Eastern Airlines' Flight 21 left the Newark, N.J., airfield on schedule at 7:10 p.m. Feb. 26, 1941. The new twin-engine Douglas DC-3, one of 10 new 21-passenger airliners in the fledgling Great Silver Fleet, was headed to Brownsville, Texas, via Washington, Atlanta, Birmingham, New Orleans and Houston. One of the 16 people on board was Edward Vernon Rickenbacker, 51, president and founder of the airline, headed for a meeting in Birmingham.

When the flight approached Atlanta, a violent storm had socked in the airport. In the darkness and driving rain, the pilots over flew the only runway and then made a 180-degree turn for their final approach by radio beam, not realizing that their altimeter was faulty. The instrument told them the plane was a thousand feet higher than it actually was. Abruptly, the wings began clipping treetops far beyond the runway, somersaulting the shiny craft, crashing it through branches and tree trunks onto the soggy ground. The pilot cut off the ignition, saving the plane from becoming a blazing inferno. Aviation fuel soaked the upside-down, split-in-two fuselage.

Kenneth Rogers (ENLARGE)

Rescue workers carry Edward Rickenbacker from the wreckage of an Eastern Airlines plane crash in 1941 near Morrow, Ga. During his recovery from serious injuries, he spent time in a body cast. Rickenbacker was one of nine people who survived the crash; seven people died.

COPY (ENLARGE)

Rickenbacker, also known as 'Captain Eddie' for his military days, leaves Atlanta after his recovery.

Bill Wilson (ENLARGE)

File / 1941 photos

Rickenbacker ended up pinned between parts of the wreckage over the dead body of the flight steward who had been sitting next to him. Dazed, he slowly realized that his left hip socket was crushed and that a major nerve must have been severed as there was no feeling.

When he overcame the initial shock, he realized he was soaking wet with blood and high-octane gasoline. Slowly he began trying to free his right hand and arm, which had escaped injury. Twisting his head slightly, a jutting piece of metal gouged his left eyeball out of its socket, leaving it dangling on his cheek. (Fortunately, a doctor was later able to reinsert it, patch it and restore his vision.)

In excruciating pain, Rickenbacker willed himself to stay awake and alive. He had been in near-death situations before. His thoughts turned then to the nine survivors, and he yelled for them. Continually, he shouted encouragement for them to hang on and organized those still ambulatory to spread out in a box formation within shouting distance to try to find help or figure out where they were.

It took more than five hours for the rescue team to find the crash site. Rickenbacker shouted frantically to them to douse their kerosene lanterns lest the whole area go up in flames. News flashed locally and nationally via radio and newspaper "Extras." Especially concerned was Rickenbacker's close friend, Ralph McGill of The Atlanta Constitution, which covered his recuperation in detail. Rickenbacker was a national celebrity — and one of America's best-known and highly decorated World War I heroes.

A man of greatness

As a seventh-grader at the time at Atlanta's E. Rivers School, even I knew all about Capt. Eddie Rickenbacker — every kid back then did.

We grew up on the heroes of that Great War some 20 years earlier. I knew "Captain Eddie" had been Americas' leading flying ace; Medal of Honor winner to boot. Although a nationally known car racing driver before the war, Rickenbacker had a rough time trying to become an Army Air Service pilot. Aviation was in its infancy; heavier-than-air flying machines having been invented only 15 years earlier.

In one of his first aerial dogfights, Rickenbacker dived toward an enemy plane at more than 150 mph — and the fabric covering of the top wing ripped off, forcing his little craft into a tailspin. Allied pilots at that time had no parachutes, so the lieutenant's only option was to tenderly nurse the half denuded craft back to the aerodrome at full throttle — which he did masterfully.

After the war, he went back and bought the Indianapolis Speedway, then formed a company to build the cars he designed, before creating one of the largest U.S. airlines in the 1930s.

The crash site rescue was front-page for days. For 10 days, Rickenbacker lay at the brink of death in (the old) Piedmont hospital; then six weeks in a cast. Four months in all.

Appendicitis put me in that same hospital two months after the crash. My begging the nurses to wheel me in to meet him worked, and, indeed, on April 15, I looked upon that unmistakable face smiling out of a mummy-like cast from chin to elevated toes.

As men of greatness are wont to do, he greeted this young admirer with charm, grace, warmth and the attention he would have one of his fellow pilots. At least, that was my naïve impression. I had brought him a gift I had made, a balsa wood model of a bi-wing Curtiss Goshawk airplane. He accepted it graciously and invited me to come back the following week.

Of course I did and this time he had a gift for me: an autographed copy of the book he wrote following the war, "Fighting the Flying Circus." It was the thrill of any kid's lifetime.

Hero until the end

Fortune was to allow me a third meeting with this American idol shortly after World War II.

Hardly fully recovered from his Atlanta crash injuries, Rickenbacker had been called upon by the War Department once more to serve his country — to study the country's early, faltering war effort, especially in aviation.

In December 1942, having been dispatched by Secretary of War Henry Stimson to deliver a message to Gen. Douglas MacArthur in Papua New Guinea, Rickenbacker suffered another crash. This time he and nine others were aboard a B-17 bomber that ditched in the south Pacific. They were adrift in three small rubber rafts for 24 days.

After eight days of bobbing and floating, parched and dehydrated by constant exposure under a blazing tropical sun which turned the castaways' skins raw and blistering, huddled shivering against the cold night air, beating off circling sharks, capturing tiny amounts of rain water that never quenched their thirst, sharing four oranges equally over four days, using the peels unsuccessfully to bait a fishing hook and line, a miracle occurred that gave them some sustenance and a lot of hope.

A wandering seagull circled, and as they watched transfixed, landed on Rickenbacker's head. Stealthily, the old warrior reached up and grabbed the bird's legs. From that, they gained some tiny nourishment and a resurgence of hope that carried them 16 more days, with Rickenbacker's exemplary courage, stamina and unbreakable will cajoling, encouraging, scolding, ordering and holding them together until final rescue.

Once more, Rickenbacker — still president of Eastern Airlines — was the nation's hero.

Rickenbacker retired from Eastern Airlines in 1963. He died 10 years later at age 83. Former astronaut Frank Borman succeeded him but was unable to keep the airline solvent. It was bought in 1986 by Frank Lorenzo's Texas Air Corp., which virtually cannibalized the carrier, leading to its liquidation in 1991 and ending its distinguished history.

Avery Chenoweth is a three-war veteran, retired Marine Reserve colonel living in Perry, and the author of "Semper FI: The Definitive Illustrated History of the U.S. Marines."