Mt. Gretna, PA Airliner Crashes, Mar 1929

PLANE, DISABLED IN FLIGHT, FALLS NEAR MT. GRETNA; 4 DEAD.

PILOT, AND 3 INVITED FRIENDS, ENROUTE FROM COLUMBUS, OHIO, TO NEW YORK CITY.

PLANE STRIKES TREE AND FALLS TO GROUND.

Mt. Gretna, March 26. -- In the second major airplane crash in this vicinity in three months, four men dropped to their deaths in a section of woodland on the Pennsylvania State Military Reservation at Mt. Gretna yesterday morning at 11:30 o'clock.
The plane, a Mahoney-Ryan monoplane piloted by JOHN L. CAMPION, war time flier and a veteran aviator, smashed against a tree stump when a tree tore a piece of one wing off and the machine fell like a plummel in the woods.
CAMPION and three passengers who had been invited to ride with him from Columbus, Ohio, to New York City, were instantly killed. Their heads were crushed and their bodies terribly mangled. The plane was reduced to a mass of tangled wreckage, almost hidden by the thick growth of small trees, into which it fell.
The three passengers were PAUL WAGER, 23, and HAROLD GLOYD, 21, of Worthington, Ohio, and CHARLES STEWART, 27, of Columbus. Relatives of the three said that the boys were offered a ride to New York by the pilot and accepted. The plane hopped off from Norton Field, Columbus, at 9 o'clock yesterday morning under adverse flying weather.
When the party neared Mt. Gretna the sound of the plane's motor attracted the attention of farmers and employes of the military reservation working nearby. However, a low-hanging haze prevented them seeing the ship. Flying northward the monoplane emerged from the haze and the watchers saw it dip sharply and suddenly. It lost altitude, rapidly and finally struck a tree which tore away an eight-foot section of the wing.
The pilot apparently was still fighting to gain altitude and the plane zoomed slightly. But the loss of part of the wing was too great a handicap for even a veteran pilot to overcome and the blue and silver ship crashed to earth with a loud noise.
It is believed that the plane was in trouble or else CAMPION was seeking to locate his position when the ship arrived over the wooded hillside. The plane was flying at a low altitude and circled the area twice before it knocked its crippled wing against the tree.
Among the first to arrive at the crushed wood and steel that once was an airplane, Allen Lehman and his two sons, William and Jacob, found all the occupants dead and the interior of the cabin charred, although the wreck did not catch fire. The Lehman's were working in a field and saw the plane as it came out of the fog. They saw it struggle along a ravine and finally strike the earth.
Edward L. Sehreadly, Harrisburg contractor who is building stables on the cavalry grounds, saw the accident. He said the ship was flying just above low clouds and that it struck a tree and then dropped.
Maj. William L. Hicks, superintendent of the reservation, was notified and took charge of the wreckage. Word was sent to the Middletown Air Depot in hopes that officials there could help in identifying the plane and its occupants.
CAMPION was identified by a card in his pocket. The identification of the others was delayed several hours until word was received from Columbus. A brief case found in the cabin bore the name of STEWART.
The pilot, whose hands still clutched the stick when his body was found, recently was appointed, eastern factory representative for the Mahoney-Ryan Aircraft Corporation of St. Louis. He was flying to New York in a new demonstration plane, having left St. Louis last Thursday.
CAMPION was 35 years old and had been a pilot for thirteen years. He served in the Air Corps during the war and is credited with at least one enemy plane. At one time he was pilot and instructor for Fred Stone, the actor.
CAMPION was a friend of Colonel Lindbergh, is survived by his widow and two children. His mother and other relatives live in Philadelphia.
Coroner J. Herbert Manbeck, of Lebanon County, was called and after inspecting the wrecked plane, removed the four bodies to an undertaking establishment in Lebanon.

Huntingdon Daily News Pennsylvania 1929-03-26
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Researched and Transcribed by Stu Beitler. Thank you, Stu!