Scatter Brained

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S C A T T E R B R A I N E D
though, the pooka looks like a six-foot-plus rabbit, and only 
Elwood can see him. Elwood utters the memorable lines, “No-
body ever brings anything small into a bar” and “I’ve wrestled 
with reality for 35 years, Doctor, and I’m happy to say I fi -
nally won out over it.” Was Elwood trying to say that he lived 
on Fantasy Island? . . .
07
 Da Plane! Da Plane! 
Th
  e Best and Worst from the Annals of Aviation
BEST
Charles Lindbergh
Sure, he later became notorious as an outspoken isolationist, 
anti-Semite, and possible Nazi sympathizer, but the man 
could fl y. In 1927, with the fi rst nonstop solo fl ight across the 
Atlantic, he gained iconic American status second only to 
Babe Ruth. (Th
  e president, Calvin Coolidge, did not place.) 
Lindbergh kept himself awake and sane on the 33-hour trip 
by playing with a Felix the Cat doll and frequently punching 
himself in the face. Eventual questions of patriotism aside, 
Lucky Lindy was fortunate, for the purposes of posterity, 
that his grandfather had changed the family surname upon 
immigrating, or all the ticker-tape parades would have been 
in honor of one Charles Mannson.
BEST
The Gossamer Albatross
Essentially a fl ying bicycle, this person-powered plane actu-
ally made it across the English Channel in less than three 

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hours, kept aloft by nothing but a single sweaty cyclist named 
Bryan Allen. With the constant rise in American obesity and 
the eventual depletion of the world’s fossil fuels, this inspired 
combination of air travel and physical fi tness should come in 
quite handy in the future. Th
  ough with its fragile structure 
and a total empty weight of only 70 pounds, you’d probably 
be wise to lose a few ounces in the gym beforehand.
WORST
The Messerschmitt Me 163
Th
 e fi rst, and still the only, tailless rocket-powered fi ghter 
plane, was one of a kind for a variety of reasons. Most nota-
bly, this manned fi rework was among the Luftwaff e’s last 
desperate gambles of World War II. Admittedly very fast, its 
unreliable motor was troublingly prone to explosion upon 
ignition, and its only method of landing, a terrifying ex-
tended skid that often fl ipped the plane over, was little bet-
ter. Lucky pilots would come away from the experience with 
nothing but a nasty case of whiplash, while others would 
fi nd themselves engulfed by a ball of fl ame. In the end, the 
rocket plane ultimately killed more German aviators than 
Allied.
BEST AND WORST
Amelia Earhart
History’s greatest female pilot as well as aviation’s most famous 
disappearing act. Early on, the press dubbed her “Lady Lindy,” 
not just due to her prowess in the skies, but because they ob-
served, somewhat unfl atteringly, that she looked just like him. 
In keeping with her counterpart’s somewhat spotty reputation 
regarding World War II, a peculiar urban legend arose that