Peacetime.

During World War I, which ended in November 1918, military aircraft technology went through prodigious and rapid development, especially by the Europeans. By contrast the 1920s were devoted to civilian aviation pursuits.

Barnstormers.

Unemployed former fighter pilots roamed the country, each having spent a few hundred dollars for a war-surplus plane, usually a two-seater Curtiss JN-4 "Jenny" trainer. They buzzed from county fair to county fair, giving one person at a time a ride for the then significant fare of five or ten dollars. The daredevil barnstormers became the subjects of many movies depicting their exploits of flying under bridges and through barns. Flying upside down and doing barrel rolls and loop-the-loops were standard practices, and even wing walking was performed to attract attention. Charles A. Lindbergh, too young to have been in the war, always wore a parachute when wing walking and ended his...