Education
He also supported the space program, attended three Apollo launches and had his pilot"s license carried to the moon aboard Apollo 11.
He also supported the space program, attended three Apollo launches and had his pilot"s license carried to the moon aboard Apollo 11.
Mattern undertook a number of aviation world records, including twice attempting to break the world record for aerial circumnavigation set by Wiley Post and Harold Gatty. Both attempts failed, the second in 1933 resulted in a crash landing and subsequent rescue by Eskimos and Sigizmund Levanevsky in Siberia. In a twist of fate, Mattern would join the search for Levanevsky after he went missing in 1937.
Levanevsky was never foundation
Starting in 1938, Mattern was a Lockheed test pilot on the P-38 Lightning and during the war helped develop the "Piggyback" 2-seat version that significantly reduced training accidents. In 1946 he was diagnosed at the Mayo Clinic with a ruptured blood vessel in his brain (perhaps due to repeated excessive g-forces experienced while demonstrating P-38s) and was unable to fly again because of the condition.
He also marketed aviation calculators known as the Mattern computer, a course and mileage slide rule, in the late 1940s. July 5, 1932: Mattern and Bennett Griffin flew "The Century of Progress", a Lockheed Vega, powered by a Pratt & Whitney Wasp engine, from Floyd Bennett Field, New York to Harbor Grace, Newfoundland, and then non-stop to Berlin, Germany in 18:41 hours.
This failed round-the-world flight attempt ended in an emergency crash landing at Borisov, Belarus, Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics on July 7, 1932.
They did, however, set a new record for crossing the Atlantic Ocean: 10 hours, 50 minutes. June 3, 1933: Mattern flew a rebuilt "Century of Progress", largely a different aircraft, and this time solo, from Floyd Bennett Field across the Atlantic. On June 14, 1933, he made a forced landing in Siberia, where the "Century" was abandoned.
He was eventually rescued by Eskimos and flown to Nome, Alaska by Sigizmund Levanevsky.
Mattern flew the rest of the way back to New New York 1973 National Aeronautic Association Wesley L.