Lituanica was a Bellanca CH-300 Pacemaker airplane flown from the United States across the Atlantic Ocean by Lithuanian pilots Steponas Darius and Stasys Girėnas in 1933.

On January 20, 1933, the aircraft was moved to E. M. Laird workshops at 5321 W. 65th St. in the Clearing Industrial District, Chicago, where she was rebuilt and outfitted for the transatlantic flight.

Steponas Darius and Stasys Girėnas were Lithuanian pilots, emigrants to the United States, who made a significant flight in the history of world aviation.

On July 15, 1933, they flew across the Atlantic Ocean, covering a distance of 3,984 miles (6,411 kilometers) without landing, in 37 hours and 11 minutes (107.1 mph).

Although Darius and Girenas did not have navigational equipment and flew under unfavorable weather conditions, the flight was one of the most precise in aviation history.

An ordinary unmodified plane of this size cannot cover a comparable distance (the Cessna 152, for instance, has a range of 1200 km), even today.

The flight was also important from a scientific and technological perspective, as it explored air flows and the capabilities of this type of aircraft.

In their last letter, the pilots wrote that either a successful flight or a possible catastrophe would be valuable and significant enough and hence it was worthwhile to fly in either case.

The planned route was: New York – Newfoundland – Atlantic Ocean – Ireland – London – Amsterdam – Swinemünde – Königsberg – Kaunas airport (a total of 7,186 km).

In 1931, Girėnas had won first prize in a flight festival in Chicago for gliding his plane and landing with a dead engine.

A few months after the Lituanica tragedy, some prominent members of the Chicago Lithuanian community discussed the possibility of financing another transatlantic flight.

When the pilot originally chosen for the flight unexpectedly resigned in the spring, the Lithuanian organizers turned to Felix Waitkus, and he accepted the challenge.

Although he landed in Ireland and not in Kaunas, he entered aviation history for being the sixth pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic.

In 1936 the Lithuanian government decided to build a mausoleum for Darius and Girėnas in Kaunas' old cemetery, that was destroyed after Soviet re-occupation.

There is a tall stone monument near the stadium, the Lithuanian Academy of Sport and the Ąžuolynas Park dedicated to the pilots.

Sculptor Bronius Pundzius made a relief of the pilots' faces on the Puntukas, then the largest known boulder in the territory of Lithuania, in 1943.

But should Neptune and the mighty ruler of storms Perkūnas unleash their wrath upon us, should they stop our way to Young Lithuania and call Lituanica to their realm – then You, Young Lithuania, will have to resolve anew, make sacrifice and prepare for a new quest, so that gods of stormy oceans be pleased with Your effort, resolution, and do not summon You for the Great Judgement.