Two Aviators Killed At Colfax, Iowa

JONES, WILLIS

Posted By: Marilyn Holmes
Date: 5/4/2016 at 08:30:01

Unknown Newspaper Clipping
August 1920

TWO AVIATORS
ARE KILLED AT
COLFAX, IOWA
--------------------------

Colfax, Ia., Aug. 16.--Two aviators, Clyde Jones and "Pat" Willis, were killed here today when their airplane went into a nose dive and fell 800 feet to the earth. The wives of both men watched the flight and fall.

The men were attempting to loop and rise out of a tail spin, but mechanics said the fact that they were flying at a low altitude prevented their straightening out before they struck the ground.

Both men were about 28 years old and both served as aviators during the war.
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Unidentified Newspaper Clipping
August 1920

WIVES SEE AVIATOR
HUSBANDS KILLED
--------------------------
Two Employes of Jones-Willis Air-
craft Company Crash to Death
With Plane at Colfax.
--------------------------

COLFAX, Iowa, Aug. 17.--Two women, Mrs. Clyde Jones and Mrs. Pat Willis, wives of aviators, stood by yesterday and saw their husbands fall 800 feet to their death. The men, employes of the Jones-Willis Aircraft company, were on the point of making a landing following the performance of some air stunts. The machine crashed to the earth in a nose dive.

Both wives had accompanied their husbands to the flying field to see them in their flight.

The machine came down in a pasture a mile from the Coloway landing field. The bodies of the aviators, badly mangled, were found in the wreckage.

The men had made a successful loop and had come out of a tail spin but, were unable to zoom up again, say eye witnesses to the accident.

The Jones-Willis company was engaged in buying and rebuilding used airplanes. Both men were former army aviators and were about 30 years old.
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Unidentified Newspaper Clipping
August 1920

AVIATORS KILLED
-------------------------
Plane Plunges to Ground in
Unsuccessful Tail-Spin

Special to The News
COLFAX, Aug. 17.--Plunging 800 feet to the ground when their plane made an unsuccessful tailspin, Clyde Jones and Pat Willis of the Jones-Willis Aircraft Co. of Colfax were instantly killed near the Soloway Aviation Field here at 7:30 Monday evening.

The wives of both men were on the field. They saw the plane dive helplessly and disappear behind a hill a mile away.

Nearby farmers, who saw the accident, rushed to the scene and removed the badly mangled bodies from the wrecked machine, which landed in a pasture.

Witnesses say that the men had successfully negotiated a loop and were just completing a tail spin. They were too low to right the machine before it struck the ground.

Jones and Willis were in the business of buying old planes and rebuilding them. The machine in which they met their death was a new one, purchased for their personal use.

Both men were in the United States air service during the war.