Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1911-08-16
Badgers Machine COlIapses and
He Falls TO GlOund.
Unknown Disaster 10 tombstone
While Over the Lake.
Drowned Under Mis- EngIne-WIis
Witnesses Terrible Scene.

Chicago, Aug. l5.-Two young aviators,
VIM. r. Badger of Pittsburg and st.
Croix tombstone of Chicago, lost their
lives at the interEa tional aviation meet
here today In dying both revealed the
srailty of the craft in which two score
more aFiatofs were curving and gliding
about In the air with scarcely a pause
or the deaths of their contemporaries.
Death in both cases was due to unex-
pected accident, probably the results OF
unsuspected defects in the mechanism OF
the machines and was in no way caused
BY earelessness or lack of responsibility
FOR the drivers
Badger, wealthy youth, oareened to
his death In a pit in the aviation field.
There had been a flaw in one of the
wings of the propeller of the Baldwin
machine he drove Centrifugal force broke
the propeller, upset the delicate equilib-
rum of the machine and Badger dashed
60 feet to the bottom of the pit, his neck
being broken.
tombstone fell 500 feet under his engine
and was drowned as the result of an
equally unsupported defect. Caught I'M
der the heavy engine in the Moisant mon
oplane, he was carried deep into Lake
Michigan, and his body was not brought
o the surface until an hour later.
Badger lived for three quarters uf
n hour after he had been extracted
rom the remains of his engine He
id not recover consciousness and died
llmost at once after he had reached /
hospital. His death was the first seri-
JUS accident of the meet, although 35
.lyers have dipped and glided here for
hree days, and experts say several
similar accidents have been narrowly
Averted
Badger flew as he formerly drove
racing automobiles, purely as an anna
eur. He was the stepson of John
ioettman of Pittsburg and was rs
ears old. He possessed an independ-
ent fortune and gratified a well-de-
Veloped speed mania. In the early
lays of automobiles he was among
he first to make amateur records at
Daytona and Palm Beach. He was
IN intimate friend of Louis Strang.
he automobile race driver. who died
beneath the engine of an automobile
in Wisconsin a month ago. Through
Strang. Badger became interested in
eroplanes and both became amateur
aviators.
The meet begun last Sunday was
Badgers first public appearance. The
zig mechanical signboard after his
leath recorded that he had flown up
today just 2 hours, 10 minutes and
9 seconds The flight that ended his
life had earned him possibly an hour
hata ha oil 10 i,,ck
front of the center of the grand
itands and thousands of spectators
we're within a few hundred yards OF
he accident. Hundreds leaped the
ence fought past the line of police
md into the pit where the wrecked
leroplane lay. There was a near
oanic in the field and numerous heads
were cracked by police clubs. The
injury was announced through the
negaphone and five minutes later.
while Badger was on his way to a
hospital. attention and interest had re-
verted to the men still flying, many of
whom offered possibilities of similar
thrills and possible fatalities
Through his friendship with Strang
Badger met Capt. Baldwin. He bought
an aeroplane outright and did his first
flying at Mineola, n. Y. On June Is
he made a successful flight and was
granted a pilots license. Following
this he made further flights. and hiS
awaiting enthusiasm grew He prac.
ticed with ]. c. (Bud) Mars and de
cided to enter the meet here with
Mars, although his entry was distinct
Continued on Page Twelve)