In 1927 Clyde Cessna started his most successful venture, the Cessna Aircraft Company. Clyde Cessna was at a high point and his new business was doing quite well. The company received several contracts and even produced the first commercial plane to make the fight from California to Hawaii.[1] The good fortune Cessna was enjoying, however, was all brought to an end with the beginning of the Great Depression. With the sudden disappearance of the airplane market, Cessna Aircraft went broke. Out of options, the board members voted Clyde Cessna out of his president role in the company and shut down all manufacturing. Left with only one airplane, Clyde and his son Eldon Cessna participated in air races in order to keep the company alive. Together they designed planes to be faster than the competition, relying on Eldon’s education as an engineer from Kansas State. There is much to be said about Clyde Cessna’s genius but by this point, he relied on his son, Eldon to bring in new information.[2]

 Clyde Cessna then started the C.V Cessna Company to design racing planes and employed several racing pilots. They fought for the life of the company and saw success racing and eventually, with the help of his son, Eldon and his nephew, Dwayne Wallace, Clyde Cessna regained leadership of Cessna Aircraft and reopened for business in 1934. All of them volunteered to work without wages to keep the company alive.[3] The times were hard for Cessna and his family partners. Despite reopening it was tough for them all to go without a wage. Cessna was able to manage but his son Eldon could not make ends meet. He was forced to leave his father’s company and moved to southern California to find aviation work there. Eldon’s daughter Janice explained that it was just too difficult to keep going; he did not have a farm that put food on the table as his father did so he was forced to pack up and leave. On top of financial trouble, Clyde Cessna was struck with a tragedy that distanced him from his love of flying. In 1933, he witnessed his pilot Roy Liggett die in a horrible crash. He was flying Ms. Wanda, a plane Clyde Cessna designed and named for his daughter. The wing separated from the aircraft midflight and Roy was killed instantly when the plane hit the ground.[4] Clyde Cessna was down and out with his airplane business and decided that is was time for his career to come to a close. In 1936 Cessna sold his interests in the company to his nephew Dwayne Wallace, purchased an additional 640 acres of land, and retired to his farm in Rago, Kansas.[5]

[1] “Farmer Clyde Cessna Turned Out Wichita’s First Airplane,” Wichita Eagle, September 20, 1958.

[2] Janice A. Clarke, Interview, November 5, 2018.

[3] Rodengen, The Legend of Cessna, 77.

[4] Ibid, 78 

[5] Ibid, 79