The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1917-11-15
James G.. Adams Reaches AL
titude of 800 Feet at
French Camp
ONE EXPERIENCE
WAS UNPLEASANT
Eyes Filled with Oil when Only Few
Minutes Off Ground and Forced to
Land-Writes Home Interestingly Of
Experiences.

Land-WTites Home Interestingly Of
Experiences.
James c. Adams, son of Mr.. and
Mrs. James NJ. Adams Of Brattleboro
IS rapidly acquiring skill rs an aviator
in France tie has made many solo
flights, and III one instance attained
an altitude OF 5,7o0 feet. without real
ling what he was doing, which great
u exceeded the prescribed limit il
aas star performance, and because
OF the excellence with which il was
accomplished the penalty imposed was
mild. Mr. Adams tolls Of this and 9th
er interesting incidents i'll private let
ters to his parents, written from his
training camp. The following extracts
recount some of his experiences:
October II.
After many days of rain and gale,
there is something doing again IN avi-
alton ana | can say with much salts
faction that | have now passed the
ordeal OF mv first flight alon aud it
is surely relief. 1t means that al
WAYS now in future | will he able to
improve details and pay attention 10
fine points Of tile game and not he
worrying about simply STAYING up in
the air. Although we are using rcla-
lively slow planes and later will get
some vastly different ones we at least
have the proper feel for flying and
thorough knowledge of the controls
and Of what they ought to do both
in theory and from past experiences.
In aviation your first few solo flights
are 20 vastly different from first at
temptS at anything else that il is a
momentous step. When YOU re once
up in space You can I change your
mind, or like an auto, 90 along slow
for q while, bat you We got to go
through with it at full speed. and land
whore YOU started from, which means
making circle and thus facing the
wind IN each direction. We are told
not to 90 over 200 meters (650 feet
high at first, but | feel better and
have tlown more with my INSTRUCTOR
9t a greater height. so | went nearly
4Ga meters on nv first two solo trips
and climbed TO 600 on my third. The
air is less .bumpv up there and
YOU are ii less danger Of running in
to other planes also As ] wrote you
before there are sometimes 80 planes
III the mir at Il time over our huge
training field
Lunch bell called me away and |
have since had 4 sensational trip.
What do YOU suppose | did this after
noon-only my second day as solo
fIier! Strange To say, the wind died
down to nothing, but just as | left
the ground | ran into a fine drilling
rain which felt like hail as it was
dashed back by the propeller. | start
ed to climb and to avoid the rain |
kept ~ going up and sped along way
in another direction, following a road
that kept getting smaller and smaller
under me. | had a beautiful steady
machine and i'll the smooth air, no
wind, | didn realize my height un-
I'll | looked at the altimeter and saw
was up 300 feet. | turned toward
the field estimated my gliding dis
tance. stopped the motor and began
to glide, keeping the same angle all
the way down to the field that /
could hardly see. Everything worked
perfectly smooth, but when ! stopped
TO figure how high | was | came as
near ashiyer as allow myself 10.
But ! knew Just what was doing,
though rather surprised that | was do
ing It 50 well, and down | glided and
IN few seconds landed within a few
wards of my fellow students. The lieu
tenant couldn ( bawl me out as the
landing was good, and better Judged
than many that come down from only
i1o meters ! was penalized mildly by
not being allowed up again this aft
ernoon, but | had had nearly enough
for one day. There was really no
danger, understand, but YOU must have
a perfect eve to gauge Your landing
SPOT, and confidence to hold your
course The fellows handed it to me
good and proper and seemed to figure
It was some dive
After only eight flights alone in a
light plane, | was released right away
to a heavier and more powerful one
and have made four flights already in
that. There are five of us that are
about equally advanced. In my first
flight today had a disconcerting in
eident When only few minutes off
the ground my plane began shooting oil
back into my face and particularly on
my glasses. 1t got worse and worse
and soon everything was blur and
for moment | feared it was my eyes
going bad on me. | tried to wipe off
the glasses but my gloves were oily
aud couldn't reach for my handker-
chief. All the time | was sailing
along and could bareiN see the arollnd