Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-10-10

sort Of brisk bened1CtOn IN tareWellS to
the men who went out looking for sub
marines in the North sea or aloft to
awful duels mile or two over the lines
These two words, like a vivid fragment
of a sonnet, were all that the flying men
needed to express their conception of the
full sum of human happiness, the reward
of virtue and all that is desirable in this
life:
"Hoppy iandings"
Certainly the whole country should
have wished happy landings for the fifty
nine pilots and their assistants who par
ticipated in the transcontinental endur-
ance test that began Wednesday under
the auspices Of the army. 1t is already too
late tc 'visn for few of them. The
great air race was not a sporting event,
though as a demonstration of skill, cour-
age and endurance it was the most
superb spectacle ever planned in the
United States. If the worlds series
game at Chicago monopolized general
attention, even when the race was at its
height, it was because the event in the
air was too big and the factors involved
too mysterious to be comprehended at
glance or even in the detailed report of
miracles performed by the devil-may-
care f1ers who hurtled across the coun-
try in the wake of twomle-a- minute
parson of whom all Baptists ought to be
proud; parson who, assessed from any
angle, seems to be the most admirable of
all sky pilots.
The race wasn't arranged for any
body's glory or anybody's profit. 1t was
scientifically conducted for a scientific
purpose. The army was repeating eN-
periments of the sort made by the navy in
the first transocean flight. Men and ma
chimes, instruments and equipment were
put to a racking trial in order that eX
perts might know a little more about
engines, structural design, motor endur-
ance and the dependability of instru-
ments and codes devised for aerial navi-
CATION. The flight has carried the
science of aviation little further for
for.
Motors are pretty we'll understood. 1t
is interesting to know that Lieutenant
Maynard who was the pacemaker from
this side of the country, rode behind a
Liberty motor which made hop $40 miles
long from Mneola to happy landings at
Chicago without a complaint" Es-
sentially, however, the flight was a test
of navigation methods. Airmen in war
time often have had to fly. for hours with
;rrb+ &c ND rr1;r &c {l,a
sun. What is being sought now is the
refinement of methods and instruments
by which, in the future, they may travel
indefinitely in fog or darkness and yet
know their location at every mile.
Ships may slow down in fog or wait for
clear weather to get their bearings. Air
machines can't They must keep moving
or risk the sort of landings that are any
thing but happy. The means of air
navigation are still crude, yet airmen
already are cleverer at finding their way
about than navigators who travel the
seas.
Hawker, for example, was not actually
the hero of the first flight across the
Atlantic. 1t was Lieutenant Commander
Mackenzie Grieve, the Sopwith's navi-
gator, who bore the heaviest response
bilities of the spectacular fight and in
the end saved Hawker and himself from
death. Hawker merely handled the con-
trolls. Grieve plotted the course of the
airplane by the stars when he could see
any and by his instruments when he
couldn't and was able, when the engine
failed, to find the sea lanes and drop
neatly alongside a steamship,
Alcock and Brown crossed the ocean
and hit at point in Ireland only forty
miles from the place for which they had
to steer over the whole width of the
Atlantic by mathematical calculation
alone. Upon the navigator in this in
stance the fate of the airplane hung, anc
he performed even more brilliantly thar
the pilot the difficult job, though he got
but minimum of the applause.
When aerial navigation has been de
yeloped to limits now sought by the army
and the navy air machines will be able t.
come and go at will, despite fog and dark
ness. They will not need landmarks
Much of the going yesterday was don'
by readings of instruments like thos'
used for navigation at sea.
Still we are at the beginning of avia
tion. II rumors from Washington arr
we'll founded, the navy lis. developing. 4