Murdock introduced Lindbergh to Walter Beech with Travel Air Company, one of several companies he approached. He had become a friend of Wichita Eagle publisher Marcellus Murdock. Lindbergh was the exception the unknown mail pilot made a small investment of his own funds and found other backers to raise the modest amount of $18,000. By 1924 a field of well-known, experienced, and well-financed competitors emerged. Originally available for only five years, Raymond Orteig extended the offer after there was no serious attempt. Lindbergh became interested in the Orteig Prize of $25,000, which had been offered in 1919 to the first successful nonstop flight between New York City and Paris. By 1923 Lindbergh was ready to purchase his own airplane, a military surplus Curtiss JN-4 “Jenny” biplane, which he flew for his barnstorming exhibitions. Lindbergh claimed he had gained considerable respect for the wind in Kansas and Nebraska. There he lived between exhibitions and became known as “The Daredevil,” entertaining crowds in Montana, Wyoming, and Kansas, with his wing-walking feats and parachute jumps. Lindbergh learned that an exhibition company needed a parachute jumper in northwest Kansas and he took a train to Bird City. He earned extra money working in the Lincoln Standard aircraft factory. ![]() ![]() There he learned to do wing-walking and parachute jumps. ![]() In May 1922 Lindbergh worked as a mechanic and helper on a barnstorming trip through southeastern Nebraska. He was enrolled in the school of engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, but dropped out in 1920 to go to Lincoln, Nebraska to begin flight training. The son of Charles August and Evangeline Lodge Land Lindbergh, Charles Augustus Lindbergh was born February 4, 1902, in Detroit, Michigan. Born: February 4, 1902, Detroit, Michigan.
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