The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1909-07-26
Blerlct Has the Honor OF Being the
First to Sail Across it With
an AeropIane on Sum
day Morning
A NILE A MINUTE
It'll the Smallest Machine OF Them
all He Covered the Twenty-one
Miles in Twenty-three
Minutes.

cessfully landed at Dover Sunday |
morning after fight in his aeroplane
across the English channel.
Louis Bleriot accomplished a re-
markable feat by flying across the En-
glish channel Sunday in twenty-three
minutes. The distance from his start
ing point, near Calais, to Dover, is
about twenty-one miles. and he there
fore Travelled at the rate Of nearly
a mile minute
A French torpedo boat destroyer
follower the aeropiane, but so swift
WIS the speed of the machine that
the destroyer was soon left far behind
Bleriot has for several years been
an active aviator IN France and is
said to have had more miraculous es-
capes in his career, than any other
aeronaut- He made cross country
flight from Toury to lrthenay, France,
March 81, 1908, in naonoplane. His
latest achievement prior to crossing
the channel, was the fight, July 13,
from Etampes to Orleans, twenty-five
miles. He made a successful landing,
covering the distance in SIS minutes
10 seconds, including stop of IL min
utes near Toury to examine his aero
plane. For this achievement he won
| the French Aero club prize of $500
Hubert Latham made an unsuccess-
ful attempt July l9 to cross the cham
mel. Latham got away splendidly un-
der perfect conditions from the top
OF cliff at Sangatte. and had covered
about half the distance at an average
height of FIVE hundred feet, when he
was obliged to descend on account of
4 the motor giving out. He was picked
up by the torpedo boat destroyer Har-
| pom and taken back to Calais.
| Bleriot's monoplane is the smallest
flying machine yet built. 1t is fitted
! with a three-cylinder motor. which is
air cooled. and drives a two-bladed
propeller. The pilots seat is in the
skifflike body behind the wings.
Saturday Mr.. Bleriot received the
decoration of the legion or honor for
his efforts in promoting the science OF
aviation.
/ The neck of water that connects the
1 English channel and the North Sea,
known to the English as the Straits Of
| Dover. and to the French as the Pas
4 de Calais, and which Napoleon wistful'
/ ly gazed across less than a hundred
years ago with dreams of avengins
conquest on his most determined and
finally triumphant enemy, is about
| twenty miles wide between Calais and
Dover. The feat of Bleriot, Frances
greatest genius of the air, early sun
day morning. is the most notable tri
umph of aerial fight yet recorded
and his practical demonstration leads
4 to dreams of possibilities such as
Napoleon never could have enter
tanned. Throughout England this
successful dropping down of an air
! shin from foreign country upon its
soil will doubtless cause greater trep
idation than any Of the recent alarms
of possible invasion and will increase
its anxiety to continue and strength
Il en- its present amicable understand
4 ing with France AT Dover. where
i Bleriot landed, rise chalk cliffs from
three hundred to six hundred feet II
height
Is on Exhibition.
LONDON, July 26.-The Bleriot
monoplane was exhibited today in the
American department store of Henr,
G. Selfridge Such crowd was pres
ont that police were necessary to pre-
vent the monoplane from being dam
aged. Arrangements are being made
to give Bleriot a welcome when h,
comes. He is expected in few days
That the French We're the first t
cross the channel brings an intens,
outcry by the Britishers against TIN
backwardness of England in aviation
Private subscriptions for purchasin,
) airships for the government are in
creasing. Waldorf Astor gave $4,000
: Bleriot Arrives.
: London gave tremendous welcom
to Bleriot when he was met at the ste
. ton today by 100000 people. Anothe
, half million cheered him enroute I
the hotel and hundred notable fig
ures suffered inconyeniences to obtai
a glimpse Of Bleriot. Bleriot declal
:. ed the honors compensated him hur
dred fold for the fortuna he HIS spen
in mastering the science OF aviation