BIO: Texas-born Douglas CORRIGAN (1907-1995) was a welder by trade and an amateur pilot. Inspired by Lindbergh's famous 1927 Atlantic crossing, Corrigan bought a 1929 Curtis-Robin plane off a garbage pile. He modified and rebuilt the plan so that it could make a flight across the Atlantic. Officials at the Federal Bureau of Air Commerce, however, denied him the permit, citing his inexperience as a pilot and the dreadful condition of his airplane. Determined to get his share of aviation glory, Corrigan hatched an ingenious plan. On July 18, 1938, he set off in his plane bound, he told his friends, for California. Instead, he pointed his plane NE and soared out over the Atlantic. Some 28 hours and 13 minutes later (five hous better than Lindbergh) he touched down at Baldonnel Airport near Dublin. "Just in from New York," he announced to the startled airfield attendants, "Where am I?" When informed that he was in Ireland, Corrigan feigned shock. "You mean," he said, "this isn't California?" Word spread quickly about the wacky Yank who'd mistakenly made a 3,150-mile transatlantic flight without benefit of a radio or navigational equipment other than a compass. For two weeks he was Ireland's biggest celebrity and when he returned to the U. S. on August 4th, "Wrong Way" Corrigan received a hero's welcome. His plan had worked to perfection. The bizarre nature of his feat earned him the fame he sought, and since the whole thing was an "honest mistake," he avoided prosecution for making an unauthorized flight. Corrigan earned a few dollars selling his story to magazines and Hollywood, then took up farming in California and disappeared from public view. He stuck to his story that his famous journey had been a mistake right up to the day he died. The sentimental still believed him. The rest understood his story for what it was -- a brilliant bit of well-timed blarney. -- Excerpt, "1001 Things Everyone Should Know About Irish American History, " Edward T. O'Donnell (2002).