Benjamin Delahauf Foulois
(1879-1967)

Benjamin Delahauf Foulois, the first chief of the Army Air Corps to be a military aviator, had a number of "firsts" in his long and illustrious career. His accomplishments spanned 56 years during active-duty and retired military aviation service.

He was born in Washington, Conn., in 1879. Foulois enlisted as a volunteer in 1898, about six months later, he rejoined the Infantry as a private. He was commissioned officer of Infantry in 1901 until 1908 when he graduated from Signal School. Foulois was then assigned to the Office of the Chief Signal Officer, Washington, D.C. During this tour he operated the first dirigible balloon purchased by the U.S. government. He was also one of the first three officers in the Army to operate the first military airplane purchased by the government from the Wright Brothers in 1909. He accompanied Orville Wright on the final trial flight from Fort Myer, Va., breaking three world's records - speed, altitude and duration cross-country.

Transferring to Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, Texas, Foulois was in charge of the first airplane owned and used in the service of the U.S. Army. He was the only pilot, navigator, instructor, observer and commander in the heavier-than-air division of the U.S. Army from November 1909 to April 1911, and made many mechanical improvements, later incorporated in subsequent models of airplanes. He corresponded with the Wright Brothers to learn to fly, and correct his piloting errors. From May to July 1911 he was detailed with the Maneuver Division at San Antonio, and while there he designed and used the first radio receiving set ever used in a military airplane. During this period he also broke the world cross-country record with a passenger, and carried out the first aerial reconnaissance flights.

Transferred to the Militia Bureau, Washington, D.C., in July 1911, Foulois was in charge of all Signal Corps and engineering units of the National Guard. From 1912 to 1915, he attended Signal Corps Aviation School and assumed command of the First Aero Squadron.

Under his command, the squadron participated in the Mexican Punitive Expedition (March to August 1916) with General John J. Pershing, the supreme commander of the expedition. The First Aero flew hundreds of reconnaissance, photo and courier missions. The squadron demonstrated that the airplane was no longer an experiment or novelty, but a practical tool with many use military applications.

In May 1918 he was appointed chief of air service, First Army. When our European pipe lines began to "leak badly," he was designated assistant chief of the air service, zone of the advance, and two months later he became assistant chief of air service, Services of Supply.

Appointed assistant chief of the Air Corps in December 1927, Foulois became chief of the Materiel Division at Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio, in 1929. He was then reassigned to the Office of the Chief of Air Corps, Washington, D.C., in July 1930. In May 1931 he commanded the Air Corps exercises, leadership of which earned him the Mackey Trophy for that year. On December 19, 1931 he was designated chief of the Air Corps.

Foulois retired from active duty December 31, 1935, after 37 years of service.

He was the president of the Air Force Historical Foundation from 1956 to 1965. He received many honors, including the Air Force Association Citation of Honor in the 50th Anniversary Year of the Silver Wings in 1963 and was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame also in 1963. Foulois tells his story in "From the Wright Brothers to the Astronauts" (McGrawHill, 1968). He died April 25, 1967.

Sources compiled from Air Force History Support Office. Benjamin Foulois sought independence for the air service as a separate branch of the military throughout his career and has been called the "father of the United States Air Force." He was born in Connecticut in 1879 and enlisted as an engineer in the United States Army Corps of Engineers during the Spanish-American War in 1898. For a time he served as an infantryman in the Philippines and was commissioned in 1902. He entered the Signal Corps in 1906, where he became interested in aviation and sought assignment to the new Aeronautical Division. He became the third military aviator to be trained by the Wright brothers, soloing in 1910. In 1916 he led the 1st Aero Squadron in Gen. John J. Pershing's Mexican campaign.

Foulois became chief of the AEF Air Service when the U.S. entered World War I and led his squadrons in many aerial dogfights. After the war, he became assistant chief of the Army Air Corps in 1927 and assumed the office of Air Corps Chief in 1931 as a Major General. He led the Air Corps through the disastrous air mail experiment of 1934 and worked diligently for continual advancements in aeronautics. He was largely responsible for the early development and adoption of the Boeing B-17 bomber.

Foulois retired from active duty in 1935, but spent the rest of his life devoted to aviation and the mighty Air Force he helped create. He died at Andrews AFB, Maryland, in 1967.