Why They Fly

What on earth, or over it, makes a man want to fly? There must be cogent reasons, and not all as lyrical as Icarus'. One answer has been given by the Army Air Forces' Colonel R. C. Anderson, who during the war had an unexcelled psychiatrist's-eye view as chief of neuropsychiatry at Randolph Field's School of Aviation Medicine. He offered his diagnosis before the Aero Medical Convention in Chicago. Some highlights:

"The boy plagued by inner doubts finds flying a proving ground where he can establish his worth to his own satisfaction.

"Flying offers an outlet for hostility which [some flyers] are afraid to express otherwise. Many fighter pilots . . . not too enthusiastic about aerial combat derive great . . . satisfaction from strafing ... an uninhibited outlet for their hostilities without too great a chance for retribution.

"One [pilot] I knew went up and performed violent acrobatics following frequent quarrels . . . with his wife.

"Many . . . classified as psychopathic personalities have made creditable records in combat aviation. Flying offers special fascination to ... a schizoid makeup. These people whose desire [it is] to detach themselves from reality . . . find an ideal situation in the air. It is almost as if their actual fantasies were being lived out.. . . Expressions such as 'I get a feeling of power,' or 'It seems as though the world were at my feet,' are common in this type of flyer.

"Of all types of motivation the [strongest] is that associated with the true 'love of flying.' The pilot who has [it] is recognized by fellow flyers as being somewhat apart. They speak of him as being 'plane-crazy.' Not infrequently such an individual makes sexual analogies-with flying. The wife ... of such a man is truly an 'aviation widow.'

"These men are devoted to their aircraft, tend to personalize them ... alibidinization of flying which occurs in this type. . . . They are proud . . . that they have never scratched an airplane. To do so would be to injure themselves."

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