Viewing page 18 of 27

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

NOVEMEBER 15, 1980       LOS ANGELES 

Old Hand at Flying 
WALTER WELLMAN, pioneer aviator who attempted transatlantic flight in 1909 is alive and hearty today. He recently celebrated his seventy-second birthday.-Associated Press photo.

[[image - Waltern Wellman]] 

HE TRIED OCEAN HOP IN 1909!
NEW YORK, Nov. 14-Walter Wellman is a living rebuke to those cynics who still maintain that anyone who dabbles in a aviation must meet a violent death. 
  For Wellman, one of this nation's pioneer airmen, is not only still alive, but last week he celebrated his seventy-second birthday anniversary, as hale and hearty as ever! 
   His most famous flight, perhaps, was his attempted Atlantic crossing in an airship in 1909, twenty-one years ago. Forerunner of present transoceanic trips by air, Wellman and his companions covered 1000 miles in seventy-nine hours before mishaps forced them down. 
  Two years before, in 1907, he prepared for a trip to the North Pole, but delayed by structural difficulties in his airship, he finally abandoned this trip when Admiral Peary beat him to it.