Nelly Bly, Elephants and Flying the Hump

Earlier today I packaged my latest book for delivery to my editor: The Hump 1942–45: America's first massive military airlift. One of the photos I will use in it is this one:

Yup. That's an elephant loading a 55-gallon fuel barrel into a C-46. Gasoline, especially 100-octane aviation fuel, was one of the major cargoes taken from India to China during World War II. The first cargo carried was 100 octane to refuel the Doolittle Raiders when they landed in China. (It didn't work out and the gasoline was used for other aircraft.)

As I was writing the caption I wondered if the barrel was empty or full. I thought it had to be full, because why load an empty fuel barrel onto a transport in India? I could see moving empty fuel barrels from China to India, but not from India to China.

That raised another question: could an elephant lift a full barrel of fuel with its trunk?

The first thing I needed to know was how much an elephant can lift with its trunk. I did some web searching and came across several sites that gave the answer: 660 to 700 pounds. More accurately, 6% of its body weight.

How much does that standard barrel weigh when full? Regular gasoline weighs about 6 pounds per gallon. 100 octane weighs a bit more - about 6.25 pounds per gallon. (I had dug out the fuel weights earlier while writing the book.) I did not remember how much a standard steel fuel drum carries or what it weighs. So I did some more web searches.

Turns out the standard fuel barrel holds 55 gallons and weighs about 40 pounds empty. (It varies between 38 to 42 pounds.) That is what the AI result yielded on my search. I mistrust AI, so I went to manufacturer and trade industry sites to confirm the weight. This time the AI was right. Which means a full steel barrel weighs around 400 pounds.

Four hundred pounds is well within the comfort limit of an adult elephant. So they were loading aircraft with full drums of avgas on the India end of the China airlift.

Where does Nelly Bly fit into this story? She is best known as an investigative reporter and her famous 1889 round-the-world trip—done as a newspaper promotion. She steamed past India without visiting during her 72-day trip, stopping at Ceylon (today's Sri Lanka) instead.

I came across her name when researching oil barrels. Turns out, in 1895 she married a manufacturing millionaire. When he died in 1904, she took over the company, Iron Clad Manufacturing Co., which manufactured steel containers. Shortly afterward, the company released a new product: the first-ever 55-gallon liquids barrel. It quickly became the industry standard. She did not invent it (as some have claimed) but one of her employees did.

Her real name was Elizabeth Jane Cochran — Elizabeth Cochran Seaman after marriage. Nelly Bly was a pen name.

These types of discoveries are why I find writing so fun. When I started writing this book, I never dreamed that in the process I would discover a connection between an elephant carrying fuel drums and a 19th-century investigative reporter. Yet there it was. It was one of dozens of such things that popped up that never appear in the book. Outtakes, so to speak.