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From the North Pole to Tabor: A Nearly Century-Old Gift Returns to View

A vintage airplane propeller is mounted above a large flat-screen television, both set against a backdrop of light wood paneling.
A group of young men in sailor uniforms pose with their instruments in a room with a propeller on the wall and a portrait in the background.
A framed newspaper front page, featuring a headline about Byrd's flight to the North Pole and a portrait of a man in aviator gear, is presented against a white background.
A vintage letter from the Byrd Antarctic Expedition is placed in front of a black and white photograph of an airplane flying over clouds.
A wooden door with %22WEST READING ROOM%22 etched on the glass is framed by a wall with an airplane propeller mounted above it.
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From the North Pole to Tabor: A Nearly Century-Old Gift Returns to View

Visitors to the Travis Roy Campus Center may have noticed something new hanging on the wall: a large propeller, nearly a century old, with a story that has ventured from the Arctic ice to Tabor's campus.

The propeller was a gift to Tabor in 1928 from Richard F. Hoyt, a trustee who served the school from 1919 until his death in 1935. Hoyt was a New York financier and one of the most influential figures in early American aviation. He helped arrange the engines for Charles Lindbergh's solo flight to Paris. He sat on the executive committee of Pan American Airways. In 1929, he became chairman of the Curtiss-Wright Corporation, then the largest aviation firm in the country.

Hoyt's reach extended across Tabor's campus. He funded Hoyt Field and Hoyt Hall. He helped build Lillard Hall. He's left an indelible mark on this campus.

The propeller itself comes from one of the most celebrated flights of the twentieth century. In May 1926, American Explorer Richard E. Byrd took off from Spitsbergen, Norway, in a three-engine Fokker monoplane called the Josephine Ford and flew over the North Pole, in what was hailed as the first flight ever to reach the top of the world. Byrd returned a national hero. He was awarded the Medal of Honor.

Hoyt had financed Byrd's expeditions. Two years after the flight, Byrd shipped him one of the three propellers from the Josephine Ford with a short letter:

"My dear Dick: It gives me pleasure to send you this propeller which was one of the three that carried Bennett and me over the North Pole, May 9, 1926. Best of good wishes."

Hoyt passed the gift along to Tabor that fall. For decades, it hung in the living room of Lillard Hall—one of the buildings Hoyt himself had helped build. After Lillard Living Room was renovated, the propeller moved to Hayden Library, where it was mounted above the entrance to the West Reading Room. 

After its time in Hayden came to end, with the demolition of the building to make way for the Travis Roy Campus Center, the propeller went into storage. This spring, it was brought back out and installed in the Campus Center, where students, faculty, and visitors now pass by it every day.

A more in-depth look at Richard F. Hoyt, his own aviation career, and the propeller's journey will appear in the fall 2026 issue of Tabor Today. Stay tuned!