"Flying Parson" Goes Back to the Pulpit

1919

Takes Old Man's Advice and Quits "Being a Fool."

NEW YORK, N. Y. — Lieut. Belvin W. Maynard, "the flying parson," winner of the recent Army transcontinental air race, announced here that he had resigned from the Army Air Service and will resume his work as a clergyman. He said he expected to be out of the service early in the new year.

"I am going to take the advice I received in an anonymous letter the other day and go back to my preaching," Lieutenant Maynard said. "In substance it said: 'I am over 80, but when I was a young man an old man told me not to be a fool. Now I am old and you are young, so I want to give you some advice. Don't be a fool. Go back to your pulpit and give up your flying and newspaper fame.'"

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 11.