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Murray C. Morgan
Jane O'Roark and Gustave Stromer Were Fated to Have a
Brief Flight Together in Tacoma
The Tacoma News Tribune
May 2, 1993
P. D-3
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Copyright, 1993, Murray Morgan
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Jane O'Roark and Gustave
Stromer Were Fated to Have a Brief Flight Together in Tacoma
 Gustave
was a big, adventuresome Scandinavian of few words. He appeared in
Tacoma, apparently out of nowhere, and set himself up as a
manufacturer and pilot of hydro-aeroplanes. The Stromer Co. had
offices in the Berlin Building at 11th and Pacific, where the
Washington Building now stands. He fabricated float planes in a
shop on Day Island.
Jane, whose real name was Emil Rorke, was a tiny adventuress from
Los Angeles who sought fame as an actress/celebrity any way
possible. Her stage training was financed by unsecured loans from
well-fixed Angelenos, among them a past president of the
prestigious Union League Club. She eventually attracted
considerable attention when she named them all as creditors she
would be unable to pay when declaring bankruptcy. Manfully they
denied having loaned her anything. With her financial future
uncertain, she sought new opportunity on Puget Sound.
After
a few appearances in Seattle, where she ran up a hotel bill that
the New Washington filed suit to collect, she signed on for the
1915 season with the Richards Stock Company, which was staging
shows at the Empress Theater between Ninth and 10th on Pacific
Avenue.
The
actress and the aviator met while she was appearing in Jack Lait's
melodrama, "Help Wanted." Jane played a double role: the
sexually harassed stenographer for a wealthy importer and the
deceived wife of her amorous boss.
On
meeting Stromer after a performance she told him that she longed
to be an aviatrix and had taken flying lessons from Weldon Cook,
who had recently been killed in a crash. Her mother had insisted
that she stop taking lessons, but she had gone into the clouds
with Glenn Hartin, Robert Hamilton and Glenn Curtis, a passenger.
Stromer
predictably made her an offer: the chance to be the first woman to
look down on Tacoma from the air. Would she? She would. When could
they get together in the air? How about next Saturday?
Charles
Richards managed the Empress Theater. He had Jane under contract
for the season. He also had a good sense of the value of
publicity. He objected to the idea of having one of his leading
ladies risk her pretty neck by flying. His objections resonated
more loudly when he realized the venture was scheduled for the
ominous 13th day of the month.
He
objected strenuously, most strenuously, but not firmly enough to
prevent the flight. Somehow the papers got wind of it.
Jane
told reporters she was afraid of neither heights nor ominous dates
on the calendar. Richards said he'd get an injunction. Jane said
she'd get aloft.
On
the Saturday morning of sinister date, actress and manager staged
a dramatic tableaux in front of the Empress. Jane sat at the wheel
of a Maxwell racing car loaned her by the proprietor of the Tacoma
Motor Company. Richards came running down the sidewalk waving a
legal-looking document. Reporters took notes that resulted in
different versions of the drama. The consensus was that Jane
ordered a stagehand to crank up the Maxwell, Richards arrived in
time to thrust a document in her hand, Jane looked at it, the
motor roared to life and she tore the paper in two, handing it
back with the explanation, "I'm sorry, but this morning I
cannot read."
At
this moment the Maxwell's motor roared to life. "I'll be back
for the matinee," Jane cried as she started to drive away.
Richards jumped onto the car to try to stop her. From here
accounts differ. One story is that he fell off. A nother has him
sprawling sidesaddle across the hood across the 11th Street Bridge
and on to the Tideflats.
Stromer
was waiting for her at the Middle Waterway after having flown in
from Day Island. The hydro-aeroplane, which resembled a box-kite
with a structured tail, was moored to a log raft. Jane settled
into a seat beside him, unprotected by anything remotely
resembling a windbreak. They posed for pictures: he imposing in
leather jacket and leather helmet, she diminutive in a red sweater
and wool cap.
Shortly
after noon, to the cheers of spectators on the Tideflats, at
Firemen's Park on the Tacoma bluff, and on the verandah of the
Tacoma Hotel, the hydro-aeroplane taxied down the waterway for
about 100 yards and lifted into the air. Stromer turned her toward
Browns Point and continued the climb until they were about 800
feet up. He circled back along the east side of the bay, then
turned back to the city, passed over the Perkins Building and
followed 11th Street south to the College of Puget Sound (where
Jason Lee Junior High now stands) before turning back to the bay,
descending. They passed low over Stadium. As they came in for the
landing the plane made an unexpected drop but leveled off 25 feet
from the water and touched down gently.
"Wonderful,
simply wonderful," Jane exclaimed as she was helped from the
log raft to the shore. I've been up with a great many celebrities,
but Mr. Stromer has them beaten to a pulp. I've flown with
Hamilton, who won the $20,000 prize for a flight from New York to
Philadelphia, but Stromer has them all lashed to the mast. But I'm
nearly frozen."
Reporters
asked Richards of the Empress what he was going to do about his
star's disobedience. "Do? What's the use of doing anything
after everything's done?"
Jane
was by no means done. Nor was Stromer. Probably with Richards'
help, they quickly conceived a more newsworthy flight for the
following Saturday the first delivery of airmail in the Pacific
Northwest.
