Eddie Rickenbacker, the Hat-in-the-Ring Squadron, and the Race Driver Who Became America's Ace of Aces

Eddie Rickenbacker ended World War I as America’s undisputed Ace of Aces with 26 confirmed aerial victories, flying with the 94th Aero Pursuit Squadron - the first American pursuit unit to conduct combat operations over enemy lines. On September 25, 1918, he earned the Medal of Honor by attacking a seven-aircraft German formation alone. In 1942, at age 52, he survived 24 days adrift on a life raft in the Pacific Ocean, and then completed his classified mission after rescue.

From Columbus to the Starting Grid

Edward Rickenbacher was born on October 8, 1890, in Columbus, Ohio, to Swiss-German immigrant parents. His father died in a construction accident when Eddie was twelve, and from that point forward he functioned as the man of the family - driving delivery wagons, sweeping floors, cleaning stables.

He found his way to speed early. By his early twenties he was racing automobiles professionally, and by 1916 he was competing at Indianapolis. He maintained his own machines when possible and developed a mechanical intimacy with his equipment that would later define his approach to aircraft.

A Name Change, a War, and a Transfer

When the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Rickenbacher altered the spelling of his name to Rickenbacker - removing the Germanic h and replacing it with a k. Anti-German sentiment was running high, and the change was purely practical. He adapted to what the situation required.

He wanted to fly fighters. The Army reviewed a man with a fourth-grade education and a career built on racetracks and said no. Instead, they sent him to France as a staff driver for General Pershing’s headquarters.

He drove generals. He watched aircraft. He arranged his own flying lessons on off-hours, applied for transfer, and - through persistence applied through entirely proper channels - convinced the United States Army to train him as a combat pilot.

The Hat-in-the-Ring Squadron

In March 1918, Rickenbacker was assigned to the 94th Aero Pursuit Squadron. The insignia showed Uncle Sam’s stovepipe hat sailing through a ring. The 94th was the first American pursuit squadron to fly combat operations over enemy lines, and the men who flew it carried that weight.

On arrival, he trained alongside Major Raoul Lufbery, a Franco-American ace with 17 aerial victories and the most experienced pursuit pilot in the American Air Service. Lufbery taught angles, altitude, when to press and when to hold. He died in combat in May 1918, falling from his aircraft without a parachute - American airmen in WWI were not issued them, on the justification that pilots might otherwise abandon repairable aircraft. The actual cost was men like Lufbery.

Rickenbacker absorbed everything Lufbery had taught him before he was gone.

The Aircraft: Nieuport 28 and SPAD XIII

His first aircraft was the Nieuport 28, a machine with a particular character. The rotary engine threw castor oil back across the windscreen in anything but still air - pilots arrived home coated in it, goggles perpetually smeared. More consequentially, in a prolonged dive, the Nieuport had a tendency to shed the fabric from its upper wing. Pilots knew this and flew with it in mind.

He later transitioned to the SPAD XIII, powered by a Hispano-Suiza engine. Where the Nieuport was twitchy and nervous, the SPAD was deliberate and solid. A serious machine for serious work.

His first confirmed aerial victory came on April 29, 1918 - less than two months after arriving at the front. He dove on an Albatros D.V near the lines, fired, and watched it go down.

The Medal of Honor Action: September 25, 1918

By late September, Rickenbacker had been made commanding officer of the 94th. On September 25, 1918, flying alone, he spotted a mixed formation of seven German aircraft below him - five Fokker D.VIIs and two observation two-seaters - attacking an American kite balloon tethered near the front lines.

He dove into all seven. Alone.

He fired on an observation two-seater first and sent it down, then turned immediately on a Fokker D.VII before the formation had fully registered what was happening. The second aircraft fell. He pulled away into cloud cover and flew home.

Two kills. Seven enemies. One pilot.

The Medal of Honor was awarded in 1930 - twelve years after the armistice. Institutional recognition moves at its own pace.

Ace of Aces

Rickenbacker ended the war with 26 confirmed aerial victories: 22 aircraft and 4 observation balloons. No American pilot in World War I surpassed that total. He was 28 years old.

