The Grouping and Life History of World War I Pilot Jonathan Prescott Hoyt Sr.

This page is dedicated to the man who helped me put this together out of Love and adoration for his father….. His name, Jonathan Prescott Hoyt Junior. Thank you John for your patience, joy, dedication, generosity and unmistakable Love for your father. Also to a Friend who is well established in knowledge and wisdom regarding US Military Aviation History and Insignia Collecting, Cliff Presley, without whose help I would not have been knowledgable enough to recognize the veracity and authenticity of Jonathan Prescott Hoyt Sr.’s tunic and insignia.  I could not have done this without the kindness and patience of you both.

The life story of Lieutenant Jonathan Prescott Hoyt Senior, World War I Pilot………

This is a brief account of the life story of a World War I pilot, not just from the account of his wartime exploits in the United States but as a whole man.  John Prescott Hoyt Sr was a true Renaissance Man of the early half of the 20th century which included a 13 month period of time trying his best to be sent into the new and honorable field of aviation combat for the modern Knight of the 20th century.  I tell the story from the account of his son John Prescott Hoyt Jr, 91 of Vermont, USA.  The vitality in his son reflects the vitality, ingenuity, enterprise and faith indicative of the father who was such a large part of his son’s life in his developmental years.

John Prescott Hoyt Sr was born on February 20, 1889 in Parker, South Dakota Territory.  November 2 of the same year South Dakota received statehood.  The city of Parker was about nine years old at this time and was the rural county seat of Turner County.  Parker was center of a complex railroad system in the Dakota Territory which kept commerce passing through with the railroad.  John Sr’s great-grandfather, Melancthon Tier Hoyt was the first Episcopal Bishop of the Dakota Territory and thus the theological lineage was set as a standard within the family line.  John’s father, also Melancthon and was the namesake of the Bishop, was a printer and journalist with the Parker Press and enjoyed with his wife, Phila Anora (Lawrence) Hoyt, a unified background in journalism education from Detroit, OH schools.

John Sr’s father Melancthon, was in demand regarding his skills in Parker from his consummate knowledge of both printing and journalism and therefore was successful in his endeavors.  Spirit Lake was a destination in South Dakota for vacationing families and the Hoyts were no exception.  Melancthon enjoyed boating on the lake but his wife, Phila, had a fear of the water and thus was very reticent to board the sturdy catamaran Melancthon built for her!  Melancthon proceeded to acquire the attentions of five hefty men to stand on one of the twin hulls (outriggers) to show that the boat would not flip and she finally conceded her body to the boat at least out of love and trust of Melancthon if not trust the boat!

John’s life was about to change as Phila, John’s beloved mother, died in 1898 of a battle with cancer when John Sr was nine years old.  John remained with his father for six more years, during which time Melancthon Hoyt remarried and then proceeded to merge his business with other area news outlets.  At 15 John moved via a distant train ride, to where his sister Clara Hoyt had already journeyed to live with their blood Aunt Clara Lamberton and her husband Fred.  When John arrived he finished grade school while helping to raise thoroughbred Jersey cattle on his aunt and uncle’s farm in North Pomfret, Vermont.  John finished grade school with the intellectual skills already evident in this young man and journeyed to Mount Herman High School in Northfield, Massachusetts for this term of his education.  Mount Herman High School was a very special institution of the time begun by Dwight L Moody….  The following is an excerpt from Wikipedia:

–The school was originally founded by famed Protestant evangelist Dwight Lyman Moody as two separate institutions: Northfield Seminary for Young Ladies in 1879, and Mount Hermon School for Boys in 1881. Moody envisaged both these schools as parts of his dream to provide the best possible education for less privileged people. Indeed, even, in their infancy, Moody’s schools matriculated students whose parents were slaves, Native Americans, and from outside the US—something that was unimaginable in many elite private schools at that time.—

Uncle Fred and Aunt Clara had two farms, one of which John’s sister, Clara Hoyt and he moved to for the purpose of upkeep and operation of the farm in the summer months and schooling both for Clara regarding nursing and John regarding high school at Mount Herman HS.  John’s exemplary skills in the grasping of higher concepts of learning and subsequent inductive and deductive reasoning in practical and theoretical use of these concepts became clearly evident through his success at Mount Herman HS.

