The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-01-07

close to the scat of the operator. There is also a cord by which it may be de- taehed. and when the jumper is ready to let go, he sees that everything is clear. and then swings to one side so that he will pull the top of the balloon over. Here is where his hands come Into play. As the balloon turns, he pulls the cord that frees him and the parachute, and both shoot downward. The parachute should open in 100 or 150 feet, but I've known jumpers to drop twice that dis
 tanee before the canopy inhates and checks the decent. This check at times Is sudden, and often the force rends the parachute in twain. Nothing can save the jumper then. To guard against such accidents I always had a round hole sewed in the top of my parachutes to serve as a safety-valve. This hole l think also helped to straighten out the canvas more quickly.
 With the parachute open the weight of your body shoots you through the air at rate of from eight to ten miles an hour. That is fast enough to Jar you when you hit the earth. and, besides, jumpers have to let go their parachutes and fall twenty feet with nothing to aid them-this to prevent them from being smothered by the folds of the canvas. have often hit a house, or barn, or tree, and tum- bled thirty or forty rect but fortune was always with me. Parachute jumpers con- trol their course by tipping up the edges of their canopy and making a plane, down which they slide at a longer angle and also much faster.
 Always Comes Down.
 T could always get down some way. There isn't any doubt about your hitting the earth in some shape or other. That never worried me. l didn't mind barns. Or hOngpS half did curious people, and particularly the people in the southwest. Excitement al- ways brings out the wildness in a man, and down there the spectators get worked up to a great pitch over a parachute jumper. Their pent-up feeling has it's i effect on the jumper, too, and tends to rattle him. Jumping isn't the pleasant est occupation in the world, and 1t Is a large sight more unpleasant to hear bull lets singing past you, either coming down or going upi A balloon ascension in my early days out west wouldn't have been natural without the popping of six shooters. It was all done in play, of course, but when a man gets red liquor i in his system and gun in his hand, it's no place for a balloon. The old saying, You can't hit balloon is all bosh. I know better I've spent a good many hours sewing up bullet holes in my ap- paratus.
 Another diSconcerting thing was to i look down as you fell and see string of , mounted men come riding across lot at full jump, shooting as they rode and yell ing like Indians to see who would be first to get under you as you neared the
 ground. Usually these citizens would have a small bet up on the results of the , race. Add this little personal interest to the excitement of the jump, and the re- suit was enough to make you want to keep on going right through the earth and never stop on top. The wild look of excitement in some of those eyes I will remember to my grave. As many as could would get their hands on me the me on the back, punch me, pinch me, of fer me tobacco, whisky, guns, everything they had, uttering yipping yells in shrill staccato to let their exuberance of spirits escape.
 But my jumping days are all over. I'm spending all my time now, and money. too, trying to fly. Parachute jump ing. besides bringing in money, helped me with ideas for my machine. Sometimes when l was jumping the fair manage I ment mould give me dollar bills to throw down as I went up. and the zigzag move l ment of those banknotes as they futtered down gave me one idea. The movement of a clamshell when thrown into the wa | ter is the same as it sinks. It is a glid- 1 ing, shifting movement, and the wings on my machine have identically the same movement reversed. There is also a tail and a head on it which largely control | it's flight. I got that idea from watching | pigeons. They use the balance of their heads and the movement of their tails