The German pilots he fought were skilled and experienced, flying excellent machines. The Fokker D.VII was widely regarded as one of the finest fighter aircraft of the war, and the men flying it had been at this longer than any American in France. Rickenbacker studied aerial combat the way he had studied racetracks - identifying angles, blind spots, and the moments when pressing was correct versus waiting.

He flew alongside men who carried their own legacies forward. James Norman Hall would later co-write Mutiny on the Bounty and live out his days in Tahiti. Douglas Campbell became the first American pilot trained entirely in the United States to score an aerial kill over France.

Building Eastern Air Lines

After the war, Rickenbacker moved through several ventures. An automobile company bearing his name produced a respected car before going under. He owned Indianapolis Motor Speedway for a period.

Aviation fit him completely. He became general manager of Eastern Air Lines in the mid-1930s and president in 1938, running the airline the way he ran himself. Aircraft were maintained. Schedules were honest. He was not a desk-bound executive - he flew, and he understood what his crews were doing because he had done it himself. Eastern grew.

Twenty-Four Days in the Pacific

In fall 1942, Secretary of War Henry Stimson sent Rickenbacker on a classified personal mission: carry a message - not written down, carried in his head - to General Douglas MacArthur in the Pacific.

On October 21, 1942, Rickenbacker flew out of Hawaii aboard a B-17 Flying Fortress. The navigator made errors. Over that ocean, where small mistakes become catastrophes, they went off course and flew past their destination. The fuel ran out and the water went on.

On October 22, they ditched.

Eight men. Three rubber life rafts.

The Navy began searching immediately, but with no accurate position data, they searched the wrong areas for twelve days before officially declaring the crew missing in action.

The equatorial Pacific sun offers no negotiation. It bears down from above while the ocean reflects heat from below. Sharks circled beneath the rafts from nearly the first day - not attacking, just present, patient. On the eighth day, Sergeant Alex Kaczmarczyk died. The others lowered him over the side.

On approximately the ninth day, a seagull landed on Rickenbacker’s hat. A man who had dove alone into seven German fighters now sat still enough, composed enough, that a wild bird chose him as a resting place. He let it settle. He waited. Then he reached up and caught it.

They divided every part of the bird. Intestines went into the water as bait. They caught small fish. They rationed everything in portions almost too small to see, caught what rain came, and kept their minds working while their bodies stayed still.

November 13: Navy patrol aircraft found the survivors - some together, Rickenbacker and two others who had drifted separately in a different location. Several men weighed under 100 pounds. Rickenbacker had lost 35 pounds off an already lean frame.

He recovered. Then he traveled on to MacArthur and delivered the message he had been carrying in his head through the crash, the ocean, and the weeks adrift. He finished what Stimson had sent him to do.

The Rest of a Remarkable Life

Rickenbacker published his account in “Seven Came Through” (1943). He told it plainly, without dramatic decoration - which made it more powerful than any embellished version would have been. When asked how he survived, his answer was faith and discipline. He said a man who has spent his life around machines understands that a machine does not care about you. The ocean does not care. The sun does not care. What keeps you alive is what you carry inside yourself.

He ran Eastern Air Lines until 1963. He died on July 23, 1973, in Zurich, Switzerland. He was 82 years old.

Twenty-six kills and twenty-four days. The same qualities that made him fast on a racetrack and precise in the air were the ones that kept him alive on a rubber raft in the Pacific: patience, calculation, and the refusal to spend anything - energy, ammunition, hope - before the moment was right.

Key Takeaways

• Rickenbacker ended WWI with 26 confirmed aerial victories (22 aircraft, 4 balloons), making him America’s all-time Ace of Aces flying with the 94th Aero Pursuit Squadron from March 1918.
• His Medal of Honor action on September 25, 1918 - a solo attack on seven German aircraft - earned him the award twelve years later in 1930.
• His racing background gave him a mechanical and tactical precision that translated directly to aerial combat: he studied angles, withheld shots that weren’t there, and thought past the kill.
• At age 52, he survived 24 days adrift in the Pacific following a B-17 navigational error in October 1942, then completed his classified mission to General MacArthur upon rescue.
• He built and led Eastern Air Lines from the mid-1930s until 1963, applying the same hands-on discipline to airline management that defined his time in the cockpit.