Courtly
Frank Stocking was about to retire as Tacoma postmaster. He was
not adverse to going out with a festoon of headlines. Without
bothering to check with Washington, D.C., he authorized the
dispatch of a packet of mail to Seattle by hydro-aeroplane. He
agreed to write a letter to his Seattle counterpart, Postmaster
Edgar Battle. Tacoma Mayor Angelo Fawcett, who was a passionate
non-avoider of publicity, volunteered to write one to Mayor Hiram
Gill of Seattle.
(Though
their cities were rivals, Fawcett and Gill had a common bond. Each
had been defeated for reelection on charges that they countenanced
an open city, then made comebacks running as reformers.) Jack
Haswell, the manager of the Tacoma Motor Company, who had loaned
Jane the racing Maxwell as part of the first flight publicity, now
announced that if Auburn, Kent and Renton officials gave
permission, he would try to beat the hydro-aeroplane to Seattle in
a Maxwell identical to one used by Eddie Rickenbacker in several
winning races.
Amid
all these flourishes, impresario Richards neglected to speak of
injunctions. Came Saturday morning, Feb. 20, 1915. Jane drove the
borrowed Maxwell from the house she and her mother had rented at
624 N. Alder to City Hall. Mayor Fawcett's letter to Mayor Gill
awaited. His Honor told the Other Honor that receipt of the
missive would "signalize the success in the latest step in
the evolution of transportation between Tacoma and Seattle."
Fawcett
concluded by congratulating "you and ourselves on the
elimination of one-third of the time that has heretofore separated
the two great cities of Puget Sound."
Then
on to the post office at 11th and A. Postmaster Stocking opened
his letter to Postmaster Battle with the optimistic statement that
its delivery marked the beginning of daily air service between
Tacoma and Seattle. It closed with a prescient note of caution: "Let
us hope that the conclusion of this flight will not be like that
of Darius Green and his Flying Machine of 90 years ago, which
caused Darius to soliloquize as follows `Wall I like flyin' well
enough, but they ain't sich a thunderin' sight of fun in it when
ye come to light.' "
In
addition to his own letter, Stocking gave Jane a bag containing
between 50 and 100 other letters that ordinarily would have gone
to Seattle by ship. Each was canceled with the handwritten
postmark, "Aeromail to Seattle."
Stromer
was waiting for Jane at the Middle Waterway. He had flown in
earlier from Day Island with Addie LaVoie, a waitress at the
Donnelly Hotel across Pacific Avenue from the Empress Theater.
Addie's enthusiasm for the flight was modest. She allowed that it
was more enjoyable than the submarine ride she had taken in
Massachusetts water.
After
Jane for the second time settled into the unsheltered seat beside
Stromer, Jack Haswell took over the red Maxwell. He had not
received permission from local authorities to race through their
towns on the red brick road that led through the valley to
Seattle, but what the hell! It would be fun to race the plane. So
he drove to the post office and kept the motor running.
At
10 they were off. (Some spectators alleged that Stromer jumped the
gun by three minutes. But there was no gun. Stromer, at about 10
o'clock, taxied down the waterway. Haswell started along Pacific
Avenue.)
The
hydro-aeroplane rose through light fog, crossed Browns Point and
straightened out over East Passage, following the steamer route to
Seattle. The plane caught and passed the steamer Indianapolis off
Poverty Bay, skirted Three Tree Point and West Seattle in patchy
fog, and prepared for a landing in Elliott Bay off Colman Dock
about 10:24 only to be faced with a 134-foot complication.
The
SS Kennedy was pulling out, bound for Victoria. It was kicking up
more waves than Stromer chose to risk. He pulled around, made a
wide circle over Elliott Bay and came back in. Too soon. As he
touched down the chop brought the plane to a shuddering halt,
splashed water over Jane and Stromer, and killed the motor. Plane,
Jane, Stromer and the mail drifted for a quarter hour before
someone came out in a small boat and took Jane to Pier One.
She
hitched a ride to town. Stromer, when the plane was finally
grounded, went to West Seattle to rest up for the return flight.
Stromer's time, Tacoma to Seattle, was listed as 27 minutes for
the estimated 24 airline miles. Haswell was credited with making
the 40 mile drive in 46 minutes.
Because
of the plane's delay after touchdown, Haswell got to the Seattle
post office just as Jane was delivering the mail. O'Roark and
Haswell went together from the post office to City Hall only to
find Mayor Gill absent. His secretary signed a receipt for Mayor
Fawcett's letter.
Having
set a record for the longest heavier-than-air flight by a woman in
Washington, and having literally delivered the mail, Jane drove
back to Tacoma in the Maxwell with Haswell. She arrived in time to
play her two parts in "Help Wanted." Stromer spent the
afternoon in West Seattle, then flew back to Tacoma with Arthur
Aronson, for whom he was building a plane. The return flight took
30 minutes.
Stromer's
plan for daily flights to Seattle never materialized. Neither did
his idea of forming an air squadron for the National Guard. He
left for Oregon in 1917 and eventually turned to manufacturing
boxes, not hydro-aeroplanes.
Jane
finished the season at the Empress, which did not reopen in 1916.
She went back to California and completed the bankruptcy
proceeding, still hoping for a stage career. Her last notice in
the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts file has her
at the Bishop Theater in Oakland in 1917, playing in "A Fool
There Was."
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