1920-1930

Mabel Cody’s Flying Circus is popular Florida attraction

Dazzling aerial displays fire the public’s imagination

“She Flirts with Death!”

We tend to think of the barnstorming aerial performances of the early 20th century simply as amusements, but nothing did more to popularize aviation and fire up America’s enthusiasm for airplanes than these thrilling stunt performances. One such barnstorming act, Mabel Cody’s Flying Circus, was often in Florida in the early 1920s, where our hard-packed sand beaches and flat empty fields provided natural landing strips. Mabel, who claimed to be the niece of the famous Buffalo Bill Cody (but apparently wasn’t) wasn’t a pilot herself, but she organized the stunt show and was a fearless stunt-woman. Along with her fellow circus crew, she would do “wing dances,” auto-to-plane transfers, parachute drops and more. The circus performed at fairs and special events primarily throughout the Southeast and drew large audiences. George Merrick invited Mabel to Coral Gables in 1922 to promote his growing new planned community and Glenn Curtiss and James Bright asked her to “HI-A-LE-AH” for the same reason.

Fall at Pablo Beach

A 20-foot fall suffered during a car-to-plane transfer in Pablo Beach in March 1924 put Cody out of business for awhile. But not for very long. The camera was rolling when the accident happened and a month later, despite having broken an arm and dislocated a shoulder, Cody, on crutches, was making personal appearances and narrating the soundtrack for the two-reeler. Once fully back on her feet, Cody returned to barnstorming.

The show goes on

As late as February 1927, Cody could be found touring several Florida cities as the featured attraction of a troupe called Mabel Cody’s Congress of Aerial Daredevils. That month, she appeared before large crowds in Tampa, St. Petersburg and Sarasota. Newspaper accounts described her as one of the world’s best-known aerial exhibitionists, still undertaking the breathtaking feats that had made her famous, including wing walking, automobile-to-airplane transfers, and other high-altitude acrobatics. It was reported that one of her most recent stunts had involved a sensational change from a speed boat, Miss Tampa, to a plane traveling at high speed, staged for Pathe News. In Tampa alone, an estimated 15,000 people crowded the municipal airport to watch Cody and her troupe of stunt fliers.

The record grows sketchier as the decade winds down. Cody is said to have retired as a stuntwoman in 1929, following the death of her husband/promotor, Curly Burns. Barnstorming itself was gradually phased out, as stricter airline regulations and the Great Depression led to the end of the era. But in retrospect, Mabel Cody’s Flying Circus was remarkable not only for its thrilling performances but also for the talent it attracted. Among those who flew with Cody were A. B. McMullen, later appointed Florida’s first state aviation director, and Andrew Heermance, who would become Miami’s first aviation director. Few better examples exist to illustrate how barnstorming and aerial exhibitions served as an important stepping stone for many of the men and women who went on to build Florida’s civil aviation system during its formative years.