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Early Flying Experiences with the First Cafe Aviation School  by Brig Bean. DeWitt Milling, USAF I Rett
As the year 1910 drove to a close, the Regional Corps which had looked forward so confidently in the summer of 1909 to a brighter future for military aummaties following the purchase by the War Department of the first airplane for military purposes, had make little burgers - the entire air service stational at Fort Sum Howatm consisted of this one airplane, one officer pilot, Luit B.D.Fowlers, and nine enlisted men; Europe, in the meantime, Europe had rapidly forged ahead. Fared with this situation, conquers torte metium and appropriated $150,000 for the fiscal year 1912 of which $25,000 was to be made available on 3 March 1911. This action marked the beginning of military aviation; It provided the money for the establishment of the first aviation school and for the purchase of a few airplanes.
Captain Arthur S. Cowan of the Signal Corps was in charge of aviation activities in the Office of the Chief Signal Office, War Department and it fell to his lot to select a suitable site for an aviation school; to detail officers to be trained as pilots; and to see that orders were placed for airplanes. The location for a suitable school site was not much in doubt - College Park, Maryland, a small village about 7 miles East of Washington of the Baltimore & Ohio and the Baltimore highway was the logical place. It has been used during the Fall of 1909 by Wilbur Wright, in giving flying instruction to Sceintenants Frank P. Lahm, Frederick Humphreys and Benny Fowlers. After, the necewsary legal steps were taken to acquire an adjoining acreage, giving a maximum runway of about 2500 feet in an east-west direction, Lieut. Ray C. Kirtland was ordered detailed to aviation duty and sent to College Park to supervise the clearing of the land