Subsequent to high school graduation in 1910, John matriculated at Bangor Theological Seminary, as they had a program which accepted, as Mount Herman high school did, the underprivileged for excellent education.  John continued his excellence in academic pursuit through seminary in Bangor, Maine for three years from 1910 to 1913.  While in Bangor he was called to a Baptist Church in the area as Minister for his final year in Maine.  He was known well for his gentlemanly stature and the characteristic dry wit of an intellectual, considerately targeting the magnitude of intellectual acumen required to understand his humor to his current company. His ability to wax philosophically was welcomed for its reliance on facts in history and the Moral Law of God instead of the blind passions of prejudice, as he intellectually and theologically pursued an idea, concept or principle unto marked goals of consideration and conjecture. John utilized, to the Glory of God whom he served, his grasp of Greek language and his affinity for history as indication of the Sovereignty of God in God’s plan of creation, fall and redemption in Jesus Christ.

Upon completion of his theological degree in 1913 he was called to the ministry in Bethel Vermont for a year where he came in contact with Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont which was approximately 40 miles away.  He studied at Middlebury College from 1913 to 1916 ending with a degree in History and Political Science.  His academic performance at Middlebury College was of the same caliber and excellence as he had become known for in every academic setting he entered upon.

This academic excellence was recognized at Harvard University and he was matriculated into Harvard Law in 1916 as World War I continued in Europe.  His academic excellence continued through his first year at Harvard Law school but the war in Europe and on the high seas of the Atlantic with its ancillary seas touching the lands of Europe, caught more and more of John’s attention as it did all of America, especially its young men of military age, with aspirations to early-American patriotism  or a marked sense of responsibility to act in a way beneficial to the continuance of the faithful way of life.  America had risen from the Reformation’s exudation of Righteousness, to grasp this obedience to God who had placed before them in the birthing years of this nation, a sense of the Truth of Scripture, an attitude which asserts the Kingdom of Christ is in place and the Creation being Redeemed in the Name of Christ through the Body of Christ, the Church, which be His vehicle of Righteousness’ spread. Not all knew this mind, as, since the mid-1800’s a cancer of humanism which is essentially the glorification and worship of man, has infected first the Church and then the nation’s population and then it’s governing body, today being formed into a false deity by the ignorance spread through government schooling which would have broken John’s heart; the spiritual deadening of our children. John still carried the fullness of hope founded in a dependent Faith in God, not a tyrannical control by a government to give the illusion of safety and continuity. Patriotism used to be this Faith. In 1917 Pres. Wilson went before Congress to make the case for war against Germany after unrestricted submarine warfare was reconstituted by the Germans.  On April 6, 1917 the US declared war on Germany.

After completing his first year of Harvard Law school, by the time of matriculation for his second year of Harvard Law school, he had determined that war against German aggression would be where he would place his skills and honor to the test.  In August of 1917 John Prescott Hoyt entered military training as a second lieutenant at the Plattsburgh, New York 17th Provisional Training Regiment, 3^rd Company.  By November 27 of 1917 John was accepted into the Air Division Signal Officers Reserve Corps.  He was transferred to Kelly Field, Texas and boarded a train from Vermont to San Antonio Texas on December 11, where Kelly Field was located.  John arrived at a chaotic time when the vast numbers of the men arriving for Air Service training far exceeded the organization and supply provisions awaiting their arrival.  John was part of the gargantuan effort to bring this chaos of man and matériel imbalance under control.  Finally in January, Lt. Col. Quackenbush was brought in and assisted by Maj. Lackland, Maj.  Bonesteel and Maj.  Clagett along with all the first and second lieutenants, including second lieutenant John Prescott Hoyt.  They formed the Air Service Concentration Brigade with a Trades Division out of which squadrons were formed by trade of the officer and a Recruitment Division for new recruits entering camp.  This effort saved lives as sickness was avoided through constant screening and quarantine as these officers worked night and day to keep their men safe; they were certainly unsung heroes.

