The lost airfields of East Lansing

Over the years, East Lansing has been the site of three different airfields, now all gone. All three were connected with one man: Arthur J. “Art” Davis (1895–1979, M.A.C. ’23), a legend of Michigan aviation. His biography is amazing, and several books could deservedly be written about him.

Art Davis enrolled at the Michigan Agricultural College in 1917 but enlisted with the U.S. Army during that first fall term. He was allowed to finish the year’s studies before entering aviator training in spring 1918. Although one recent source describes him as “battle-tested,” implying he saw combat, earlier biographies say he was still in training when the armistice was signed on November 11, 1918.¹

Shortly after he completed his training in February 1919, Davis left active service. He purchased an army surplus biplane (likely an open-cockpit Standard J-1) and started his barnstorming career, partnering with a flyer from Jackson named Roswell “Ross” Becker. Davis and Becker trouped around the state, performing exhibitions and offering passenger trips.²

Around 1920 or 1921, Art Davis returned to M.A.C. to complete his engineering degree. It was then that he established the first airfield of East Lansing. The M.A.C. Record mentions “the flying field two blocks east and one block north of the tennis courts on Grand River Avenue” which in typical Record fashion is vague and uses a long-gone reference point.^† Davis himself would later be more specific:

“My first flying was out south of Lansing on a dairy farm, but then because I was going to M.A.C. I came out here to East Lansing. I landed my plane where Bailey School now is and kept it tied down there. That was in the spring of 1920 or 1921, I think it was. Just west of this was a hay field and pasture and beyond that was Angell’s Woods.”³

It is hard to imagine airplanes flying from the site now, but at the time Bailey School and the surrounding houses were yet to be built, the former farmland was almost completely devoid of trees, and the Standard J-1 (despite being clumsy and slow) was lightweight and had a fairly short takeoff and landing distance. From the future schoolyard, Davis offered ten-minute sightseeing rides for five dollars each, an attraction which was quite popular during Homecoming week in 1921.⁴

The following spring, while still a junior in college and living in the Dorian Society house at 223 Delta Street (of which he was a member), Davis founded Michigan Airways Incorporated along with Ross Becker and another now-famous Michigan aviator, Talbert “Ted” Abrams. “The firm is incorporated for $5,000, and will buy and sell airplanes, parts, own and operate them for exhibition work and for carrying passengers.”⁵

Michigan Airways grew to success through sheer hustle, combining charter passenger service with a fair share of barnstorming—aerial exhibitions, stunt flying, and sightseeing hops.^†† Abrams, later to become a trailblazer in aerial photography and the benefactor namesake of the M.S.U. Planetarium, was their daredevil wing walker. Davis and Becker entered into numerous air races and won—a lot. Amazingly, even though this was a very dangerous era for aviation, Art Davis never had an accident.⁶

In 1926, Davis announced that “East Lansing is to have a new permanent flying field,” owned and operated by Michigan Airways. “The new field is about one mile east of East Lansing on M-16 on land purchased by the company.”⁷

State highway M-16, later to be designated as U.S. Highway 16, was Grand River Avenue. Again, “one mile east” of the city is a bit vague—but it was as specific as the annoucement and subsequent advertisements could be at the time, since Meridian Township had not applied address numbers along that stretch of highway. It took some connecting of the dots for this author to determine that it was in the vicinity of 2736 East Grand River, today the site of a motel constructed in 1959.

The land might have been purchased soon after Michigan Airways was founded, but the airfield took a while to become fully operational. Davis received a permit to operate a flying school in March 1928, by which time at least four aircraft were based there: a Thomas-Morse scout plane, two Waco 10’s, and a new American Eagle owned by Tom Demarest, one of Davis’ students. It was not until a year later that demonstration events marked the official opening of the airport. The state board of aeronautics granted the East Lansing Airport permanent license in 1930.⁸

In spite of all that effort, the East Lansing Airport did not last very long. Art Davis soon shifted his attention back to air racing, and city directories and newpaper ads cease to mention the airport—and Michigan Airways Incorporated—after 1934. Ross Becker moved to Grand Rapids and flew for a charter company called Central Air Service. Ted Abrams started his famed Abrams Aerial Survey Corporation at Lansing; his custom P-1 Explorer camera airplane is now in the National Air and Space Museum.

In 1938, Davis re-established the Davis School of Aviation at Lansing’s Capital City Airport. Many graduates of the school went on to fly for major airlines including American, Pennsylvania Central, and Trans-Western Airlines. Meanwhile, the “Art Davis Flying Circus” performed at air shows throughout the United States and Canada.⁹

Returning to active service in 1941, he served with an aviation examining board in Chicago and Milwaukee. Early in 1943, he joined the ferrying division of the air transport command; stationed at Palm Springs, California, he flew “virtually every type of aircraft used by the A.A.F.,” delivering them “to every war theater of operations.”¹⁰

Finally, after the war’s end, Art Davis returned home to the Lansing area and bought a piece of land 3½ miles north of East Lansing, where Abbot Road becomes Chandler Road as it enters Clinton County. He built an airfield there in 1946, which was dedicated as Davis Airport in 1948. The little airport with three grass runways operated for decades and was a popular site for general aviation use into the 1990s. It officially closed on May 5, 2000, and has since been redeveloped with student apartment buildings as part of East Lansing’s “Northern Tier.”¹¹

In his retirement, Art Davis continued to advocate for general aviation training, though he no longer operated a flying school himself. He became a gentleman farmer and beekeeper, and enjoyed hunting and fishing trips. He died in 1979.¹²

1. Jefferson (Iowa) Herald, 11 Aug 2021, retrieved 5 Dec 2024. LSJ, 25 Oct 1936, p. 19. ↩︎
2. MAC Record, 27(5), 28 Oct 1921, p. 5. ↩︎
3. Kestenbaum, p. 146. ↩︎
4. MAC Record, 27(5), 28 Oct 1921, p. 5. ↩︎
5. LSJ, 1 Mar 1922, p. 13. ↩︎
6. Kestenbaum, pp. 146–7. ↩︎
7. LSJ, 14 Aug 1926, p. 1. ↩︎
8. LSJ, 10 Mar 1928, p. 17; 5 Apr 1928, p. 3; 29 Mar 1929, p. 10; 13 Jun 1930, p. 33. ↩︎
9. LSJ, 15 Nov 1940, p. 13. Knoxville News-Sentinel, 10 Oct 1937, p. 5. LSJ, 27 Jul 1939, p. 9. Claresholm (Alberta) Local Press, 15 Jun 1939, p. 6. ↩︎
10. LSJ, 17 Feb 1946, p. 5. ↩︎
11. LSJ, 8 May 1946, p. 17; 20 Dec 1946, p. 24. MSC Record, 53(6), Sep 1948, p. 13. ↩︎
12. Kestenbaum, p. 147. LSJ, 24 Sep 1979, p. 2. ↩︎

1. † The tennis courts were north and west of the Women’s Building. They were partially removed when the Home Economics Building (Human Ecology) was built in 1922, and finished off when Grand River Avenue was widened in 1924.↩︎
2. †† Davis later reminisced that Becker “was the first to go from one [ride] for five dollars to two for five dollars, and after this we really started making money.”↩︎
3. ††† If online sources are to be believed, this aircraft had serial number 3117 and was built in 1930. Now registered with the modern-equivalent tail number N666N, it has a valid FAA certificate and appears to still be flying in 2024.↩︎