WILLIAM CHARLES OCKER 1876-1942 AKA Sgt. W.C. ("Bill") Ocker

William C. Ocker EARLY YEARS -- William C. Ocker, the father of "Blind Flying," flew from Brooks Field, San Antonio, Texas, to March Field, California in a covered cockpit to prove that a pilot's instrumentation could be more reliable than his own natural senses. (U.S. Air Force photo) from Air Force Links

 

William C. Ocker U.S. Air Force photo from Air Force Links

 

ONLINE RESOURCES      If you search for "William C. Ocker", using the Google search engine, (6-25-05), you will find about 43 links. Roy Nagl has identified several of these as being especially helpful.

 

Ocker, pioneer of ‘blind flying’ By Rudy Purificato 311th Human Systems Wing       This page offers a very comprehensive story of Ocker's life and career, with special emphasis on his activities as the "pioneer of 'blind flying.' Unfortunately, it has disappeared from the net, but I was able to retrieve it with the aid of the www.waybackmachine.org program.You can access a copy of his article by clicking on the title above.

 

History of Cockpit Attitude Instruments and Introduction to Spatial Disorientation Training Tuesday, 15 Jul 97, 1330-1510 Col. (Ret) Bill Ercoline       This page offers a transcription of the presentation of Col. Ercoline and complements the article on the webiste cited above. Included are references to the contributions of Maj John McCready and Jimmie Doolittle. You can access the page by clicking on the title.

 

Brooks Airforce Base PEOPLE Colonel William C. Ocker       This page offers a revue of his life and career and displays a very small photo of him. It also offers several links to other websites of interest. You may want to use the FIND function on "Ocker" to locate the entry on the page. You can access the page by clicking on the title.

 

Ocker & Menoher Photo of Ocker in plane with Maj.Gen. Charles T. Menoher. Menoher was the Director of the Army Air Service 6/2/19-6/4/20, and Chief of the Air Service 6/4/20-10/4/21, who had commanded the Rainbow Division in France during WWI, and resigned 10/4/21 over Billy Mitchell's campaign to promote a separate military air service. (I'm not sure Menoher was even a pilot.)

 

Colonel William Ocker died in 1942 at Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, D.C.   Editor's Note: If you have any more information on this pioneer aviator please contact me. E-mail to Ralph Cooper

 

Back