John was sent to Taliaferro Field in Hicks Texas after January 1917 for short time to utilize his skills in organization of the paperwork of the new recruits.  He was then sent to Carruthers field in Benbrook Texas, just outside of Fort Worth Texas.  At Carruthers field he was assigned to the 209th Squadron and subsequently reassigned to do 274th Squadron.  During this time his exceptional analytical, organizational and interpersonal skills were spotted and he was tapped as part of a military tribunal to investigate a problem which was killing many young airmen, far more than battle was….  Accidents.  He served honorably on this tribunal to assess the issues that led to death of these military pilots and form strategies to save lives.  While serving on this tribunal John was working diligently to be sent overseas, acquiring all necessary gear plus three very difficult to obtain typewriters for the thorough equipping of his squadron with all necessities and in any case possible, redundancies.  It was during this time of the incessant effort to be sent into battle that he developed the moniker “Overseas Jack”.

During one of John’s training flights which gave respite from the frenetic activities of the time, John deviated from his planned (and permitted) route.  You see John, as a young man in South Dakota, was an avid and accomplished duck hunter.  John had spent many a splendid evening and morning amongst the cattails and Sawgrass of the lake shores in South Dakota with his trusty hunting dog.  These nostalgic memories acted like an ethereal magnet to his heart and drew his training “Jenny” which he was piloting over Lake Worth just outside Fort Worth.

He had seen ducks over the lake and wanted to assess any duck action visible on the lake that day….  against flight pattern rules!  Well, John found out just why those rules were there when his Jenny lost engine power!  John glided adroitly towards the tree line and barely missed the tops of the last trees before entering the airspace over a small pasture where he glided to a landing at a good speed and immediately saw the cliff spanning the side of the ravine he was headed towards!  In a shot right out of the old silent movies of stark heroism and literal cliffhanger escapes, John jerked the rudder to the right for a 90° angle turn at the last second, avoiding tumbling into the ravine and certain death!  These were the days when men were men and schools had not yet fully fallen under the government sanctioned ignorance of today.  John Rockefeller’s and John Dewey’s plans for creating mindless worker bees in government education centers which pervade our nation today, had not extricated higher-order thought and philosophical considerations yet.  Therefore our Renaissance Man, John Prescott Hoyt Sr found the problem of a broken fuel line and immediately engineered a solution with the jack-knife he always carried; he returned to the pilot seat, cranked up his airplane and in the limited confines of that field took off and return to base.  Now THAT is a REAL MAN.

John On December 27, 1918 John Prescott Hoyt, second Lieut., Sixth Company Second Wing Air Service Concentration Brigade, was honorably discharged and departed his final station at Kelly Field Texas to South Royalton Vermont where the military adventure ended.  He was placed on Reserve Military Pilot status, inactive as of January 18, 1919.

John met Elsie Pearl Ralph who was the niece of the illustrious Eliza Jane Watson, the wife of the rubber and potash magnate, John Jay Watson.  Pearl, as she became known, was teaching at Bethel High School where John Hoyt had Pastored before attending Middleberry College.  Pearl had been educated at Barnard College in New York City with a concentration in the languages, especially French and Latin as well as mathematics and history, preparing her for the mental acuity of her future husband.

John courted Pearl after the war with diligence, this with a Godly man’s consideration and adoration of the gentle glory of God’s feminine creation.  John had a patience which spoke to the paramount importance of this delicate yet persevering woman and the glorious gift of this woman’s love.  John knew the Biblical analogy of Jesus Christ’s relationship to the Church, His Bride, and how Jesus laid His life down for her cleansing unto Righteousness and her eternal salvation from lasting harm or danger.  He knew that Jesus gave and used the Word of God for his Bride’s cleansing in Righteousness, that she may reflect his glory, just as John knew he must cleanse his bride with that same Word that she may know the security of being loved by God and by a man of God. John Prescott Hoyt and Elsie Pearl Ralph became Mr. and Mrs. John Prescott Hoyt on June 30, 1920 as John took full responsibility for his bride and her edification in the very Word of God he had dedicated his life to, in knowing his Creator and God of Life.

