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7. February 2. Saturday a Baddeck 57 teary Digest New York 24 Nov 1906. Air-ship Fad Predicted.---Santos-Dumont, latest aerial successes are mentioned else- this number, has confided to the public [[?]] in the early approach of practical utilization air ship. The time is soon to be here, he is [[?]] saying, when navigation of the air will be [[?]] as riding a bicycle, and almost as common. interview in Paris he said, according to the [[?]]rk Evening Post. that the flying-machine [[?]]ntually become the "poor man's" auto-[[?]] be safer, faster, and cheaper. The rest of [[?]]mistic views are thus further quoted: [[?]]nachine I am experimenting with is very [[?]]aving a surface of eighty square meters, [[?]]practical airplane, which will be fore the air [[?]] democratic bicycle is for the earth, will [[?]] smaller. With ordinary flying-machines [[?]]ssary to increase the size in order to increase [[?]]er. With the aeroplane, on the contrary, [[?]]d will be increased in direct proportion to [[?]]nution of the resisting surface. My present [[?]]e was intentionally built larde to overcome [[?]]stacles as to principles. But with increased [[?]]which means speed, the size can be reduced. [[?]]ame time increased speed adds to the safety, [[?]]erful motor is more easily manipulated. [[?]]ay, therefore, look forward to a practical [[?]]e which may be comfortable house in [[?]]me. From the standpoint of maintenance, [[?]] both of petroleum and repairs, the airplane [[?]]much less expensive than the auto-car. There [[?]]o expensive tires to burst and no bad roads [[?]]hem to pieces. There will be no collisions. [[?]]ar people will be able to go to the seashore [[?]] airplanes. It will become the fad and the [[?]] cement of a new industry. [[?]]of the danger? [[?]]nly danger would be the risk of a broken [[?]]and I cano not see that a rudder could break [[?]] The airplane is immobility itself. The [[?]] which made me descend on October 23 [[?]]asily rectified by a second rudder to counter[[?]] tendency in that direction. The practical [[?]], while the matter remains in the experi[[?]]tage, would, of course, be how to control [[?]]plementary rudders while the hands are [[?]]e engaged. My intention is to attach the [[?]]es to my neck and maintain the equilibrium [[?]]instinctive movement of the head. Later [[?]]nitive arrangement will be replaced by an [[?]]ic mercurial apparatus. [[?]] the automobile was first introduced, the [[?]]he-street treated those who had the temerity [[?]]te them as madmen, never anticipating the [[?]]n the fashionable thoroughfares fo every [[?]] would be crowded with automobiled filled [[?]]rses and newly born children. Men will [[?]]roplanes as they now drive automobiles. [[?]]ill be a short apprenticeship, but that can [[?]]on terra firms. In bried the day is not far [[?]]nt when the aeroplane, as a means of locomotion, [[?]]eplace in the air the bicycle on the earth. Post Boston 24 Nov 1906 MAN-FLIGHT ____ It is reported from Dayton, O., that [[?]]ne Wright brothers have sold their intention of a flying machine to the French government for a large sum. This is the machine which Alexander Graham Bell told about in his remarks before the meeting of the National Academy of Sciences at the Harvard Medical School day before yesterday. Dr. Bell himself is a leader in the art of man-flight. He has devised a sort of [[?]]llular kite, made up of "tetrahedral [[?]]nits," which lifts in the way that the [[?]]ings of a bird are supposed to lift, and [[?]]as apparently supported a considerable [[?]]eight in motion in the experiments which the originator of the telephone has [[?]]nducted at his summer residence in the provinces. His indorsement of the Wright brothers' machine, which is constructed on a somewhat different plan, is therefore [[?]]rank and weighty; he is not advertising his own invention. And his testimony is what the Wright brothers of Dayton O., have produced a machine which flies in the air, circles and takes direction as it [[?]]s governed by steerage and makes rapid [[?]]assage as driven by motors. The machine making the flight weighs nearly 2000 pounds, and the motors drive it 37 miles an hour. If we may accept all this as proven practically as well as theoretically, the French government has got possession of the type of the real airship. But in these days the ownership of a scientific discovery, invention or idea by any government does not create a monopoly or shut out development by ingenious minds elsewhere. The device which Wilbur and Orville Wright have produced cannot by secluded, and we may look to see men flying here in the United States even before the Frenchmen make the aerial course. Literary Digest New York [[strikethrough]] 71 [[/strikethrough]] 24 Nov. 1906. SCIENCE AND INVENTION. _____ SANTOS-DUMONT'S AEROPLANE. The first successful trials of an airplane that were freely open to public observation took place in Paris on September 15 last. The experiments of the brothers Wright in this country were much more extensive and successful, but the public was not allowed to note their details. The first trials of Santos-Dumont's airplane therefore possess special interest, even more than his subsequent flights, which have been much longer. They are described in La Nature (Paris, October 6) by Mr. G. Chalmarès. Says this writer: "We were able to prove by actual observation, as did three hundred other persons, that on the Bagatelle lawn in the Bois de Boulogne Santos-Dumont raised himself about 1 meter [3 feet 3 inches] into the air for a distance of 7 to 8 meters [about 25 feet]. This is very little, of course, but sufficient to prove that a person may carry with him a source of energy that will enable him to fly through the air. _____________________________________________________________ [[image with caption:]] SANTOS-DUMONT'S SUCCESSFUL AIR-SHIP. A fifty-horse-power airplane with which the inventor gives promise of solution of the "heavier-than-air" problem in aerial navigation. _____________________________________________________________ "His apparatus is an assemblage of kites of the