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Updated: May 6, 2025
The Berlin meeting proved that, from the time of the construction of the first successful German machine mentioned above, to the date of the meeting, a good number of German aviators had qualified for flight, but principally on Wright and Antoinette machines, though by that time the Aviatik and Dorner German makes had taken the air.
It seemed very serious indeed, for any one to drop in this way; and yet how much more dangerous to fall upon land, where the wrecked aviators would stand a good chance of broken limbs, even though they saved their necks. Then a cry from the impulsive Andy told that the biplane was in the water.
For the first time in history, the Stars and Stripes of Old Glory were flung to the breeze over the camp, in France, of American fighting men. Inspired by the sight, and spurred to instant action by the ringing call of their French captain, this band of aviators from the U.S.A. sprang into their trim little biplanes.
This was demonstrated to some extent by the British raids on the German naval bases of Cuxhaven and Wilhelmshaven, but even in these instances it was bombs dropped by aviators, not gunfire that injured the enemy's works. But for the airplane proper this added weight was so positive a handicap as to practically destroy its usefulness as an assailant of fortified positions.
The great possibilities as well as the dangers connected with aviation were brought out in the meet at Chicago during August, 1911, where two aviators lost their lives. C. P. Rodgers, in a Wright machine, remained in the air twenty-six and one-half hours out of the possible thirty-one and one-half hours. Lincoln Beachey set a new world's record by ascending 11,642 feet.
Billy had heard enough, however, to convince him that by some strange fate he had been rescued from death in the Sound to become the instrument of the discovery of a plot to beat the boys to the Sargasso and the treasure ship. Gritting his teeth he resolved to do all he could to frustrate the man who had tried to outwit the Boy Aviators in Africa and steal their hard-won ivory.
Two veteran French aces were to be in command, with Tom and Jack as helpers, and some of the American aviators were to go into the battle of the air for the first time. "The Huns are evidently going to try to bomb some of our ammunition dumps behind our lines," said one officer, speaking to Tom. "It's up to you boys to drive 'em back." "We'll try, sir," was the answer.
Most aviators, thus confronted by strange problems, would have grown loquacious, tried to exhibit their knowledge, asked questions, made much talk. But Alden held his tongue. A look of appreciation, of liking, came upon the Master's face. It was just the suspicion of a look, for in all this strange man's life no great show of emotion ever had been permitted to mirror itself upon his countenance.
His ebony body was cut and scarred with the signs of his battle with the thorns and saw-bladed grasses of the dense forest, across which he had cut in desperate haste, scorning all paths in order to warn the Boy Aviators and their chum Ben of the rapid approach of Muley-Hassan.
Henry Farman asked L2,000 for a week's exhibition flying in England, and Paulhan asked half that sum, but a rapid increase in the number of capable pilots, together with the fact that most flying meetings were financial failures, owing to great expense in organisation and the doubtful factor of the weather, killed this goose before many golden eggs had been gathered in by the star aviators.
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