Now we will digress a little, for context, unto the vast majority of the rest of John and Pearls’ life together.  In 1916, John spent a summer with Hobe Morgan on Lake Champlain as Hobe had tuberculosis and was referred to the area around Lake Champlain as best for a  geographical/environmental treatment for his condition and recovery.  John’s sister Clara had married a gentleman named Horace Kinney from South Hero, Vermont on Grand Isle on Lake Champlain.  John agreed to work one day a week on Kinney’s farm and the rest he would finish with Hobe.  They journeyed to a small island via canoe, called Cedar Island on Lake Champlain where they met 5 commercial fishermen trolling for Pike.

These 2 college boys weren’t exactly what the fishermen had in mind for good company so they suggested that Hobe and John paddled a canoe over toward Milton, VT on the shores of Lake Champlain for a good campsite and renowned fishing spot.  John and Hobe found the very cold spring on the shore feeding into the lake and made their campsite there in what became an enchanting shoreline of the most exquisite and glorious beauty which John would never forget.  John and Hobe finished out the summer there with the new metal boat they had acquired called “Old Beaney”, fishing, boating and sharing in the friendship they had been blessed with.  At summer’s end they left the boat with someone nearby; Hobe went on to Providence, Rhode Island for his career and John headed off to Harvard Law school with a clear and intractable vision of the potential of a little campsite with the spring on the shores of Lake Champlain in Milton, Vermont.

John’s first teaching job began in the fall of 1920 at Chelsea High School in Chelsea, Massachusetts.  The beginning of a new section of John and Pearls’ life began joyfully on May 30, 1921 with the gracious arrival of John Prescott Hoyt Jr.  From this author’s communications with John Jr regarding his dad, John Sr, I sense that John Jr grew up in a home that knew the safety, peace and order given as joyful Grace, in Love, to the home of those who have been blessed to be touched with the Word of God as a foundation for life.  John was the head of the English department at Chelsea High School for 3 years.

In the spring of 1922 John Sr was blessed with the opportunity to buy 150 acres which included that particular shoreline that never left John’s heart, on Lake Champlain in Milton, Vermont!  It was the very same campsite which John Sr and Hobe had discovered by gracious Providence those several years before.  John was wise with his money with Pearl’s good encouragement and edification and he put together the funds necessary to purchase that section of land which had never left his heart from the time the Lord blessed him with stepping foot on it.  In 1923 John moved his teaching skills to Chapman Tech High School in New London, Connecticut and this was the year of the arrival of Gladys Helen Hoyt, John and Pearls’ daughter, to their great delight as a family.  He continued his headship of the English department at Chadman Tech and excelled both in the academic performance of his students as well is the anecdotal and social graces that were showered upon him in regard to his character and his capacity for relationship, with those he worked with and those he taught.  At this point in John Srs career, he began one of the most influential undertakings to which one who is involved with students at this level of their educational career, can be blessed with.  John began to work with his students as a Guidance Counselor regarding the choices they were making currently, the issues that influenced those choices, the problems they had to overcome regarding their chosen path of progression educationally and eventually vocationally and of course the powerful and sometimes tragic aspects of the lives of children as they transition from childhood to young adult.

During this time John Sr was marked as standing apart from others who worked with these children in presenting wisdom to them to facilitate and the decision-making process regarding what they had been called to in their lives.  John was known for truly seeking out the young adult’s heart’s desire regarding vocational pursuit as well as taking into account academic performance and capacities when counseling them regarding further pursuit of academia or after High School, their focusing on the particular trade which interested the young adult, possibly as an apprentice.  Apprenticeship used to be the most effective way of transferring acumen in any given trade, and developed deep and meaningful relationships between mentor and protégé, accentuating and augmenting the skills of both teacher and student in a synergy which the stale classrooms of today are completely insufficient to manifest.

