first Hispanic fighter pilot in the Marines. Historical flights In July 1919, he went to Texas. Rigau Carrera met Bertha Dunston (1900–1989), who became his wife in 1919 and with whom he was to have three children, Félix (1921–1995), Carmen (1923–2016), and Jaime (1925–1970) Rigau Carrera returned to Puerto Rico and made it clear to everyone that knew him that his main objective was to be able to someday own his own and fly his own aircraft. Consequently, his four brothers helped him financially to buy his first aircraft, a Curtiss JN-4, $2,250 in 1919. The Curtiss JN-4 "Jenny" was one of a series of "JN" biplanes built by the Curtiss Aeroplane Company of Hammondsport, New York, later the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company. Rigau Carrera piloted his first flight in Puerto Rico, flying out of Camp Las Casas, the exact area where Residencial Las Casas is currently located, becoming the first Puerto Rican pilot to do so. At the time, the area was used by the military as an air base and it was also Puerto Rico's first commercial airport, and Rigau Carrera was allowed to perform his historic flight from the air field. Rigau Carrera then started using the air base frequently, for exhibition flights and to carry paying passengers on sightseeing trips. He became a national hero in Puerto Rico during the 1920s, traveling to many Puerto Rican cities by air. The local town people celebrated his landings with live music and fireworks and he became known as "The Eagle of Sabana Grande". In 1931, Rigau Carrera was given a license by San Juan's mail system authority to deliver mail via air mail throughout the island, becoming the first pilot to fly on air mail carrying duties in Puerto Rico. Rigau Carrera then established a system similar to the one used by the airlines today, where he would fly people from one point of the island to another, with paying customers on board. Not all of his career went without problems, as Rigau Carrera almost lost his life during flights twice, once in San German and another time in Guanica. Later years Rigau Carrera settled in Gloucester, Virginia, in the early 1920s. He lived with his family in an old Abingdon Glebe School House and constructed a building to house a flour mill and other enterprises. Rigau Carrera founded the Rigau Concrete Works which manufactured a wide