GPS June 2020

Zeppelin Matchmaker:
LZ-126 / ZR3 Trial Flight
Cheryl R. Ganz
Decades ago, I obtained a zeppelin mail drop bag in auction – a
major purchase for me at that stage of my young collecting life. From the
pioneer period before World War I through the early Graf Zeppelin years,
drop bags full of mail were released from aboard zeppelins, the mail
inside to be posted by the finder. By 1936, when Hindenburg flew, safety
concerns prompted zeppelin officers to forbid such drops. They feared a
card or bag being caught in a propeller. These bags had always fascinated
me, and owning one from a trial flight of the LZ-126, also known as
ZR3 and later as Los Angeles, absolutely thrilled me.
Images 1 & 2. LZ-126 drop mail bag from the 5th trial
flight over Germany, 1924. (front and reverse)
In August and
September of 1924,
the LZ-126 made
six trial flights over
Germany before Dr.
Hugo Eckener and
the crew flew it over
the Atlantic Ocean to
deliver the reparations
airship to the U.S.
Navy at Lakehurst,
New Jersey, in
October. Drop mail
has been recorded
from the second,
third, fifth, and sixth trial flights. All drop mail is extremely rare due to
the small numbers dropped and the smaller number of surviving examples.
Surviving mail drop bags are even rarer.
My drop bag is from the 33-hour, 26-minutes fifth trial flight,
known as the “Greater Germany Flight,” which took place on September
25-26, 1924. The LZ-126 flew over major cities on a route that circled
the country from Friedrichshafen to the coast of Sweden and back. There
were twenty-eight crew and forty-three passengers aboard. The zeppelin
arrived over Flensburg at 6:17 p.m. and departed at 6:23. During this
228
German Postal Specialist