Charles Lindbergh lands in Paris, conquering the Atlantic alone
On this day · 21 May 1927
After 33 sleepless hours over open ocean, a 25-year-old airmail pilot touched down at Le Bourget and woke up world-famous.
On the evening of May 21, 1927, a single-engine monoplane dropped out of the dark over Paris and rolled to a stop at Le Bourget aerodrome. Out climbed Charles Lindbergh, 25 years old, who had just flown the Spirit of St. Louis nonstop and alone from Roosevelt Field, New York—roughly 3,610 miles in 33 hours and 30 minutes.
He had no radio, no parachute, and barely any sleep. To stay aloft he fought fog, ice, and the pull of his own eyelids, sometimes flying within feet of the waves to jolt himself awake.
A crowd of about 150,000 surged across the field to meet him.
Lindbergh was not the first to cross the Atlantic by air, but he was the first to do it solo and nonstop, claiming the $25,000 Orteig Prize. Overnight he became one of the most famous people on earth, and his flight convinced a skeptical public that long-distance air travel had a future.
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