United Airlines’ 1st Pilot Takes Controls at 100 : Aviation: E. Hamilton (Ham) Lee is honored by friends and relatives as he co-pilots a DC-3 on a bumpy, half-hour flight from Ontario to Van Nuys Airport.

E. Hamilton Lee, who was flying planes just 13 years after the Wright Brothers took flight at Kitty Hawk, celebrated his 100th birthday Saturday by flying as co-pilot on a DC-3 from Ontario to Van Nuys Airport.

“Good, good, good,” but “a little rough,” said Lee, known in aviation circles as the dean of airline pilots, as he emerged from the plane, his trademark cigar dangling from his mouth.

Lee, the first civilian pilot to fly the U.S. mail in 1918, also was the first pilot hired by United Airlines, the nation’s first commercial airline, when it was formed in 1927.

“Everyone in aviation owes him a debt of thanks for his pioneering,” wrote Don McBain of Sherman Oaks in the April newsletter of the Retired United Pilots Assn.

Bill Arnott, a retired United Airlines pilot, organized Saturday’s 30-minute flight and a tribute to Lee at Lacy Aviation, where more than 100 former colleagues, friends and relatives awaited the DC-3’s arrival.

“This man has spanned the largest bit of aviation in history,” Arnott said.

Lee, who left his family’s farm in Illinois because he disliked farming, first flew in 1913 in a homemade biplane. Then and there, he said he decided he wanted to learn to fly.

After taking flying lessons in 1916, he was an instructor for the military during World War II and piloted pioneer aircraft for the U.S. Mail Service and various early passenger planes for United. Before he retired from United in 1949, Lee had graduated to the more complex DC-3s.

The 21-passenger DC-3 was “the best airplane I flew,” Lee said in a 1977 interview. “They were sweethearts, very reliable.”

The DC-3 that carried Lee to Van Nuys on Saturday was christened the Capt. E. Hamilton Lee for the occasion. Among those aboard were Lee’s son, Robert E. Lee of Denver, who once flew co-pilot with his father, and Fern Reid Jones of Pacific Palisades, a stewardess in the 1940s who flew on United Airlines planes piloted by Lee.

“Flying was more fun then,” said Jones, who donned an early stewardess uniform for the flight. “We had a ball. Ham was a good pilot. But he also was a lot of fun.”

She described Saturday’s trip “as a very lovely flight. It was bumpy because of the wind, but still nice.”

Both Jones, who also holds a commercial pilot’s license, and Lee briefly took over the plane’s controls. But the plane’s owner, Clay Lacy, a United pilot and owner of Lacy Aviation, was at the controls most of the trip.

Also aboard the plane were about 500 pieces of mail, said Peter Hass, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service’s Van Nuys Division. “We’re calling this Lee’s last U.S. mail flight,” he said.

During a ceremony, Bill Williams Jr. of the Federal Aviation Administration presented Lee with the application for his first license, dated May 28, 1927, and all of his aviation records, including some documents signed by Wilbur Wright.

Lee accepted the records and other gifts with a smile and even tried on caps given him by the FAA and Postal Service for the crowd. But none made his eyes light up more than a set of diamond-studded wings given him by Gary Meermons, United’s current chief pilot.

“His hearing isn’t at all good,” said his grandson, Gregory Lee, with whom Lee lives in Colton. “But he heard the word ‘diamonds.’ Did you see? He immediately put those wings in his pocket.”

Gregory Lee did not follow his father and grandfather’s footsteps and become a pilot, much to Lee’s dismay. “The boy’s eyesight wasn’t good enough,” he said.

Gregory Lee recently took a leave from the restaurant business to care for his grandfather. “He was fairly independent until he was 99,” Gregory Lee said. “Then, he lost his driver’s license. But he still likes to eat out a couple of times a day.”

Throughout the ceremony, the elder Lee chomped on his cigar.

“Like George Burns, Ham’s always got that cigar,” Arnott said.

A former colleague of Lee’s, who did not want his name used, said Lee stopped lighting the cigar when he was piloting a plane “because of the time he smelled smoke and thought his plane was on fire. He looked down and his tie was on fire. He’d dropped an ash.”

The guest of honor, who greeted old friends with hearty handshakes, said little throughout the celebration. He told a reporter he had many stories to tell, but “I can’t remember any right now.”

However, he added that he would not like to be flying commercially today. “Too many restrictions,” he said.