Masashi Goto wanted to be remembered as one of the first pilots to fly around the world.
Goto, the first Japanese citizen to have a pilot's license in the United States, plotted a course that would have taken him across America and Europe to Tokyo. His dream died when he crashed July 4, 1929, during a thunderstorm in the Uinta Mountains near Francis, Summit County.Goto didn't accomplish his goal, but that doesn't mean he has been forgotten. On Friday, the Uinta National Forest Service and Utah chapters of the Japanese-American Citizens League will rededicate a monument to him that was erected after the crash.
Ray Pugsley, representing Rep. Merrill Cook, R-Utah, rededicated the monument. Third District Judge Raymond Uno read a letter written by Gov. Morihiko Hiramatsu of Oita, Japan. The letter thanks Utah residents for taking the time to honor Goto, who was born in Oita.
Erin Nishi, special projects coordinator for the Mount Olympus Japanese-American Citizens League, will sketch Goto's history and his accomplishments.
Goto was an adventurer, she said. He left Japan at the age of 20 when he took a job on a French cargo ship. He traveled the world on a ship for about two years. He quit his job and lived in England before moving to Los Angeles in 1926. It was there that he started flying.
"He had seen the world from a ship and he wanted to see it from a plane," said Tomoko Moses, who serves as a contact between Goto's family in Oita and Utah's Japanese community.
Goto did gardening work in California while he saved money for a plane. With the help of a friend, Takeo Watanabe, who was a superintendent at the Crawford Aircraft Co. in Venice, Calif., Goto built a one-seater biplane. He called the plane the "Ryofu," which means the Thunderbird.
The two built the plane in a garage in Venice. It had a wingspan of 22 feet and a length of 14 feet, Nishi said. The plane had a five-cylinder Pratt and Whitney engine.
Goto, 33, flew up the coast to Oakland July 1, 1929, on the first leg of a journey. The next day, he flew to Reno, Nev. On July 3, 1929, Goto touched down in Salt Lake City.
On Independence Day, with a small American flag in the plane, Goto flew out of Salt Lake City bound for New York City. He piloted his plane through Parleys Canyon and past Park City. When he reached the base of the Uinta mountains, Goto encountered a heavy thunderstorm, Nishi said.
The plane was found five days later 13 miles southeast of Francis. Goto hit his head on the instrument panel. He broke his neck and died instantly. Watanabe identified the body. Goto was taken back to Los Angeles and buried.
Nishi thinks Goto was trying to fly under the storm and flew too low for the mountains when he crashed, she said. Goto planned to put the plane on a ship to cross the Atlantic Ocean if he would have made it to New York. He then planned to fly across Europe and Asia to his homeland of Japan.
He read stories of aviator legends, such as Amelia Earhart and the Wright brothers. He wanted to make history as they did, Nishi said.
The rededication will take place 13 miles east of Francis on Wolf Creek Road (U-35) at 11 a.m. Friday.
A new plaque will be put on the monument because vandals have shot the old one and scratched it with knives, said Loyal Clark, a spokeswoman for the Uinta National Forest. The monument will be moved a few feet away from the road so it won't be such an easy target.
The monument will be about 3,000 feet from the site where Goto crashed 68 years ago.