New Britain herald., 1930-01-16
RACING KING IS
 NOW IN BUSINESS
Eddie RiCE5nbacker Recalls : Stirring Scenes in World War

New York. Jan. Is GPLHe lolled back there in an easy chair behind a fiat topped mahogany desk. a satisfied. energetic executive in his tiny office. high up in a corner of one of those huge piles of brick and stone modern business builds as it's own monuments.
 Papers were massed on his desk. A secretary answered phone calls. Light flooded in through windows on two sides. An aviation map. dot ted with red circles, criss-c crossed with multtudes Of vavey blue lines. covered the third wall So far it was a perfect picture Of sbig business.
 But the sleepy eyes of the tall, husky, smiling chap in the soft chair fingered most on the wall di- ,rectly opposite him. Hung there was q strange picture for a modern business temple. sheet of gray canvas, stripped from the fusilage of a plane, housed in thin frame with a dozen snapshots forming a border
 On the canvas was painted inc red, white and blue stove pipe hat Of Uncle Sam with ring floating about it. That was the insignia Of the famous 94th flying squadron the hat in the ring" squadron greatest American air fighting unit developed during the world wal days. The figure II" beside that hat denoted the plane of the squadron commander. Most of the pictures were of Captain Edward V. Ricken- packer, American ace Of aces.
 Then Eddie Rickenbackcr, farm CTS boy from Ohio. mechanic. au- tomobile racing king, chauffeur fol General PerShing, wartime con- queror Of 26 German planes. now vice president and general manager of the Fokller Aircraft corporation untangled his long legs and strollcd over to the picture.
 "The 94th." he said proudly, the finest outfit that ever flew the skies" Then sheepishly he explain, cd that four tiny maltese crosses painted in a semicircle about the ''hat-in-the-ri covered bulle holes left by the slugs of a German ace who caught him una wares anC drenched his Spad with lead befor, dying in one Of the countless "doi ! iSrh C in
 Four Of the snapshots show tn, relics of other enemies who few to the last time against Rick" Tn, rest show his beloved fighting Spad the plane he brought back iron France as a keepsake. The smilin! figures in khaki are the captain himself, snapped in those reckles days overseas.
 But Rickenbacker has no though for heroics today. Last summer h, flew commercial planes 400 hours 100 more than he was in the air il two years of wartime flying. Hi job IS to aid in developing aviation into the safest of all means 0 travel
 The unusual. he believes. pro vidcs the dangers in all modes O travel An open manholc make walking dangerous. Railroad trave is dangerous if a rail is split. Sea faring is dangerous when he cap tain fails 10 communicate witt ,ther vessels.
 And So with aviation," Eicken packer explained. The possiblit. of the unusual must be eliminated Tremendous improvements in planes motors, air data, are solving me chanical problems. Flying is 40 pc cent mechanical and GO per cent il the aviator himself today. Durin! the war the t]icr was 90 per cent Five years from now he will be | per cent
 As Rick" talked window washer swung nonchalantly out int space at his elbow, swabbing pane and teetering back and forth in tn straps that kept him from falling The captain watched him an fidgeted. Finally he exploded.
 That guy will get killed" he an nounced. "I can see 20 places wher that harness can break. How doe he dare take such chances?"