Hargrave type, made of light linen and bamboo cases open at both ends. There were three of these on each side, and perpendicular to them a longer kite that had a movable one fastened to its end to serve as rudder. "The whole was those shaped like a letter T, but, contrary to what might be supposed, it was the stem of this T that was in front. At the intersection of the branches were the basket and the 50-horse-power petrol-motor with its four cylinders, built by Levasseur. This drove two-bladed metal screw 2 meters [6 1/2 feet] in diameter, placed in the rear of the kites. The whole was supported by three wheels by means of an elastic suspension, and weighed about 300 kilograms [660 pounds] with the aeronaut. The total horizontal surface was 80 square meters, so in that case the motor should give out while the machine was flying it would have to support 4 kilograms to the square meter--a normal figure, according to competent experimenters. Left to itself, the machine would fall gently to the ground if properly balanced. We believe, however, that this is not the case with the aeroplane in question, and it was probably this defect of equilibrium that put too speedy an end to the experiment of September 15. "The screw having been started, at a speed of 1,000 to 1,200 turns a minute--its normal rate of revolution being 1,600--the machine moved along on its wheels at about 30 kilometers [18 1/2 miles] an hour, for a distance of about 200 meters [656 feet]; then, obeying a turn of the helm, it rose into the air. The two forward wheels left the ground first, and then, several meters farther along the third followed. No longer resting at any point on the ground, the machine flew 7 to 8 meters, but then it tipped sharply at the rear, and the propeller, striking the ground, broke. The wheels came into contact with the ground somewhat suddenly but without dangerous shock to the aeronaut. We have said above that the aeroplane was propelled along the ground at a speed of 30 kilometers [18 1/2 miles] an hour by the action of the propeller on the air. We should note here an experiment made by Mr. Ernest Archdeacon, president of the Aviation Committee of the Aero Club....... "Mr. Archdeacon, with the object of studying the action of a screw-propeller under these conditions, installed on a 6-horse-power motor-cycle an aluminum screw 2 meters [6 1/2 feet] in diameter. A chain transmission united it to the motor and rotated it at a speed of 900 turns a minute; the wheels of the cycle served simply as means of support. In these conditions, with a cyclist weighing 80 kilograms [176 pounds], or a total of 250 kilograms [330 pounds], the machine was propelled over a level road at the rate of 80 kilometers [50 miles] an hour, while under normal condi-tions, without the propeller and with the motor connected to the rear wheel, the machine made 90 kilometers [56 miles] an hour. We see from this interesting experiment that the result is nearly the same in the two cases. It might even be made superior in the case of the propeller, but the experiment should be repeated soon, and we shall then describe it more in detail. As for the trials of Santos-Dumont's apparatus, they will be resumed when the necessary repairs and changes have been com-pleted. For the moment the fact remains that he was able to raise himself into space without a balloon; and this is an impor-tant victory for the partizans of the 'heavier-than-air' method of aerial navigation." Since this memorable first trial, Santos-Dumont has done much better. On October 23 he drove his aeroplane 150 feet at a height of 20 feet above the ground, and in November he traveled several hundred feet at about the same height, descending only because he feared that his propel-ler would injure the heads of some of the crowd be-low. The main feature about all these trials is their publicity. The aero-plane itself does noot ap-pear to be as efficient as that of the Wright broth-ers. Says The Scientific American (November 3): "The young Brazilian, altho having an appara-tus of the same general type as that used by the American experimenters, but of about one-half its weight, found that a 50-horse-power motor was nec-essary to drive his flier up into the air and forward through it at a speed of 25 miles per hour; while the Wrights, with a machine of twice the weight and half the power, claim to have made nearly double the speed (38 miles per hour). "In the experiment just described [that on October 23] Santos-Dumont's machine lifted only about 10 pounds to the horse-power, while the Wright brothers' aeroplane, it is claimed, lifted 60, and Maxim found that it is possible to lift 133, altho, in reality, with his huge machine weighing 8,000 pounds, provided with two 18-foot propellers and steam-engines developing 461 horse-power, he only succeeded in lifting 20 pounds per horse-power at speeds of about 40 miles an hour. When the fact is noted that the new aeroplane has a total surface of 645 square feet (the superposed planes being 39.37 feet long by 8.2 feet wide) as against about 480 square feet of sustaining surface carried by the Wright ma-chine (the planes in this machine are said to have been 40 feet long by 6 feet wide), if we concede the correctness of the Wrights' re-sults, we must immediately conclude that the Dumont machine is exceedingly inefficient. The only essential features wherein it differs from the Wright flier are the use of a small, high-speed propeller (necessitated by the mounting of it on the engine shaft) and the setting of the planes at a dihedral angle. Therefore, it would appear that both these arrangements are quite inefficient." Mr. Dumont, however, has faith in his air-ship, and says that but for the "idiotic" excitement of the crowd at his trials on November 12, he would have made a kilometer [3/5 mile] with ease. "I was well in the air," he says, "perfectly balanced, and my motor was working exceedingly well." --Translation made for THE LITERARY DIGEST.
Transcription Notes:
The first column is cut off on the left side, so visibility of those words is limited. I left [[?]] where missing words are, but I did my best to infer.
