Wrong Way Corrigan

We have all seen football players running the wrong way on the field, and some announcer will refer to the unfortunate player as Wrong Way Corrigan.

The original ‘Wrong Way’ was not a football player; he was Douglas Corrigan, unemployed airplane mechanic. It was on a foggy day in 1938, that Douglas left Floyd Bennett Field in New York, supposedly headed for Los Angeles. He landed his monoplane about 28 hours later in Ireland at Dublin’s Baldonnel Field. He had originally been denied a flight plan to Ireland and some think he did it on purpose, because he was of Irish descent.

Corrigan made the 3,150-mile flight without benefit of a radio or navigational equipment other than a compass. His explanation for the monumental mistake was that he was following the wrong end of the compass needle.

He was welcomed home as a hero with a ticker tape parade and known became Wrong Way Corrigan.