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[[image - black & white photograph of a crashed plane and people looking on]]
[[caption]] The above picture shows the daring young aviator, Charles F. Walsh, and his wrecked aeroplane dangling from the wires of an electric light pole that it hit during flight yesterday at Madison Park. [[/caption]]

WALSH FALLS 30 FEET WHEN FLYER HITS LIGHT POLE
In View of Wife and Two Children, Daring Young Birdman Meets Disaster During Flight at Madison Park.
HORRIFIED SPECTATORS RUSH TO WOMAN'S SIDE

IN plain sight of his wife and his two little children, while his aeroplane pitched and wobbled like a cork on an angry sea, Aviator Charles F. Walsh tried to guide his Curtiss-Farman machine into Madison Park yesterday afternoon, struck an electric light pole 150 yards from the runway and dropped nearly thirty feet to the pavement.

With blanched face and wide, staring eyes, the wife and mother saw Walsh battle against treacherous air currents after had had made a beautiful flight almost encircling the wooded vicinity of the park.  On the instant, the invisible undercurrents of air seemed to suck at the trembling craft.  Walsh worked desperately at his wheel while trying to make a landing, but as he passed from the south to cross Madison Street at its end, he was drawn downward and against an electric light pole.

Spectators Horrified.

Nearly 2,000 horrified spectators saw the aeroplane turn vertically in the air.  The black human figure at the wheel dropped from sight.  There was a moment of tense silence and then a woman's shriek.  Men rushed to Mrs. Walsh to calm her while a thousand dashed for the gate to view the wreck of the machine and, as they thought, to help pick up the mangled fragments of the air navigator.

When those nearest Walsh gained his side, they found him standing, crestfallen and dusty, with his hands in his pockets and ruefully looking at his wrecked machine.  He was absolutely unhurt, although he dropped approximately thirty feet when his air craft swung like a pendulum on top of the electric light pole.

Walsh was bundled into an automobile by Charles L. Young, his manager, and the car was headed for the grounds so that the terror-stricken spectators would know that he was alive and unhurt.  Through the crowd that surrounded the car Mrs. Walsh made her way, weeping and hysterical.  She was taken aboard the car and in a moment both were in front of the grand stand while Young announced that Walsh miraculously had escaped fatal injury.

Thus ended the aviation exhibition arranged by James W. Morrison for the

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