All the way back to the 1950s . . .
Reading up on the X-15 programme, which included Scott Crossfield as a pilot, making 14 of the 199 test flights. But he flew other kinds of aircraft also - for example, he flew a North American F-100 Super Sabre.
While flying one of those, as described at his Wikipedia page, he once had to make a dead stick landing, and "was forced to use the wall of the NACA hangar as a makeshift brake".
That's a nice way to put it. Has anyone here ever had to use a wall as a makeshift brake? :P