Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-03-13
Flying Pary0n Loses nay
In (IoudS;; Engine Fails
Omly IS Feet Ab0Ue Field

G III w 70 L T. L LGz
can you expect when I didn'
even know the engine had stopped
So many things had happened tina
l expected anything.
Trip Lasted Three Hours
We'll be back III about half ar
hour" Lieutenant Maynard told Col
onel 3. NJ. Bailey. just before the
take-off. The lieutenant came to At
lanta, you see, to stimulate interes
IN recruiting men for the army. The
| army now offers some wonderful op
portunities to men in the way Of
vocational education, promotion
travel, etc. I was going out anC
fly with the flying parson, and write
a feature story for the Sunday maya
zine section in the interest of re.
cruiting. The photographer went
along and posed us nicely together
Thus we planned, but so much hap.
pened not in the program, that il
! turns out to be a news story in
stead. You can't abduct a celebrity
like the flying parson for three NOR
| tai hours longer than promised, and
have Colonel Bailey and the whole
recruiting office, to say nothing of the
city news room of your own paper
making frantic inquiries in all direc-
tions, confident that the worst has
happened . and keep it a secret
| for a week.
1t happened, I think, because
tried to appear just a little blase.
You'll have to really put on some
frills," 1 told him, "to make it in
teresting for me, because Topped the
loop with Bob Shank only a week or
so ago. You'll take me over the
city and up above the clouds, won't
you?"
Two minutes after we left the
ground I almost regretted my rash
ness. Volplaning, 1 think they call
it, anyway, we turned completely
sideways, first on one side and then
on the other, several times, and all
the time I felt exactly as though
L was hanging on to the universe
by one eyelash.
We sailed in the direction of At
lanta, upward always. I looked at the
recording gauge; 1000 feet and still
climbing. Fascinated, I watched it
crawl to six, seven, eight and nine
thousand, and all the time the earth
below was getting hazier and hazier.
until finally, 10000 feet, when 1
locked down, there was nothing be-
low, nothing above us, nothing any,
where but silver blue mist! An aerial
body we were indeed, cut off from
earth, cut off from everything. And
still we climbed upward!
J~,f1
stop! Just wait until the Going Up
club" hears about this, I Thought
10 Miles an Hour
I looked at the speedometer. One
hundred and ten miles an hour! We
were simply cutting through the air.
The wind whistled viciously. And in
spite Of my goggles and the heavy
leather helmet strapped about my
head, my ear drums were like to
burst. 1t was physical pain so acute
that [ wanted to cry out. I wondered
if I could speak. L opened my lips.
but no words came, even if I could
have heard myself above the rush
and roar. And then, somehow, in
that moment of panic, a sickening
thought took root in my mind. Some
thing was wrong with the electric
wires, and I was being electrocuted!
There was an opening in the bottom
Of the machine that let the air in
uncomfortably, and gave me cold
feet; otherwise I had been quite COM
Portable, wrapped up in my own and
one Of the parsons leather coats. My
feet seemed getting warmer, and my
face was tingling as from an on
slaught of ten million electric
needles. And all the time the agony
T
being electrocuted, and when Lieu
tenant Maynard landed-if he ever
did-they would find me strapped in
the electric chair. All would be over.
Then when 1 suppose I should have
been saying my prayers, or chanting
Tosti's good-by, those perfectly abb
surd lines from "Longboy'' popped
into my head:
Goodbye nav, goodbye paw,
Goodbye mule with your old hee-
haw-"
That settled it.
We had been up above the clouds
about forty minutes. Slowly we be-
gan to descend. What town it was l
do not know. At first I thought it
was East Point, but we must have
sailed over a dozen that offered no
more individual signs by which one
might distinguish it. I realized that
we were lost. Below was a river.
We began to follow it, at speed of
about ninety miles per hour. II
may have been the Chattahoochee,
and it may have been the Coosa. Any
way. they told US when We landed
that we had come from the direc-
ton of Alabama and were only
eleven miles from the state line, so
it must have been the Coosa. +
Landed In Dat Patch
Closer and closer to the earth VIC
came, almost touching the tree tops,
it seemed, and finally made beau
tiful landing in the aforesaid oat
patch.
Lieutenant Maynard bobbed UP ir
the seat and cast me a backward
glance. We laughed simultaneously
I'm still here" I said, Where are
WEI"
That's what. I'd like to know