New Britain Herald Newspaper, December 24, 1918, Page 10

“ALL ABOARD 'OR "HE NOIRTH “ By Charles W. Duke HAT the motorcar did before the war by way of building a new nationalism the airplane will do after the war by way of building a new in- ternationalism. Breakfast in New York, luncheon in Philadelphia and dinner in Wash- ington gave the motorist a new con- ception of the wide areas of his own United States. Ham and eggs in St. Louis, chili con earne in Mexico City and good old Argentine beef in Buenos Aires—all in one day—will link up the conti- nents in a new spirit ¢ imaraderie and coment the foundations of American brotherliood Crossing old ocean Tray and melancholy waste via t “Trans- atlantic Express,” and touching Lon- don, Paris, Rome and Constantinople in the time it now takes to travel by vail across the Andes Mountains, will put the individual at once in touch with the heart of the world—anid orify democracy Fifteen years ago the Wright othe: little sixteen-horsepower “mosquito,” carrying one intrepid pas genger, who literally “flew in the face of folly” and superstition. lifted off the earth and successfully negotiated an air voyage. Only a few days ago a huge air- plane flew over Paris with thirty-five passengers; another air machine scur- ried over London at a height of more than a mile carrying forty passeniers, and in the United States a pnir of pioneers shot across the continent from coast to coast. Future Possibilities What will happen in the next fifteen years? What the aviators of war have done through four long bloody years, translated in terms of peace achieve- ments, may amount to: 0ld and new worlds connected up by lines of aero-trains, the harbingers of the one world. Alr trunk lines spanning the great American Divide—timetables between Broadway and the Golden Gate, where- in sky pilot enginecers will measure in seconds tho mileage that James J. Hill and his fron rail ploneers meas- ured in hours Pan-American “limiteds,” whose commuters may 1pe Race and Cape Horn between sunrise and sun- set—the Seattle business man meeting his business partner in Valparaiso be- fore the hour hand circles the dial of his watch. The Viceroy of India volplaning to Parliament in London between week- end recesses-—traveling either west- ward over Asia and Europe, or, if the weather is propitious for a “spin” eastward over the Pacific, America and the Atlantic. Holland’s cup of coffee delivered from Java by aerial parcel post. The Christmas ‘card of the King of Siam and the New Year's card of the President of Liberia interexchanged during the holiday week by the aero- postman Cairo to Cape Town via air before engineers can connect up the remain- ing links in the land railway. To the North or South Poles by the “reindeer of the air’—the Santa Claus night express. The modern Nellle Bly—around the world in ninety hours Frivolous fancy? That's what they sald when “visiona men first strapped wings on their shoulders and leaped off sand cliffs in the earliest experiments with aviation. Worse yet —once when Glenn Curtiss was flying down the Hudson River he landed by accident in the front yard of the Poughkeepsic Asyvlum for the Insane. Come right in with the rest of the bugs,’ " snickered the keeper. You may pick up your paper any morning now and read of the accom- plishment of any one of these head- Just before the war came liners. about com- along preparations were plete for the first attempted tran atlantic flight. Had it continued a few months more Signor Gianni Ca- proni, the Ttallan wizard, whose ma- chines are among the marvels of air creations, probably would have made good his intention to carry a me ge from General Pershing to President Wilgon in Washington. There is no secret about the plans now under way for spanning the oceans. An airplane may carry a delegate to the peace con- ference, or bring back a copy of the world’s new “working agreement.” Transatlantic Flight “We are looking forward confldently to transaiantic flight”” said Augus- tus F. Post, of the Acro Club of America, not *long ago. “Machines building in Italy for this very pur- pose will make the flight of 1860 miles across the Atlantic from Ircland to Nova Scotia. Kipling’s ‘midnight train’ will come true. After the wat it will be possible to ride from Phila- delphia to San Francisco in three days and cr the Atlantic in little more than one, or two days. We shall reach the uttermost parts of the earth, and we shall consider the airplane part of our common life.” How about those transcontinental trips? Already the lanes of travel across America have been plotted. Flying machines of the Curtiss type, equipped with Liberty motors and capable of carrying from ten to twen- ty-five passengers, are being built to carry tourists this summer between New York, Philadelphia, Atlantic City and the Atlantic coast summer resorts, From Paris comes the announce- ment that the French Government is studying a proposition for the creation of twenty aerial lines connecting Paris with the chief towns of France and the great foreign centers. The King and Queen of Belgium flew from France to England and back as non- chalantly as a Yonkers commuter ne. gotiates the Battery in an “L” train “R. . D" formerly meant rural free delivery Wit means rapid flight delivery. Uncle ,Sam’s posta mail service has passed from the ex perimental stage to permanency. ready Government contracts for fizht ing machines that had progressed ic far to be cancelea have been trans ferred from the department of ait craft production to the department of the Postmaster General. The first aero Post between New York and Wash neton. developed in wartime, was the progenitor of the commercial air-car- vier of the new era. You who stood gaping into the blue. watching” the first sky postman ecir- cling over your home town, will tel your zrandehfldren, as they climb into their own 12-cylinder Fearless, hound for a week-end in the culti vated jungles of beautified Brazil, of the birth of the new era in aerial naviga- tion—just as our fathers stepped from the horse car to gaze in wonderment at the first “horseless car riage.’ Regular aircraft passen- &ger service between London and Paris probably will be the first peace time air line in operation. Already plans are matured for its maintenance. The time is to be two and a half hours and the fure fifteen guineas (378.73). In 1914 flight across the Englisii Channel was considered a wonderful and dangerous performance. Now the project for a transatlantic flight is well under way. Major General William Brancker, of the British Royal Air Force, came to this country last sum- mer to arrange with Secretary Daniels for such a trip under military aus- pices. “The sooner that a pioneer proves the flight not only to be pos- sible but comparatively safe,” said the general, “the better can the wonderful resources of America be employed.” But the American eagle has soared over the Rhine, the dove of peace flut- ters in the offing, and the airplane di- rects its energies not to the annihila- tion of man, but to the peaceful con- quest Of the air on a more compre- hensive scale. Some wonderful records have been made during the war that set the pace for peace-time accomplishments. What may be done by way of sus- tained flight was shown by Gabriel D'Annunzio, the famous Italian poet, who in August of this year flew over Vienna and dropped 2.000,000 peace manifestos. In all D'Annunzio trav- eled close to 800 miles in 6 hours and 35 minutes and at an average height of more than 16,000 feet. Most conspicuous, however, among the de- tails of this flight was the fact that for five hours the poet was entirely over enemy country in close proximity to heavy Austrian harrage fire “ive Miles a Minute Speed records have followed cach other in startling sequence. One mile in 331-5 seconds was the record mads by De Lloyd Thompson in a flight over the Hempstead, Long Island, course in 1916. The best orevious record had been 363-5 seconds, made by Glenn L. Martin, at Los Angeles Ccal. For average flying a mile a minute was considered a good pace before the war. Then it went up to eighty and 100 miles an hour. Next an engine was developed that gave a speed of 140 miles an hour. At the present time it is something close to 160 miles an hour—three miles a min- ute. Five miles a minute is the next objective. Cross-country reco:ds likewise bave increased on a marvelous scale. One year ago a squadron of four Ttalian aviators flew from Nor- folk, Va., to Mineola, I.. I, a distance of 330 miles. Lieutenant Baldioli, fly- ing alone, made the distance in two hours and fifty-five minutes. Captain A. Silvio, carrying cight passengers, covered the journey :n four hours and twenty-five minutes. In that same year Captain G. Lau- reami, an Italian, made two records. Fiying from Turin to Naples and back to Turin, a distance of 920 miles, in 10 hours and 33 minutes, he estab- lished a new non-stop world’s record. Not content with that he set out a month later from Turin and went all the way to London, a distance of 700 miles, crossing the Alps, carrying one passenger, and making the trip in 12 hours and minutes. Honors for Women American women have been playing a leading role in records made in this country. Two years ago Ruth Law traveled from Hornell, N. Y., to New York city, a distance of 294 miles, in 3 houis and 10 minutes. Then she went out to Chicago and flew to Hor- nell, nearly 600 miles, in less than six hours. Katherine Stinson, another American girl flyer, bettered Mis Law’s cross-country record in May of this vear, when she flew from Chicago to Binghamton. N. Y., without a stop, ' eighty-three These young ladies vied for honors in endurance Francisco, son having the better of the argument by 1 hour and 5 minutes. now closing will be known onl the official approved by revealed and the aerona.tical expert D’Annunzio’s statistics are this tabulation. records likely will go nounced by British Bureau of In- formation in September. was of a type used on the battlefront considerable The distance as the crow flies is more ment of such a feat would have been pronounced and lost sight of in the maclstrom of the conflict. record for long-distance flight was established in this country Spencer, signal electrician, and car- ng Major M. J. Boots as a passen- ger, was reported to have made a flight of more’ than 700 miles from Mount Clemens, Mich.. to Yonkers, N. Y., in 4 hours and 30 minutes. Iliness of his father provided ames M. Schoonmalker, Jr., son of the vice president of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad, with an oppor- tunity for a new specd record In October when he flew from Dayton, O., to Pittsburgh, a distance of 228 miles, in 1 hour and 15 minutes, or virtually three miles a