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424 [header] Aerial Age Weekly, January 17, 1916 [/header]
Miss Katherine Stinson's Looping at Night
  Not satisfied with all the aeronoutic honors which she has gained in her short life of nineteen years, Miss Katherine Stinson, coveted the one remaining flight which she held to be necessary to place herself at the very top of the experts in flying. She had performed all the "stunts" known in the art by day, but after Art. Smith had looped-the-loop by night, leaving behind him a trail of fire, she resolved that what an aviator had done an aviatrix can do also. 
  The feat was performed in Los Angeles. Using the sky for a background, she etched fantastic figures with her biplane studded with magnesium pyrotechnics. She traced the letters, "Cal," in the sky; she looped; flew upside down, and dropped in a mad tumble to within a hundred feet of the earth all the while being showered with the drippings from the burning lights on her biplane. 
Miss smith flew from a field, narrow, rough and lighted only with four small bonfires of wood. Probably less than twenty-five persons witnessed the starting and the landing because the little lady thinks that it is not lucky to try a new stunt before a great crowd, but from afar thousands saw the aerial display weird and beautiful, like a great invisible pen writing in molten fire on the curtain of the night. 

"When I looped-the-loop in Chicago last July," said Miss Stinson, "it was a biter pill for the male loopers to swallow. But I accomplished all their stunts and in many cases went them one better. Only night looping stood between me and the top. I chose Los Angeles, the wisest aviation city in the world, to be the scene of my triumph. 
"Now that I have equaled the greatest efforts of the male flyers I am going to go ahead and evolve a new stunt or two that will put woman ahead of man at the most difficult of all sciences." 
After this unheralded exhibition Miss Stinson left for her home in San Antonio, Texas, and next month she expects to return to California. In her four years in aviation Miss Stinson has made more than 1,000 flights, has looped the loop 515 times and has developed a skill in handling an aeroplane that is marvelous even to other aviators. 
  Miss Stinson recently paid a visit to the officers of Aerial Age. She had been called to Ottawa on business, and took occasion to extend her trip to New York, Boston and Buffalo. She visited the Curtiss plant in the latter city, the Sturtevant aeroplane factory at Jamaica Plains, Mass., and the Sturtevant motor plant at Hyde Park, Mass.


Pittsburg Will have an Aero Squadron
  Announcement has been made in Pittsburgh that the State of Pennsylvania plans to form an aero squadron of Pittsburgh militiamen and that a squadron of eight aeroplanes will be stationed in that city when the complete plans have been carried out. 
  A military radio company, the first in the National Guard of that state is also to be established there. 


Records Homologated
  Lieut. R.S. Saufley, U.S.N, has distinguished himself by breaking the American hydroaeroplane altitude record, pilot alone, twice in succession. The figures as homologated by the Aero Club of America are as follows: 
Flight No. 1, Nov. 30, 1915, Pensacola, Fla., 11.056 feet. 
Flight No. 2, Dec. 3, 1915, Pensacola, Fla., 11,975 feet. 
  These altitudes were attained in a Curtiss hydroaeroplane type of machine equipped with a Paragon propeller, three-bladed. The Aeronautic Station Number of the machine used in the first flight is "AH-15," and that used in flight No. 2, "AH-14." 

Aviator A.C. Beech in Jacksonville
  In a signed article in The Metropolis of Jacksonville, Fla., A.C. Beech, who has been looping-the-loop over that city, defends his daring as follows: 
  "To the average man or woman, an aviator is a sort of 'crazy person who risks his life for the money that is in it.' As a matter of fact the proficiency necessary to perform the higher class aerial feats can only be acquired by long and careful practice coupled with a thorough knowledge of the technical branch of aeronautics. In the first place, the aviator must be absolutely convinced of his own knowledge that all parts of his machine to be of such strength as to withstand by a safe margin the tremendous stresses which the spectacular flying subjects it to. In the second place, the aviator must have had sufficient practice to render the actual control of the aeroplane instinctive and independent of deliberate tough effort, because the successive movements are too rapid to make planning them possible. But given an aeroplane with the same safety margin as the axle of a railroad passenger coach, given an aeroplane of modern construction and design which will fall from any position into a controllable position, and the aviator can with reasonable safety fling his machine into situations limited only by its momentum, the power of the motor and the pull of gravity. 
  In the flight of yesterday I deliberately permitted the aeroplane to get into positions which were considered positively fatal, but a few months ago." 

Satan Day to Fly at University of Illinois
  Satan Day, the youngest licensed aviator in America, is now attending the University of Illinois, where he is a Junior. Young Day will start his fourth exhibition season this spring and will probably fly at Champaign. 
  There has been some talk of him flying in connection with the annual Spring military manoeuvers of the cadet regiment. The University of Illinois has a huge new armory and the largest student regiment in the United States, and Day thinks that his alma mater should be equally progressive in Military Aviation.
  During the past season Day was managed by R.S. Richardson, who managed Cal Rogers at the Chicago meet in 1911, and on his transcontinental flight from New York to Los Angeles. This year he will be under another manager as his services are jointly contracted for by the Benoist Aeroplane Company and some business men of his town. 

[Image] [Caption] Some of the students at the new Wright School at Augusta, Georgia. The weather conditions have been excellent since the opening of the school and the students have made rapid progress.[caption/]

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