Elmer Stone graduated from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, Class of 1913. He became the Coast Guard’s first aviator upon graduation from flight training at Pensacola. During World War I while assigned to the U.S.S. Huntington, he made several convoy escort patrols across the Atlantic. Lieutenant Stone was the Coast Guard’s leading aviator, and in 1933 was the only pilot willing to risk a sea-landing during a major storm in order to rescue three survivors of the Navy dirigible Akron, which went down off the Atlantic coast. In 1934 he set a new world speed record for seaplanes. He died of a heart attack while serving in San Diego on May 26, 1936.