Linton Wells
| Linton Wells | |
|---|---|
| Born |
April 1, 1893 Louisville, Kentucky, USA |
| Died | January 14, 1976 Washington, D.C., USA |
| Occupation | News reporter and correspondent |
Linton Wells (1893–1976) was an American foreign correspondent, world traveler and pioneer broadcaster.
Born in Louisville, Kentucky, on April 1, 1893, he attended the US Naval Academy with the Class of 1914, but left before graduation. He began his career as a foreign correspondent with the China Press in Shanghai in 1912, covering Sun Yat Sen and the Xinhai Revolution. Returning from China early in World War I via Europe, he covered a revolution in Mexico, learned to fly in 1915, and helped build the first dam in Samoa.
After service in the Navy during World War I, he covered the Russian revolution, being imprisoned briefly by the Bolsheviks near Irkutsk. Following reporting from East Asia, he returned to the States in 1921 to cover Hollywood and events along the West Coast, returning to Japan in 1923, just in time to be injured in the Great Kantō earthquake of September 1, 1923.
In 1924, while working for the Associated Press, he stowed away on the US Army aircraft Boston during the Calcutta to Karachi leg of the first round-the-world flight. The following year he and Leigh Wade, who had been the pilot of the Boston during the First World Flight, made the first non-stop automobile trip between Los Angeles and New York (167 hours and 50 minutes).
In 1926 he and Edward Steptoe Evans set a record for the fastest circumnavigation of the globe (28 days, 14 hours, 36 min). The following year he participated in fighting in Nicaragua, and returned to newspaper work in 1929 reporting from Europe for the International News Service.
From 1932 to early 1934 he reported from Moscow, where he met his future wife, the aviator Fay Gillis. After covering the coronation of the Puppet Emperor Puyi in Manchukuo, he returned to the US.
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