A Cumberland Times-News article in 1932 stated the following:
A Thanksgiving air journey to visit friends in Cumberland, using a commercial type plane of their own, ended abruptly in death for two US Army Air Service enlisted men from Bolling Field, DC yesterday afternoon. Their plane lost a wing and fell to earth near Mexico Farms Airport. Staff Sergeant George Dodge of Oakland, MD and Aviation Mechanic Preston Miller of Martinsburg, WV left Bolling Field in the yellow low wing Aeromarine-Klem airplane and, while circling South Cumberland, was buffeted by high winds. Eye witnesses say as they attempted to descend, a wing suddenly broke off and the plane dropped down on the West Virginia side of Mexico Farms on the hillside above the Potomac River.
The bodies were later identified by Wolfe ‘Red’ Hanley, also of the Army Air Service at Bolling Field who was here on furlough, and a friend of both men. They had stopped at Martinsburg for dinner at Miller’s home and resumed their flight here to surprise Hanley who had not been advised of their coming. Hanley recognized their plane as they were circling to land, when to his horror, the wing broke off. The Army flyers were caught by a down wind. The flying conditions west of here were so bad yesterday that no local plane was taken from its hangar due to gale winds above and strong gusty winds at the surface.
Mrs. Elmer Hostetler, a sister to Sergeant Dodge, was Randolph Hostetler’s mother. Randolph later became one of the Kelly-Springfield Tire Company’s corporate pilots. Red Hanley (his correct name was Henley) was the Sergeant in charge of the Army detachment stationed at the Government Field at Mexico Farms previous to its closing. Gene Kelley recalled that both Red Henley and Ronald ‘Torque’ Landis swam the Potomac River in their efforts to reach the crash site quickly on that cold windy November day.
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Wings Over Cumberland 