Milford chronicle., 1928-06-01
TWELVE
NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE

Ulysses S. Guyer, a representative
from Kansas, recently recalled an
incident which gives us an interest
ing glimpse of the early history of
aviation. His text was suggested by
a ride over Washington with Col.
Lindbergh. In the fall of 1895 Guyer
returned home for a vacation from
the University of Kansas where he
was studying law. His father, Rev.
Joseph Guyer, had just received q
visit from an old friend, Bishop Mil
ton Wright of the United Brethren
Church.
These two men, declared Repre-
sentative Guyer in a speech in Con-
gress, had been born in the same
year-1S2S-jus a century ago; they
had been boyhood and manhood
friends, and they had preached in
the same church for more than a
quarter of a century. 81 remember"
the speaker said, "hOw my father
laughed at Bishop Wright because he
said his boys were going to perfect
a flying machine that would fly; how
the venerable bishop had described
that old biplane; how the boys had
built a slide on the side of sand
dune; how one of them would lie
down on the lower part of the plane
while the other pushed him off; and
that when he reached the bottom of
the slide he had gained sufficient
momentum to keep the air 25, so,
and sometimes 100 feet. And then,
with all the audacity and finality OF
one who has demonstrated Il prOpo-
sition in geometry, Milton Wright
exclaimed: When Wilbur and Or
Vile find an agent to drive that ma
chine, they'll fly like birds!'"
That conversation in central Kan
sas 80 years ago makes dramatic
story now. when Wilbur and Or
willie find an agent to drive that ma
chine, they'll fly like birds!" Ye
gods, what foolish things even bish-
ops can say! That" said Rep. Guy
er, was where my father laughed.
The whole world laughed. Flying |
had been the jest of the ages since |
Icarus blossomed out in Greek myth /
ology. The highest expression of i'm |
possibility was: You might just as /
well try to fly an expression so /
deeply rooted that it still persists in
our language.
q wonder what my father would /
have thought if, in a moment of pro-
phetic vision, Milton Wright should /
have told him that, before a third of
a century had fallen into the abyss .
of the past, a boy five and twenty
years of age would in SO hours wrap
about his youthful brow the chaplet
of immortal fame by conquering the
old Atlantic and cheating its hungry
billows. and landing safely in the
field of lie Bourget in Paris"
Then, addressing the Speaker of
the House, Rep. Guyer asked: What
are we going to do next? They tell
me, Sir, that they are going to dig
down into the dusty archives of dead
and forgotten centuries and repro
luce the voices of those whose ton
CUES have been sealed by the silence I
If death for thousands of years. ]
they tell me that they will repro I
luce the golden voice of him who 1
hurled his thunderbolts at Philip of e
,Iacedon. That they will reproduce 1
he voice of Him who walked by the l.
ide of the tideless sea of Galilee. p
Impossible! you say. Of course it II
S impossible. That was precisely a
What my father told Milton Wright '
n 1895 about the airplane. There is II
lothing impossible if the intellect of Il
nan centers upon it and thinks and c
reams about it long enough. I re- a
eNt it, there is nothing impossible.
you have any respect for your q
eputation as a prophet, erase that q
rOrd impossible from your vocabu- a
Try. There is nothing impossible for p
merica as long as she is filled with n
outh that looks straight into the b.
ln, gazes across the far and radiant IL
of the sky, clear-eyed, hi
lion-hearted, like that b.
Viking of the air, like eC
nat Incompatible eaglet, unafraid" to
The Pathfinder. HI