The Spirit of St. Louis (book)
Encyclopedia
The Spirit of St. Louis is an autobiographical account by Charles Lindbergh
Charles Lindbergh
Charles Augustus Lindbergh was an American aviator, author, inventor, explorer, and social activist.Lindbergh, a 25-year-old U.S...

 about the events leading up to and including his 1927 solo trans-Atlantic flight in the Spirit of St. Louis
Spirit of St. Louis
The Spirit of St. Louis is the custom-built, single engine, single-seat monoplane that was flown solo by Charles Lindbergh on May 20–21, 1927, on the first non-stop flight from New York to Paris for which Lindbergh won the $25,000 Orteig Prize.Lindbergh took off in the Spirit from Roosevelt...

, a custom-built, single engine, single-seat monoplane (Registration: N-X-211). The book was published on September 14, 1953, and won the Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...

 in 1954.

Summary

The book covers a period of time between September 1926 and May 1927, and is divided into two sections: The Craft and New York to Paris. In the first section, The Craft (pp. 3–178), Lindbergh describes the latter days of his career as an airmail pilot and presents his account of conceiving, planning, and executing the building of the Spirit of St. Louis aircraft. He describes the many challenges he faced, including getting financial backing, constructing an aircraft that could carry the necessary fuel and still fly, and completing the project within several months—other pilots were racing to achieve the first solo trans-Atlantic flight and win the $25,000 Orteig Prize
Orteig Prize
The Orteig Prize was a $25,000 reward offered on May 19, 1919, by New York hotel owner Raymond Orteig to the first allied aviator to fly non-stop from New York City to Paris or vice-versa. On offer for five years, it attracted no competitors...

.

In the second section, New York to Paris (pp. 181–492), Lindbergh gives a detailed hour-by-hour account of his 33-hour solo flight above the Atlantic and northern Europe that began in the early morning hours of May 21, 1927. He describes the numerous challenges presented by navigation, storms, fuel calculation, boredom, and lack of sleep during the course of the flight that would take him over 3,600 miles from Roosevelt Field in Long Island, New York to Le Bourget field
Paris – Le Bourget Airport
Paris – Le Bourget Airport is an airport located in Le Bourget, Bonneuil-en-France, and Dugny, north-northeast of Paris, France. It is now used only for general aviation as well as air shows...

 in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

. Throughout the narrative, Lindbergh interjects flashback memories of his childhood in Little Falls, Minnesota
Little Falls, Minnesota
As of the census of 2000, there were 7,719 people , 3,197 households, and 1,899 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,232.5 people per square mile . There were 3,358 housing units at an average density of 536.2 per square mile...

, his college years, his early years as an aviator barnstorming
Barnstorming
Barnstorming was a popular form of entertainment in the 1920s in which stunt pilots would perform tricks with airplanes, either individually or in groups called a flying circus. Barnstorming was the first major form of civil aviation in the history of flight...

 across the countryside, his aviation mentors and friends who flew the mail routes with him, and his family—especially his father, who was not only a congressman, but a respected and sage companion to his young son.

As Lindbergh flies through the long, solitary night toward Europe, forcing his sleep-obsessed mind to check and re-check his course, he recalls the night he was flying the mail from St. Louis to Chicago when he first thought of flying across the Atlantic Ocean. Lindbergh believed he could make that flight, and he remembers his nine St. Louis friends who helped him purchase the Spirit of St. Louis and realize his dream. Lindbergh describes the thrill of spotting the first fishing boats off the coast of Ireland, and then crossing the coast of France, and then following the Seine
Seine
The Seine is a -long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Saint-Seine near Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and into the English Channel at Le Havre . It is navigable by ocean-going vessels...

 River all the way Paris and Le Bourget field.

In addition to an Afterword (pp. 495–501), Lindbergh included an extensive Appendix (pp. 503–562) containing his flight log, a flight map, his journal account of his return to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 aboard the cruiser Memphis, an article about the decorations, awards, and trophies he received, engineering data and engine specifications, 16 pages of photographs, various illustrations, and a glossary.

Background information

Lindbergh wrote two accounts of his solo trans-Atlantic flight. He wrote a brief chronological account in We in three weeks in 1927. He wrote a more expansive account in a book titled Of Flight and Life, which covered his entire aviation history. Lindbergh was pleased with the way Charles Scribner's Sons handled the publication of the latter, and he chose them to publish The Spirit of St. Louis. He asked for and received a $25,000 advance and 15 percent royalty from the first copy sold. He arranged for all proceeds to go directly into a trust for his children.

Lindbergh's editor, John Hall Wheelock, responded enthusiastically to the first manuscripts he read, writing to Lindbergh how impressed he was "not only by the way you have unfolded your story, but by the extraordinary beauty of the descriptions of sea and air." When Lindbergh asked Wheelock for more severe criticism, the editor responded with several suggestions that trimmed the book by about 70 pages—mainly flashbacks to his early life, which the editor felt distracted from the main narrative.