John was also known for his acute awareness of the importance of social interaction and relationship building around whatever focal point in society brought a group of people together in a common purpose.  At this point, John Jr was beginning to participate in this aspect of John Sr and Pearls’ life, as events like clam bakes were held to bring this New London community together in a genial atmosphere where they not only shared in the intensity and the focus of the job but in the joys and laughter, tears and sorrow, thoughts and dreams of the more complete and honest aspects and areas of their lives.  John built community and John Jr learned that from him.

During his time as teacher, director and counselor at the schools, John was building his dream encampment on the shores of Lake Champlain.  By 1927 he had built a cottage on the property with 3 rooms, using a raft of lumber and a motor boat to bring materials 5 miles across the lake to Milton, the building site.  In addition, between 1925 and 1927 there was a gargantuan effort in building a mile and a half road leading from the camp to the main road into Milton.  The road was such an effort comparatively speaking, because the work was done with horses and a drag bucket and a great deal of elbow grease!  In those days, instead of a tractor removing a stump or a boulder, this was facilitated with an “accelerated” removal process utilizing Black Powder!  The housekeeping cottage became a rental eventually and a very desirable destination for vacationers, as this particular cottage’s design made it the most sought after centerpiece of the camp.  Cold Spring Camp as it came to be known, was an unmatched destination for fishing and experiencing the peaceful purgation of time spent at nature’s pace, apart from the chaos and constant hyper awareness of the population centers of civilization.

From 1928 to 1931 the 2nd and 3rd cottage were built on the property and the feasibility of the property as a whole becoming self-contained as a business and lifestyle began to dawn.  As the 1930s began, John began to move toward turning the property toward an additional use in farming.  In 1932 Fred Lamberton passed away, John Sr’s uncle.  Aunt Clara gave John Sr the farm equipment from their homestead in North Pomfret Vermont to begin production of both hey and eventually produce.  John Jr participated by undertaking the care of a hen and chicks which in Clara gave to him for his 4-H project.  By this time America was heavily hit by the Great Depression and John was released as the head of the English department at Chapman Tech High School.

Providence has a way of moving the man of God to a place of Grace unrecognized at the time but fully according to God’s will.  John undertook management of the property he had been blessed with for the rest of his life building a cottage is in all and a lovely home completed in 1932 for his family.  In addition to the farming John took up Maple Syrup and Maple Sugar production; this was accomplished by tapping the trees, with 1200 buckets hung on those taps during the springtime for a production of 200 gallons per year of delicious Maple Syrup.  John never lost touch with his relationship with God and any of the families who were blessed to stay on his property were kindly ministered to and his heart for the Lord was shared with them.  Cold Spring Camp was transformed into a center for the ministry of hospitality to over 55 families each and every year under the leadership of John Senior.  John participated in the community in Milton along with Pearl including becoming a Master Mason and joining along with Pearl the Eastern Star of the Masons.  By the end of building, there were 7 two-bedroom cottages and one one-bedroom cottage  John Jr and Gladys participated in the augmentation of the family’s property into all its different facets and when I say facets I mean it; for this place stationed on the shores of Lake Champlain was certainly a gem.

In 1952, at 63 years old John Sr had a heart attack which debilitated him physically and he died peacefully in his sleep in August of
1954.  When we read of the lives of men of God and compare the lives of our leaders today in 2012, we can see that at one time God did bless America with good ungodly men who had the capacity to truly loved and take responsibility for her family.  I for one am blessed to be able to record this story and am so thankful to John Prescott Hoyt Jr for giving me the opportunity to hear his words, his memories, his Love….. and to record them all through my mind’s eye.  God bless you John Jr and thank you.

Story recorded from notes taken August 8, 2012 in conversation with John Prescott Hoyt Jr regarding his father John Prescott Hoyt Sr

Jonathan Prescott Hoyt Senior – Life Story – MS Word Version for Download & View or Save