittle.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle (NY), February 21, 1929 (Source: newspapers.com)

Another indication of his "bad boy" behavior was found in the April 8, 1930 U.S. Census. It placed him living as a prisoner in the Nassau County (NY) jail. The Census form gave no reason for his incarceration, but I don't think it was a coincidence of his arrest in Connecticut the previous August. His occupation was coded as "Engineer" in "Aviation." He had previously spent five days in the New Haven, CT county jail in January 1928 after being convicted of reckless flying.

During the Spanish Civil War, Acosta and a few other American airmen traveled to Spain to fly and fight in the "Yankee Squadron" for the Loyalists. Their arrival in Valencia was reported in The New York Times (NYT), November 21, 1936, below left.

One of his comrades in the article was Gordon O. [sic] Berry, who was a pilot coincidental to our Registers (but signed none), and whose biography is at the link. Also at the link are further articles that describe the experiences of the "Yankee Squadron" during their short time in Spain.

As with many Spanish Civil Wartime sagas, the "Yankee Squadron's" work hours were long, the military hierarchy was loose and informal, pay was short, and results were questionable. As it turned out, none of the "Yankee Squadron" were ever paid for their mercenary services. If you want a better sense of what it was like to be in Spain as a foreigner, a good book to read regarding the Spanish Civil War from the Loyalist point of view is "Homage to Catalonia" by George Orwell. To add insult to the injury of no pay, when he returned to the U.S. he was charged by federal agents with violating U.S. neutrality by serving Loyalist Spain. A fine of $1,000 and three years imprisonment were avoided when he was acquitted. He never returned to Spain.

At some point, Acosta must have divorced and remarried a third time. The 1940 Census placed him living at age 46 in Manhattan, NY at 124 E. 71st Street. He lived with his wife, Marion (32). They rented their home for $55 per month. They shared their apartment with a lodger, William Callahan (40). Acosta's occupation was coded as "Engineer" in "Aviation." His children were not living with them.

As WWII proceeded, Acosta, like almost all men past draft age, were still required to be registered for the draft. His draft registration card, dated December 11, 1942, is below right.

The New York TImes, November 21, 1936 (Source: NYT)

Bert Acosta Draft Registration, December 11, 1942 (Source: ancestry.com)

The back of his draft registration is below. At six feet, 1.5 inches, he was a lean 189 pounds. His hospitalization was probably because of his evolving tuberculosis.

Bert Acosta Draft Registration (Back), December 11, 1942 (Source: ancestry.com)

 

 

Bert Acosta Undated Obituary, 1954 (Source: SDAM)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bert Acosta Obituary, The New York Times, September 2, 1954 (Source: NYT)

 

 

 

Bert Acosta flew West on September 1, 1954 at age 59. The cause was advanced tuberculosis as reported in the unsourced article, left, courtesy of the San Diego Aerospace Museum Flickr Stream. His photograph suggests the debilitation of tuberculosis. A more complete obituary, from The New York Times, September 2, 1954, is at right. The family history download, above, suggests his death was due to cancer. It states that he had two wives and does not mention Marion, who, according to the 1940 Census, apparently was his third wife.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Announced on December 18, 2013, the National Aviation Hall of Fame inducted Acosta in 2014, below.

The National Aviation Hall of Fame, based in Dayton, Ohio, this week announced the names of six aviators who will join its roster of air and space pioneers in 2014. The list includes Alan and Dale Klapmeier, founders of Cirrus Aircraft; Emily Warner, who flew for Frontier Airlines in the 1970s; the late Steve Wittman, of Oshkosh; Bert Acosta, an early 20th-century test pilot; and USAF Brig. Gen. James McDivitt, whose career spanned the Korean War and the Apollo program. The list was unveiled at a dinner held in Dayton on Tuesday to celebrate the 110th anniversary of the Wright brothers' historic flight in Kitty Hawk. A black-tie dinner and ceremony to honor the aviators will be held in Dayton in October. The public is invited; tickets are available from NAHF. Candidates for the Hall of Fame are nominated and voted on each year by a group of more than 120 aviation professionals. NAHF, a nonprofit group, was founded in 1962 and operates a 17,000-square-foot public Learning Center in Dayton, adjacent to the National Museum of the United States Air Force. The Learning Center features interactive exhibits, a youth education program, and public outreach programs, and the October enshrinement ceremony is held there. The NAHF has so far inducted 219 air and space pioneers.

From his findagrave.com page, the following biographical statement.

Aviation Pioneer. Known as the "Bad Boy of the Air," he taught himself how to fly in 1910, and built experimental planes until 1912, when he went to work for aircraft designer Glenn Curtiss. When World War I started he joined the Royal Flying Corps, and trained Royal Navy pilots in Canada. In 1917 he was sent to the United States, where he trained United States Army Signal Corps pilots at Long Island. Commissioned into the United States Navy, by 1925 he was a Lieutenant. In 1927, he and a fellow pilot set an endurance record of over 51 hours in the air. In May of 1927, with explorer Admiral Richard Byrd as co-pilot, he made a transatlantic flight from Long Island to France (a story has been told that during the flight Admiral Byrd had to strike him on the head with a fire extinguisher after Acosta became very intoxicated). In 1936 he and other American pilots joined the Republic forces in Spain to fight fascists forces during the Spanish-American War; Acosta and the Americans were dubbed the "Yankee Squadron". He delighted in flying under bridges and doing touch and goes on the roof tops of Manhattan skyscrapers. When a passenger once asked him for the time he replied, "I don't know, but I'll find out," and he buzzed the clock tower of the Metropolitan Life building. In December of 1951 he collapsed in a New York City bar and was hospitalized with tuberculosis. He died at the Jewish Consumptive's Relief Society sanitarium in Colorado.

Acosta is interred in the Portal of the Folded Wings, North Hollywood, CA. Your Webmaster stands in front of the Portal during February 2016, below.

Portal of Folded Wings, Hollywood, 2016 (Source: Webmaster)

His portrait and grave marker from the Portal of the Folded Wings via findagrave.com are below. He has a good Web presence.

Bert Acosta, Grave Marker, September 1, 1954 (Source: findagrave.com)

Bert Acosta Portrait, Ca. 1930 (Source: findagrave.com)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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