minute. Receiving a telegram announcing the illness or his parent, young Schoonmaker, then chief engineer of tho Dayton-Wright Airplane Company, leaped to his air chariot and smashed the then exist- ing record of 2 hours and 5 minutes between the two citie: Altitude Records Altitude flights always have baffled the imagination. Starting with a climb of a mile above the earth, avia- tors have gradually worked their ma- chines up to four and five miles above the earth. When Caleb Bragg last year took two passengers up to an altitude of 12,900 feet, it was heraldea as a great feat, although air tourists had climbed twice as far when ing alone. Carlstrom, at News, went up 16,500 feet single passenger. Hawker, an English- man. ascended more than 24,000 feet at Brooklands, England, two years ago. This year. the honors—at least in this country—go to Captain R. W. Schroeder, of the American alr serv- ice. How it feels to glide along at a distance of five and a half miles above the earth is a matter of Govern- ment record. In his report to Major General Keeley, director of military aeronautics, Captain Schroeder wrote. “In order to take an airplane to a higher altitude than any other pilot in the world T found it would require more than one or two attémpts. I made three. The first took me to 24,000 feet, the second to 27,000 feet and the last one to 28,900 feet, bui now I feel certain that I can get to 3 The cold, thin air is one's greatest adversar “I took off at 1:43 o'clock the after- noon of Septemher 18, 1918, and made a steady, circular climb. At 20,000 feet my goggles became frosted, making it difficult for me to watch my instru- ments. When I reached 25,000 feet I noticed the sun growing very dim. I could hardly hear my motor run and I felt very hungry. I went to talking to myself, and this I felt was a good sign to begin taking oxygen, and 1 did. Frigid Flying “I was then more than 25,000 feet, and as soon as I started to inhale the oxygen the sun grew bright again, my motor began to exhaust so loud that it seemed something must be wrong with it; I was no longer hungry and th> day seemed to be a most beautiful one. 1 telt like singing with sheer joy. “The frost on my goggles bothered me very much. When I was up about 27,000 feet I had to remove my goggles, as 1 was unable to keep up a steady climb. My hands by this time were numb. The cold, raw air made my eves water and I was compelled to fly with my head well down inside the cockpit. “I kept at it until my oxygen gave out and at that point I noticed my aneroid indicated nearly 29,000 feet. The thermometer showed 32 degrees below zero, centigrade, and the revolu- tions per minute had dropped from 1600 to 1560. This is considered very good. But the lack of oxygen was affecting me. I was beginning to get cross and I could not understand why I was only 29,000 feet after climbing for so long a time. I remember that the horizon seemed to be very much out of place, but I felt that I was flying correctly and that I was right and the horizon was wrong. About this time the motor quit. “I was out of gasvline, so I de- scended In a large spiral. When I de- scended to about 20,000 feet I began to feel much better and realized that the lack of oxygen had affected me. “I did not see the ground from the time I went up through the ciouds above Dayton, O., until I came down through them again at 4000 feet above Canton, O., more than 200 miles trom where T started.” That new and more startling feats will be recorded in 1919 seems a per- fectly sane prophec Thousands of American men have learned the art of fiying during the war, even though the United States got off to a late start. Upon the day the armistice was signed there were actually engaged on the battlefront 740 American planes, 744 pilots, 457 observers and twenty-three aerial gunners. In all, it is known from official records that theéy ac- counted for 926 enemy planes and seventy-three balloons. In the final weeks of the war the Ljirst American Army aviators dropped 120 tons of OLE OR OVER: THE OCEAN!” Ligh explosives on the enemy lines and supply depots and railroads be- hind the lines. From 5000 to 7500 trained aviators were with the various branches of our armed service abroad. In this country there were thousands trained and many more thousands starting training or in line for such instrue. tion. Upward of 30,000 motors had been delivered, with orders for 50,000 more under way. Turned from martial life into peace- ful pursuits it is fair to presume that a proportion of these young men will go in for flying. The era of dreams has gone; the period of materializa- tion has been here for some time. Fiouted first as a dangerous experi- ment, the airplane has come to stay as part of the new civilization. What may be accomplished is a matter for speculation that leads the human mind into elysian fields of fancy. “To fly over the top of the world and cast the shadow of my airplane on the North Pole, and then continue on into Asia, is my plan,” says Cap- tain Robert A. Bartlett. “There’s no use stopping at the pole, for Admiral Peary already has found it. I In- tend to fly over it from Etah, Green- land, and continue on to Cape Cho- luskin, Asia. Bartlett's plane will carry a wireless outfit. With a capacity of two tons it will carry also a dog team, a sledge, provisions for a month and men and guns for hunting. Across the Atlantic or