The Shirttail Tradition (duplicate post)

[wickedpilot]

These are two stories/myths I have heard. Can anyone put fact to fiction or know of any place this is officially written?

Tradition of the Shirt Tail
Back in the ‘hay-day’ of aviation, most training aircraft had front seating for the student pilot and rear seating for the flight instructor. Some even had throw-over flight controls so that the only way for the instructor to enforce his “authority” was to yank on the students’ shirttail. After a students first solo, the instructor rewards the student by cutting their shirt tail off so the instructor can no longer pull on it. Today, modern trainers provide side-by side seating and dual flight controls, however the tradition of cutting the shirttail still remains.

Another common story told for cutting the shirttail is that after soloing, a student pilot has officially grown his or her wings. The shirttail is cut off, and their wings can stretch out.

I wrote both of these blurbs simply on info. passed down to me from instructors. Any thoughts or additions?

 

[Checks]

Shirt Tails.
There has been a long tradition in aviation related to cutting off the shirt tails of newly soloed student pilots. One story has it that the practice began because of the student need to clean his goggles.

Pilots had scarves to use in keeping their goggles clean but the student had to use a shirt tail. The cutting of the shirt tail was giving the student the symbolic scarf of a pilot.
At one time trainers were two place tandem seat airplanes. The instructor sat in the back seat. Some trainers had a speaking tube that worked so that you could hear
It was noisy in the airplane and the instructors learned that the way to get the students attention and direct him was to reach under the panel and yank on a shirttail!
At student solo, the removal of the shirt tail, eliminated the way the instructor used for directing the student. The student was now a pilot and didn't need the jerking on a shirttail to fly.

 

[corytx]

cool...

I've wondered what the tradition was behind the shirt tail. Had mine cut on 11/14 (this past friday) and it's now in a frame along with a picture of my first solo landing and a picture of the plane I flew.

 

[JRSLim]

Uh oh Im up the creek..

I never got mine cut.. I had a great instructor, but he didn't say anyhthing about it. The day I expected to solo I wore a black Tshirt I bought at Wally World for $5 just for that purpose... didn't knwo it wa s supposed to be white.. and when I landed my instructor didn't say anything ( and I didn't ask -jus tkind of thought - 'well, I guess they don't do that here')

So no wonder all my subsequent instructors have been yanking at me.

 

[Kansan]

The story as told to me. During the days when most flight schools where using all yellow J-3 Cubs with no radios, they needed a way to distiguish one yellow cub from another when a student was soloing. So they would cut the shirt tail off the student and tie it to the tailwheel to seperate him from the rest of the fleet.

I don't know how true this is, but its as good as any other!

Kansan

 

[English]

hmmm..then what's the reason my instructor took my shirt off of me after my solo?

 

[Kansan]

I didn't say it was a perfect story. Just what I had been told. All traditions are modified.

 

[Scarecrow]

Wow. I'd never heard those versions. I was taught that the shirt tail represents your tail feathers. The instructor (mama-bird) cuts a students shirt tail to make sure the baby bird doesn't get too far from the nest. When a student gets his ticket, he also earns his tail-feathers. Probably B.S. -- but poetic. I always used it.