Viewing page 100 of 228

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

NOT ON A BROOM         1
by
Blanche Stuart Scott
as told to William J. Adams

NOT on a broom? How else could a gal become airborne unless she was a witch? Many times I've been called something that sounded suspiciously like witch...but some people just can't help having troubles with their "b's" and "w's". I did make it into the air with something better than a broom. Only slightly better.

The degree of superiority was relative. To go aloft in a conglomerate of canvas, piano wire, pine and bamboo, powered by a motor that seemed to do its best to tell you "Go down, go down". At times I could have sworn that some of the motors were superhuman...not in performance but perversity.  The motor purred like a bolt in a dishpan battling it out with a handful of loose nuts.  Frequently I likened myself to one of these perabulating [[sic]] nuts since only a nut-pilot would seat herself in front of this thrashing clatter of bolts with no out front protection from wind, weather or anything else swirling around in the wild blue yonder. It is almost true that one didn't have to be a nut to be an aviation pioneer but a wide streak of nuttiness was a real bit of one-up.  Sure the 1910 pilots referred to themselves as 'flying nuts'..theirs was the insanity that pushed back frontiers and moved the world from the horse and buggy to the Jet and now the Super Sonic Age.  Those were the days my friends——as the pop song insists.  New worlds over every hill awaited the adventuresome with the guts and imagination to try.  Today's youngsters may make a gut-busting try at a new world only to find it already inhabited [[strikethrough]] with [[/strikethrough]] and [[ambitious]] hustler [[strikethrough]] having [[/strikethrough]] with his hot dog or pizza stand already open.


[[right margin]]

[[pencil:]] Then try to make the [[cha?]]
[[ink:]]    was [[maybe]] now
[[oencil:]] come true

[[/right margin]]