Lindbergh hired a literary agent, George T. Bye, who negotiated a serialization deal and motion-picture rights for $100,000 from The Saturday Evening Post. Ten installments appeared in that periodical under the title, "33 Hours to Paris". These installments generated the largest sales in the magazine's history. The Book-of-the-Month Club selected The Spirit of St. Louis as the main selection in September 1953.

According to the author's Preface (pp. ix–xii), Lindbergh worked on the manuscript of The Spirit of St. Louis for 14 years. Work began in 1938, 11 years after the last event described in the book, so Lindbergh needed to rely on memory for his early drafts; few detailed records were available to him. The author cites his belief in the future of aviation as his primary motive for the flight, and tried to capture that in his book.

Prior to the publication of The Spirit of St. Louis on September 14, 1953, Lindbergh presented an advance copy in August 1953 to Carl B. Allen, who had read the manuscript and provided criticism and suggestions (he is included in the Acknowledgements). Accompanying the inscribed book was a two-page typewritten letter signed by Lindbergh that provides information about some of the challenges the author faced in the writing of the book.
In the months leading up the its publication, Lindbergh and his wife Anne
Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Anne Morrow Lindbergh was an American author, aviator, and the spouse of fellow aviator Charles Lindbergh.She was an acclaimed author whose books and articles spanned the genres of poetry to non-fiction, touching upon topics as diverse as youth and age; love and marriage; peace, solitude and...

 labored over the galley proofs, leaving no detail unnoticed. Charles Scribner would later recall, "He would measure the difference between a semicolon and a colon to make sure each as what it ought to be. To him, every detail in the book has as much significance as if it were a moving part in the airplane."

Just prior to publication, Lindbergh dedicated the book to his wife, "To A.M.L. Who will never realize how much of this book she has written". A dark blue dustjacket was prepared by George W. Thompson of a night sky filled with stars. The book's endpapers were reproduced from an original aquatint
Aquatint
Aquatint is an intaglio printmaking technique, a variant of etching.Intaglio printmaking makes marks on the matrix that are capable of holding ink. The inked plate is passed through a printing press together with a sheet of paper, resulting in a transfer of the ink to the paper...

 by Burnell Poole titled, "The Epic of the Air".

Reception

The Spirit of St. Louis was an overwhelming bestseller and generated near universal praise and favorable reviews. The Book-of-the-Month Club alone sold over 100,000 copies in the first year, with several hundred thousand additional copies sold in bookstores and elsewhere. The Chicago Daily News called it a "stunning, tremendously beautiful reading experience ... a classic of adventure writing." Time noted, "At its exciting best, this book keeps the reader cockpit close to a rare adventure." And Lindbergh biographer Brendan Gill concluded, "The best authority on Lindbergh is Lindbergh."

In his book review that appeared in The New York Times on September 13, 1953, Quentin Reynolds wrote:

Later editions

The Spirit of St. Louis continued to be reprinted in a number of editions, with the copyright being renewed in 1981 by Anne Morrow Lindbergh. Later reprints beginning with the 1993 edition for the Minnesota Historical Society Press, featured an introduction written by Reeve Lindbergh. The latest hardcover and paperback editions are published by Scribner, the modern counterpart of the original, Charles Scribner's Sons.

Adaptations

Lindbergh's literary agent, George T. Bye
George T. Bye
George Thurman Bye was the Literary agent of Frank Buck and Eleanor Roosevelt. A prominent figure in the literary world before World War II, Bye rose to fame as the agent of people in the news and amateur authors with something timely or sensational to say, so called “stunt books”.-Early life and...

, sold the film rights to Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

 for more than a million dollars. The film version of the book was released in 1957, directed by Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...

, and starring James Stewart
James Stewart
James Stewart was a Hollywood movie actor and USAF brigadier general.James Stewart may also refer to:-Noblemen:*James Stewart, 5th High Steward of Scotland*James Stewart, the Black Knight of Lorn James Stewart (1908–1997) was a Hollywood movie actor and USAF brigadier general.James Stewart...

 as Charles Lindbergh
Charles Lindbergh
Charles Augustus Lindbergh was an American aviator, author, inventor, explorer, and social activist.Lindbergh, a 25-year-old U.S...

.

Legacy

A copy of the book flew in space on the first competitive Ansari X Prize
Ansari X Prize
The Ansari X Prize was a space competition in which the X Prize Foundation offered a US$10,000,000 prize for the first non-government organization to launch a reusable manned spacecraft into space twice within two weeks...

 flight in 2004, SpaceShipOne flight 16P
SpaceShipOne flight 16P
Flight 16P of SpaceShipOne was a spaceflight in the Tier One program that took place on September 29, 2004. It was the first competitive flight in the Ansari X PRIZE competition to demonstrate a non-governmental reusable manned spacecraft, and is hence also referred to as the X1 flight...

. The X Prize was inspired by the prize that Lindbergh won for his flight.
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