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Fortunately, the Regal Shoe Agency hired me to fly advertising kites for their best $3.50 shoes!  This concession was operated over the entrance to the fair grounds.  When I had it going properly, I hired four or five young boys to do the work for me and I went on, seeking my own specific goal.

The Tomlinson Captive Balloon Company of Syracuse, New York had been given the concession to put up and operate nice captive balloons at different locations on the grounds.  They somehow found out that I had brought a balloon with me and immediately wanted me to sell it to them.  But I insisted that it was not for sale.  After much arguement and persuasion on the part of the fair officials, I agreed to lease my balloon to them for a fee of fifty dollars a week whether it was in the air or not.  In other words, if we had bad weather and we couldn't fly, that was their gamble.  I was to operate my own balloon; I couldn't stand still and watch others seemingly wreck it for me!

There was no protection for the balloon and we had to anchor it out in the open.  Shortly after I had leased my balloon, we had a violent thunderstorm.  It received a severe pounding from the elements and at the height of the storm split from top to bottom.  I borrowed a sewing machine from a nearby dressmaker and quickly sewed up the rent.  Then I smeared balloon varnish on [[strikethrough]] the seams [[strikethrough]] and between the seams and we resumed operations.

Business was very good.  Our average intake was around three or four hundred dollars a day.  One of the biggest days, I remember, we took in over seven hundred dollars, but in order to do that we had to continue operations until midnight.  Even then people still lined up, waiting for rides.

Then there were days when we would have no business.  It would seem that the people were interested in other parts of the fair.