General Muir Stephen Fairchild (September 2, 1894 – March 17, 1950) was a United States Air Force officer and the service's second Vice Chief of Staff. Early service Born in Bellingham, Washington, Fairchild moved to Olympia in 1905 when his father was appointed by Governor Meade as chairman of Washington's first Railroad Commission. Muir graduated from Olympia High School (officially William Winlock Miller High School) in 1913, then entered the U.S. Army's Signal Corps in 1913 in an Army Signal Corps reserve unit in Seattle, while he was a student at the University of Washington. In 1916, he was deployed in the Washington National Guard with the rank of sergeant, and his unit joined in the search for Pancho Villa along the Mexican border, where he spent much time in a horse saddle in the desert heat. Watching observation planes flying overhead in the United States' first armed conflict using airplanes, Fairchild was an easy recruit when flyboys were being sought to fight with the French and Italians in the developing war in Europe, before the U.S. entered World War I. A year later Fairchild became a flying cadet at Berkeley, California, getting his wings and commission in the U.S. Army's Aviation Section in January 1918. Fairchild fought the Germans from the air over the Rhine, including night bombing missions, in an era when bombs were still being released from the hand grasp of the bombardier. Between the wars In December 1918 Fairchild returned home and served at McCook Field, Ohio; Mitchel Field, New York, and Langley Field, Virginia. On October 20, 1922 he was practicing dog fighting with Lt. Harold Ross Harris; when Harris lost control of his aircraft and was forced to parachute his way to safety; ironically nearly a year later August 22, 1923 both Harris and Fairchild piloted the US Military first heavy bomber the Witteman-Lewis XNBL-1. In 1926 and 1927, he flew to South America as part of the Pan American Good Will Flight a pioneering flight that sought to promote air postal service, U.S. commercial aviation and take messages of friendship to the governments and people of Central and South America, while forging aerial navigation routes through the Americas. The flight originated with five aircraft and crews taking off from Kelly Field, Texas on December 21, 1926, seeking to land in 23 Central and South American countries. The aircraft used for the journey were