The plan for the flight was conceived by the Air Service's Assistant Chief, Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell in 1923. The Air Service since 1919 had been regularly establishing endurance, distance, altitude and speed records in airplanes to promote favorable publicity and public support for the funding of the U.S. Army War Department's Major Project Number 4, the Lassiter plan for the expansion of the Air Service. The year before Lt. James H. Doolittle had flown a DH-4 from Florida to San Diego in a single calendar day, making just one stop in Texas for fuel. Mitchell wanted to not only improve on both the time and distance involved, but to have the stunt highly publicized by having it takeoff and land during daylight at major urban centers. The military purpose of the flight would be to demonstrate the utility of rapidly moving air units from one side of the nation to the other, a capability that the Army and Navy did not possess.