Alvin M. Johnston

Johnston was born August 18, 1914, in Admire, Kansas, to farmers Alva and Ella Johnston. He made his first flight in 1925, at 11 years old, when a barnstormer landed near his home. That day, he decided to become a pilot. He received mechanic and pilot instruction, soloing at age 15. After graduating from high school, Johnston began barnstorming on his own. Later, he returned to school for engineering, but dropped out in 1939 before he finished the required courses to get his degree.

He married his wife DeLores in 1935.

He was a civilian instructor for the Civilian Pilot Training Program. Once the United States entered World War II, Johnston transferred to the U.S. Army Air Corps Ferry Command.[1]

In December 1942, Johnston moved to Aircraft as a flight test engineer. He flew the Bell P-39 Airacobra and the XP-63 Kingcobra during the prototype phases. He also flew the first American jet, the XP-59 Airacomet. Johnston earned his nickname "Tex" because of his penchant for wearing cowboy boots and a Stetson hat on the flightline.[2]

After World War II ended, he bought two surplus Airacobras and modified them to enter and win the Thompson Trophy at the 1946 National Air Races. He set a race speed record of 373 miles per hour (600 km/h).[3]

Johnston helped design and later flew the rocket-propelled Bell X-1 on May 22, 1947.[4] He stayed on the program as a design advisor on modifications to the trim controls that he discovered were unusable in their manufactured configuration at high subsonic speeds. In 1991, he recounted his experience in the rocket plane in Discovery Channel's documentary series Frontiers of Flight, stating, "... the airplane was just gorgeous" and that its 18-G design was "indestructible".

He became a test pilot for Boeing in July 1948. He flew the Boeing B-47 Stratojet and piloted the first flight of the Boeing Boeing B-52 Stratofortress prototype.[5]

Johnston is best known for performing a barnstormer-style barrel roll maneuver with Boeing's pioneering 367-80 jet in a demonstration flight over Lake Washington outside Seattle, on August 7, 1955.[6] The maneuver was caught on film and was frequently shown on the Discovery Wings cable channel in a three-minute short as part of the Touched by History series, while the channel still aired. Called before the then-president of Boeing, Bill Allen, for rolling the airplane, Johnston was asked what he thought he was doing, and responded with "I was selling airplanes". He kept his position as a test pilot, and did not get in legal trouble for his actions. Along with his cowboy style of dress, such maverick behavior is said to have inspired the creation of Dr. Strangelove's Maj. T.J. "King" Kong character, who in rodeo style, rode a balky nuclear weapon to its target.[2]

From 1960 to 1963, he was assistant program manager for the Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar program in Seattle.

From 1964 to 1968, he was manager of the Boeing Atlantic Test Center in Cocoa Beach, Florida, working on two of Boeing's programs, the Minuteman missile and the Lunar Orbiter designed for the Apollo missions. He also worked with NASA, managing Saturn and Apollo programs.

In 1968, Johnston left Boeing to manage Tex Johnston, Inc., Total-In-Flight-Simulator Inc., and Aero Spacelines, the latter handling the manufacture and certification of an outsized cargo airplane known as the Pregnant Guppy.

In 1975, he became director and chief pilot of Stanley Aviation Corporation, focusing on personnel escape systems (ejection seats). Johnston was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 1993.[7]

In 1991, Johnston wrote his memoirs, Tex Johnston: Jet Age Test Pilot, with writer Charles Barton.

Johnston developed Alzheimer's disease in the 1990s and died in 1998 at a nursing home in Mount Vernon, Washington.[8]

• Johnston, A.M. and Barton, C.. Tex Johnston: Jet Age Test Pilot. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Press, 2000. ISBN 1-56098-931-9.

• Video interview
• Video of Johnston's Barrel Roll on YouTube
• Alvin "Tex" Johnston at the National Aviation Hall of Fame