Description:

Byrd Richard 1888 - 1957 Chairman of the National Economy League Richard E. Byrd check signed between first and second Antarctic expeditions.

Partly printed and partly handwritten check with pale green geometrically patterned ground. Richard E. Byrd signed and endorsed "Farmers & Merchants National Bank & Trust Co." check no. 214 in the amount of $8.26 on April 14, 1933 as "R.E. Byrd". Byrd has made out the check to the National Economy League; a stamp verso indicates that Byrd's money was directed specifically to the Massachusetts State Branch. In near fine condition, with one diagonal fold extending across left side. Check bearing various internal stamps and punched out marks, measuring overall 6.25" x 2.75".

Richard E. Byrd (1888-1957) served as Chairman of the National Economy League, the organization to whom he addressed this check, in 1933. He was also an accomplished aviator and intrepid explorer. Byrd had made the first flight to the Arctic in 1926 followed by a transatlantic flight in 1927 that missed Charles Lindbergh's record by two months. Byrd was in between Antarctic expeditions in 1933; he had delayed his second Antarctic expedition to serve as Chairman of the National Economy League. Byrd's first Antarctic mission, conducted via ships and airplanes between 1928-1930, had been a tremendous scientific and popular success. During his second Antarctic mission in 1934, Byrd manned a meteorological station alone for five months. His 1938 memoir Alone describes his near death from carbon monoxide poisoning and subsequent rescue.

The National Economy League was organized in the height of the Depression during the Hoover administration, and aimed to reduce superfluous government spending. League Chairman Richard E. Byrd and other organization members believed that trimming federal costs would spur the languid Depression economy.

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