Evening star., 1923-10-02
BIG BOMBER LOST
ON EVE OF RACES
Lieut.. Arnold Hunts AirpIane
vainIy at st. Louis-Navy
Men Confident.
By q stan Correspondent.

BY STAN Correspondent.
ST. LOUIS FLYING FIELD, St.
Louis County. Mo-. October "A Mar
tin bomber, the largest type of active
heavy-service ships in the Army air
service, has been lost in this vicinity,
and for days its pilot has been asking
the question: Have you seen my
bomber?'
Lieut.. Leslie P. Arnold, photo Off
Ger Of Boiling Field, Is entered in the
race of large-capacity planes for the
merchants exchange trophy. but he
has no ship to fly. unless he finds it
between now and Friday afternoon,
when his event is scheduled to go on.
Having given up hope of finding it,
Lieut.. Arnold now is waiting until
somebody brings 1t to him.
Aeronautical superstitution has just
about destined Lieut.. Arnold to de-
feat. A short time ago the plane he
Is to fly was flown up to Boiling Field
by Lieut.. Cole, and then dropped in
a field near Charles Town. w. Va.
with a broken motor Several other
hard-luck incidents have connected
themselves with 1t since. and now the
ship, far from being In racing con-
dition, wherever 1t Isl has disappeared.
Wait for Dry Field.
Army. Navy and Marine, Corps pilots
at the field here are marking time
while the sun tries to work overtime
for the. big events of Thursday, Fri
day and Saturday. There is very
little flying, about the only opera
-tions today. Of any note being the test
flight of Lieut.. Guy B. Hall, Marine
Corps. of Quantico, Va, in the UO-1-A
-Vought observation plane.
Lieut.. r. ]. Brown, who is partici-
pating in preparations for the round
the-worfd fight of the Army air serv-
ice next summer, arrived here today,
and. although he Is scheduled to fly a
special Douglas torpedo Job" in the
races, has been placed in charge of
publicity for the Army pilots. Lieut..
Brown is of the opinion that his ship
will not be delivered here in time for
the races.
/ The four Navy and Marine Corps
pilots from Anacostta, y. c.. air sta
ton who are to fly in the Pulitzer
race today received a cabfegram from
their four brother officers who made
up the victorious Schneider cup team
The message said:
Get Good Luck Message.
Best of luck
St1NElDEh COf
The members, all assigned to duty
in Washington, are Lieuts. David
Rittenhouse, Rutledge Irvine, F. w.
Wead and A. w. Gorton. The day be-
fore these pilots were to defend the
Navy in the British races the Pu-
liter trophy team here sent this mes
sage:
BEST of luck. Go to it.
NAVY PULITZER TEAM
One-half of the worlds laurels in
aviation are now in possession of the
naval air station, and. according to
the Navy men here, the other half
will be within week. Army money
is scarce around town." according to
the Navy crowd On the other hand,
the Army does not concede defeat at
this early stage. but 1t claims that
should its sister service take the
Pulitzer trophy the victory will be
due to what was learned from the
Army's development of pursuit planes
last year, plus little money.
Rumers About Motors.
Some interest is apparent in Army
camps over the rumor that the mo-
tors of two Navy speed plane en-
trants Will not be able to withstand
the terrible grind of 125 miles at full
turnover and that the queer-3ooking e
ship of McCook Field. known as the
Verville-Sperry, and TO be flown hy
Lieut.. Alex Pearson, will be heard
from"
In order to prevent the local en-
thusiasm over. the air meet from
being killed by the absence of activf-
ties, 1t was decided to throw a small
air exhibition for the public Wednes-
day afternoon. No Boiling Field
pilots will participate. but flyers from
other fields will give an exhibition of
formation flying and other military
maneuvers. Two features of the re-
al afN- -
be included-the fight of the famous
To by Lieut.. T. S Van Vechton and
the laying of smoke screen by the
Langley Field (Va-) squadron