Pacific and over the North or South Poles! Dream on—and wait for developments! Mean- while glimpse this broader aspect of aviation for the future as presented by a writer who has seen the dogs of war g0 over the top of the clouds over there: “Flying, in the opinion of British aviators, is going to change the char- acter of the world’s thought. It wll have a broadening influence, and it will bring a fresher, cleaner flow of ideas into the brains of men. “A man, the flyers argue, who has seen before him at the same time the cliffs of England, the long, flat flelds of Holland and the smiling country- side of Belgium and France, is bound to think in a different way from a man whose horizon has always been bounded by bricks and mortar, or even by hill and dale. Thinking Internationally “Traveling may have made him think nationally, but flying will make him think far more largely. Ho will see England and France lying close to each other, separated only by a shin. ing strip of water. “He will sea the green and brown mosaic of Belgium, which in its turn merges into a distant shadow of Hok land, while still farther on across the wide Scheldt he will see the distant lowlands sweep on over the rim of the world. “How will he regard petty spites be- tween individuals and cligues then? the birdman asks. He can cover with his thumb from the heights a feverlsh city swarming with a million persons. What will be think of those who live next to each other and will not speak? How mean and petty their quarrels and jealousies and hates will seem. “The true meaning of human inter- course and friendship will come home to him. He will gain an almost di- vine outlook upon the world. He will smile to see the little brown smudges which are great towns and the fine- drawn spider threads which are the great rallway systems. Intrigues, dis- honesty, civil strife, all will seem to him contemptible. Perhaps, say the aviators, this is the new view which will bring the millennium.” The Romance of the Rose N THESE days of war memories and peace discussions I wonder how many know the story of the “Romance of the Rose,” one of the pretticst love stories ever written? It happemed in California, that land of poetry. The hero was an American officer who had not yet won his spurs and was then only a lieutenant. The hero- ine was the Senorita Maria Ignacia Bonificia, a belle and a beauty of the little town of Monterey. The lieuten- ant was stationed on the frigate vannah, then at anchor in Monterey. Of course, there was much enter- taining done among the first families foer the officers of the ship, in all of which the senorita took a leading part. They did not meet, however, until one night at a ball given on board the Savannah. When the beautiful Span- ish girl and the gallant young lieu- tenant met it was a case of love at first sight on both sides. Every eve- ning found him at Maria Bonificia’s side, while she softly played the guitar and sang In the liquid Spanish tongue the love songs of her native land. Soon they became engaged and the wedding was set for an early date. The lovers were very happy until Commodore Sloat, the lieutenant’s su- perior officer, ordered the frigate to sea. The lovers were in despair. On the last evening, while on his way to his flancee's house, the officer saw a rosebush growing in a vacant lot. He plucked a slip and carried it to his sweetheart. “When the rose bloome, sweetheart, I wlill return to claim you,” he told her as he pressed his lips to hers and then to the rose. Togcther they went into the moonlit garden and planted the rose close to the house. Then he pressed her to his heart in farewell and was gone. Day by day Marla watched and tended the rose with jealous care. The days lengthened into weeks, the weeks into months, the months into years. The tiny bush was now a tree which nearly covered the house. Each year at rose-blossoming time she watched and waited with the faith and patience that only woman knows, but the of- ficer never returned. Whatever the contributing causes, he seemed to forget the love of his vouth, married and reared a family: but he was destined to see Maria Bonl- ficia again. Twenty-four years later, as a United States general, he accom- panied the President of the United States on a trip to the West. While in California they visited Monterey. Maria had heard of his coming; she dressed herself in her best, a dain shimmering silk; in her hand she car. ried a filmy lace handkerchief, while at her breast nestled a rose from the famous tree. She sat by the window —waiting. Soon the carriage bearing the two distinguished personages passed. For some {nexplicable reason it paused for a moment before the house. Maria leaned out the window and waved the dainty lace handkerchief. The Gen- eral turned and saw the eager old face at the window, the dark eyes alight with the fires of youth, a delicate pink mantling the faded cheeks. For just that instant Maria Bonificia was a girl agaln. Their eves met and for a long second held each other. Did the Gen. eral in that one brief second recognize the sweetheart of his youth? Marfa Bonificla belleves he did. With a courtly gesture he raised his hat, smiled—and the carriage passed on, Maria Bonificia watched it out of sight, then she turned and, wiping her tear-dimmed eves with the bit of Tace, murmured in broken tofles: “He remembers, thank God; he re- members,”