By the early 1950s Midway Airport, Chicago's main airport since 1931, was the world's busiest airport and was too crowded despite multiple expansions.
In 1953, while flying to an airshow at Naval Air Station Glenview north of Chicago, Blue Angels pilot LT Harding MacKnight experienced an engine flameout in his F7U Cutlass, forcing him to make an emergency landing at NAS Glenview.