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26

Mr. Curtiss did not choose to teach a girl to fly.  This decision was not arrived at suddenly or lightly.  It was a weighing of the tremendously adverse surge of publicity in the event a female was killed or crippled in a plane accident.  Such a happening would have set aviation progress in screaming reverse.  It was the absolutely correct conclusion.  His opposition dissolved my initial fears, I whitened a little bit and said quietly, "But Mr. Curtiss I have a contract!  Mr. Fanculli has signed the document.  You gave him carte blanche to do so as he thought best.  I've a paper that says you'll teach me to fly, and doggone it, I'm gonna learn."  This was an interesting clash of wills.  Mr. Curtiss was stubborn, I was determinedly willful.  The result was that I had a reluctant instructor.  Glenn Curtiss was quiet, self contained, like the late Cal Coolidge he was almost silent.  When he did speak, however, he had something pertinent to say and he said it so there was no possibility of interpreting it in any way except the exact way he meant it.  Curtiss had a Coolidge-like economy with the spoken word.

Mrs. Curtiss insisted that a country hotel was no proper residence for a young girl.  I found myself moved to the Curtiss home.  Our initial meeting impact had worn off and all business details were settled with training for me to begin immediately.  I greeted dawn next morning charged with anticipation and edgy with excitement ... still scared.  The first look at the odd looking plane on arrival at the field made me wish that there had been a soft spot in my stubbornness.

The plane was a single-seated pusher -- an apt [[strikethrough]] machine [[/strikethrough]] designation because of the propellor's rear location.  Since it was a single seater there was no facility for the instructor to accompany a pupil in the air.  Mr. Curtiss initiated the [[strikethrough]] [[?]] [[/strikethrough]] flight training in a 'grass cutting course!  The idea was simplicity itself.