THE WASHINGTON POST Wednesday, June 24, 1970


                      ROSCOE TURNER DIES; AIR ACE OF '30S

            Col. Roscoe Turner, 74, a renowned air racer of the 1930s
       with a showman's flair that prompted him to keep a lion named
       Gilmore in his cockpit, died yesterday in an Indianapolis hospital
       after a long illness.
            Eddie Rickenbacker, himself one of the nation's great flyers,
       said in 1938 that Col. Turner had done more for aviation than any
       man in the United States.
            Col. Turner's daring escapades in the sky won him a host of
       trophies, including three victories each in the Thompson and
       Bendix races, considered the pinnacle of speed flying in their
       day.
            Among the trademarks that made Col. Turner a familiar figure
       to flying enthusiasts were his needle-pointed and waxed mustache
       and the immaculate blue uniform that he designed for himself,
       along with a diamond-encrusted $5,000 wing pin.
            Gilmore, the tame lion, flew more than 25,000 miles with Col.
       Turner.  At hotels, so the story went, the flier would register
       simply, "Turner and Gilmore."  In all, Col. Turner estimated that
       he had flown 3 million miles in his career.
               Later in life, he turned to business and became board
       chairman of the Roscoe Turner Aeronautical Corp., a flight school
       and aircraft sales and service facility at Indianapolis' Weir Cook
       Airport.
            He also was a fervant advocate of the use of bombers in
       wartime and served as chairman of the aeronautics and space
       committee of the American Legion.
            Col. Turner was born in Corinth, Miss.  His parents wanted
       him to be a banker; he preferred to be a railroad engineer, but
       the idea was vetoed by his father as being too dangerous.
            He started at business school but quit to drive a taxicab.
       He said he was bitten by the aviation but in 1916 when the federal
       government sent some training planes to the old Memphis Driving
       Park.  He tried to join up but the Army officers in charge weren't
       interested.
            A month after the United States entered World War I, Col.
       Turner enlisted in the ambulance corps and eventually was
       transferred to the balloon service as an observer.  He won a
       commission and was discharged in 1919 as a first lieutenant.
            The title "colonel" came from his place on the staffs of the
       governors of Nevada and California.  They awarded him the title
       after he carried them on a one-day flight from Washington to Los
       Angeles in 1932.
            After the war, Col. Turner's first job was as a lion-tamer.
       Then he turned to parachute jumping with an air circus and
       qualified as a pilot and stunt flyer.  His distance speed flying
       began in 1930 when he set an east-west transcontinental record of
       18 hours, 43 minutes.
            It was as a stunt flier that Col. Turner evolved his
       flamboyant style.  At an air meet, one observer of the day
       commented that, amid the fliers in grease-stained coveralls, "he
       was as conspicuous as a shake-crowned drum major on a golf
       course."
            Devon Francis, an aviation writer of the 1930s, said of Col.
       Turner:  "He is one of those simple souls who loves to sit around
       the cracker barrel and spin yarns.  He is unhappy when he can't
       get a dozen other people to eat with him...  He takes as much
       pride in his accomplishments as a bride does in her first
       biscuits."
            Col. Turner had his financial ups and downs partly because he
       spent $200,000 on speed planes during his heyday.  But prizes,
       like the $22,000 he collected for the Thompson trophy, helped him
       to keep solvent.
            A friend remembers the pilot once saying, "When I get so old
       I can't come her and look over the field and hear the engines, I
       want to die."
            Col. Turner is survived by his wife, Madonna and a brother,
       William.

                            THE WASHINGTON POST Wednesday, June 24, 1970



       Data transcription by: Cheryl Hurley, Kossuth High School,
                              October 24, 1992.