DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Ormer Leslie Locklear. Born October 28, 1891, in Greenville, Texas.
Died August 2, 1920, up in the night sky over Hollywood — and the camera caught every second of it. His grave is sixty-five feet east of where you're standing right now. Let that sink in a moment before we begin.
Locklear's family moved to Fort Worth in 1906, and the boy came with them. He worked for his father's construction company for a stretch, steady hands learning how things get built. Then in 1914, he and his brother opened an automobile repair shop — because apparently keeping things running was just in his nature.
But the sky had other plans. When the United States entered World War I, Locklear enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Service in 1917.
He trained in San Antonio and then Austin, and somewhere in that process, something clicked. He was assigned to Barron Field, right near Fort Worth, as a flight instructor. And that's where people started noticing that Ormer Locklear had a gift that went well beyond the textbook.
He became known for daring feats of precision flying. He barnstormed — performing in air shows to recruit pilots for military service, pulling crowds in and pulling men toward the cockpit. But a man like that wasn't going to stay in uniform forever.
In 1919, he resigned his Army commission and stepped onto the commercial air show circuit. Then came Hollywood. The Universal Film Company hired him as a stunt pilot for motion pictures, and he moved west.
His second feature was called The Skywayman. August 2, 1920. The cameras were rolling, the night sky blazing with bright lights set up for filming.
And the belief — the terrible, recorded belief — is that those very lights blinded the pilot. The accident happened right there in front of the lens. The film kept rolling.
That footage was used in the movie's final scene. Thousands of mourners attended his funeral back in Fort Worth. The Fox Film Corporation filmed that too, and released it as a newsreel.
In life and in death, Ormer Locklear was always, somehow, on camera. Sixty-five feet east, he rests. A Fort Worth boy who learned to build things, then fix things, then fly — and flew until the lights got too bright.
What the marker says
(October 28, 1891 - August 2, 1920) (grave site 65 feet east) A native of Greenville, Texas, Ormer Leslie Locklear moved to Fort Worth with his family in 1906. He worked for his father's construction company until 1914, when he and his brother opened an automobile repair shop. Locklear enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Service in 1917, soon after the U.S. entered World War I. He trained in San Antonio and Austin before being assigned to Barron Field near Fort Worth as a flight instructor. He soon became known for his daring feats of precision flying and performed in barnstorming air shows to recruit pilots for military service. Locklear resigned his Army commission in 1919 to fly in the commercial air show circuit. Hired by the Universal Film Company as a stunt pilot for motion pictures, he moved to Hollywood and in 1920 was killed flying a stunt pilot for his second feature, "The Skywayman". The accident, believed to have been caused when the bright lights illuminating the night sky for filming blinded the pilot, was recorded on film and used in the movie's final scene. Thousands of mourners attended Locklear's Fort Worth funeral, which the Fox Film Corporation filmed and released later as a newsreel. (1992)