Baraboo weekly news. [volume] (Baraboo, Wis.) 1912-197?, 1923-12-20
NJ. and Ms. Burton Holmes
Journey Through Air From
France Through Spain to Africa
cOa5E I INES THEY GO UP
MORE THAN 1000 FEET
Trayeleg, Lecturer, and Author
Spoke In Old Opera House In
Baraboo Years Ago


a resident of Ableman has sent a let
ter to her Sank couaty relatives,
Mrs. Harold Boyd of Baraboo being
sister. which is of more than pass
ing interest. The. letter was written
by Mrs. Burton Holmes, wife of the
noted traveller and lecturer. Burton
Holmes gave lectures in the old opera
house in Baraboo years ago and many
of his books were sold here. The
letter describes a fifteen hour flying
trip on a mail airship taken by the
author of the letter and her husband.
The flight was from Toulouse, France
to Robat, Africa. In part the letter
says:
We got off at 9:05 and after five
minutes in the air landed again. The
pilot said the motor was not acting
properly and asked for another plane.
That was a shock to us movies!
However they got another pony from
the stable and that time we were off
at 10 and had no more engine Or
mechanical trouble throughout the
trip.
Trip Marvellous
The whole thing was marvellous.
Burton said at the field at Toulouse.
"Why we had not heard of this" :
The reply was, Because it works.
Papers are interested only if there
is trouble
The company has been operating
for five years; but one accident has
happened in that time, it not fatal,
a drop in the sea, and a rescue. Just
before we left larger plane flew off
and we asked? where to-"
They said, Canary Islands," as
calmly as if we had said Twenty
third street.
Our plane was strictly for mail SER
vice and throughout there was the
sense urgency and haste to get the
mail through-where halts were made
planes and pilots changed. We, as
passengers, were only incidents. We
might sit in the cockpit and they
hoped we were comfortable, but if not,
well it was too bad but the mail had
to go through just the same.
In a Small Plane
During one stretch in a smaller
plane, | had mail sack between my
knees because there was no room
elsewh ere. We'd had cloudless wea-
Their for a week for of course we had
to be treated to every type of wealth
er that grows. The first day was un-
der a gray sky, clouds far and high
above us, even at 1000 feet. The
pilot said they hadn't two such days
year. The next day was first
stormy, then clear, then low clouds
that looked pretty at a distance but
gave us a. very dramatic moment near
| Gibraltar where we got into a dense
lot of them. The pilot turned the
plane back, downward and under,
going far inland in an effort to get
| out of there. It was like being in a
binding snow storm, only there was.
nothing to feel. Soft gray clouds may
look pretty from below, but I shall
always remember they are not as nice
as they seem.
When we left Toulouse we flew
over flat fertile country for half
Ian hour and then came to the snow
clad Pyreneese. 1t seemed we were
an hour crossing them and probably
were We looked into dead craters
and into deep valleys and it was very
marvellous until a gust of wind would
! rock the boat. Then we would drop
Ea peg or so-smooth, straight, won
| derful-so quiet you could write or
| do anything. But rough flying-rock-
ing or what they call 'bumpy''--
isn't such fun and has little the mo-
| ton of ship in a rough sea and
likely to make one sea sick. Glad we
were not.
! We reached Barcelona, Spain, Con-
Iy it might as well have been called
vacant lot for all the fields are
quite five miles outside the cities) at
| one o'clock. We were given ten
minutes in which we gobbled a roast
chicken I had insisted in bringing in
stead Of canned food. There was no
food anywhere for passengers. &
Along the Coast
/ Barcelona to Aleconte was mostly
|a'org the coast, which was broken
| by countless small ranges of noun
ta,ns coming down tc the sea A
desolate, arid land! There was not q
| tree and water in only two of the
river beds along the whole eastern
-. ~