Description
Writings and speeches, photographs, correspondence, and
printed matter, 1933-1963, relating to Joseph S. Marriott's career in the Civil
Aeronautics Administration and its predecessor, the Bureau of Air Commerce, with
special reference to the states of California, Hawaii, Arizona, and Utah.
Background
Joseph S. Marriott was born on a farm near Waterford, Stanislaus County, California,
on July 5, 1895. He graduated from Stanford University in 1917, with a B.A. in
Analytical Chemistry. After attending Aviation Ground School at the University of
California, Berkeley, and receiving his flight training at Rockwell Field, San
Diego, he was commissioned a first lieutenant in the aviation section of the Army
Signal Corps in December 1917. He served as a flight instructor at Park Field,
Millington, Tennessee. For a brief time after the war he flew barnstorming
exhibitions with the Memphis Aerial Company. At the end of 1920, he returned to
California, received a teaching credential, and taught high school chemistry and
physics for five years in Marin County. During this period he retained his
affiliation with the Army Reserve. In 1927, he obtained a position with the newly
established Aeronautics Branch of the Department of Commerce. The Aeronautics Branch
developed into the Bureau of Air Commerce, and became the Civil Aeronautics
Administration (CAA) in 1938, and the Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) in 1958. Except
for service as the War Department member on the Inter-Departmental Air Traffic
Control Board during World War II, Marriott remained with the Commerce Department
until his retirement in 1956. During the 1930's he served as Assistant Chief, then
Chief of Inspection Service, for the Bureau of Air Commerce. Upon leaving active
military service in 1946, he became CAA regional manager for the five southwestern
states; when the CAA was reorganized several years later his authority was extended
to cover the 11 western states. A lieutenant colonel by 1936, he was promoted to
colonel in 1943, and to brigadier general between 1952 and 1954. He died in Vista,
California, in March 1984.