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XVI
THE TECHNOLOGY REVIEW
1916 Continued

members, I will not go as far as Charlie Reed and claim to be the first one to have that honor, but as my boys are now nearly five years old I think I can successfully refute his claim." (Secretary's note: Who dares dispute Saul's claim!)

Hovey Freeman writes that a good number of the Class are "conscious" and have paid all class dues to date. Among those who now have a clear conscience are: Harold Dodge, Charlie McCarthy, Ralph Fletcher, Bob Naumburg, Del Delabarre, Hovey Freeman, Harold Whitney, Paul Harrower, Wil Wylde, Ken Kenney. I hope to report a larger number of conscious names in our next letter, for I am sure there is a very large percentage of the Class who are at least semi-conscious most of the time, and should therefore snap out of their coma soon.

It was a great treat to me to have luncheon with Arvin Page recently. Arvin is still with the Bahnson Company of Winston-Salem, and had come up to the textile show here in Boston to exhibit some of their humidifying machines. Arvin is as cheerful as ever, and guarantees to be on hand at our Fifteenth Reunion next year. - Henry B. Shepard, Secretary, 269 Highland Street, West Newton, Mass. Charles W. Loomis, Assistant Secretary, 7338 Woodward Avenue, Detroit, Mich.

1917

On Wednesday, March 19, Wright Field greeted three returned travelers who had been absent under flying orders for the previous month. The trio were Major Jacob E. Fickel, executive of the materiel division; Lieutenant Albert F. Hegenberger'17, co-pilot on the first flight from California across the Pacific to Hawaii; and Lieutenant Ennis Whitehead, a pilot of the South American good will flight of 1927. The three, together with Sergeant K.D. Wilson of Bolling Field, D.C., who served as radio operator, crossed on their flight from Miami, Fla., to France Field, Panama Canal Zone, nonstop, via the Caribbean Sea. A part of Major Fickel's account of the flight follows: "As the first streaks of dawn appeared, 6:10 A.M., February 20, we took to the air. There were in the plane Lieutenants Hegenberger and Whitehead, co-pilots; Sergeant Wilson, radio operator, and myself, acting as navigator.
"Once out over the water, we discovered we had a strong wind on the port bow, causing a drift of seventeen degrees and cutting down the ground speed from 105 miles per hour, which we had hoped to make, to 82 miles per hour. This caused us little concern except that of landing in darkness, should we be delayed to that extent. We flew directly over Cuba, setting our course from Cienfuegos to the Cayman Islands. These islands which lie 200 miles south of Cuba are possessions of Great Britain, and we had been instructed not to fly over them. We skirted them beyond the three-mile limit, then set out course for the Seranilla Bank some 400 miles to the south. We later set the compass for the entrance to the Panama Canal, but struck Fort Sherman, just three miles away. We landed at France Field, Panama, at 5:30 P.M., making the time of the flight eleven hours and twenty minutes for the 1140 miles. This averaged a little better than 100 miles per hour.
"The flight from Miami to Panama without stop proved the possibility of direct communication with the Canal Zone in the shortest possible time. It was the first time such a flight had been accomplished in a multi-motored plane, and only once before had it been accomplished by any type plane whatever. As a military maneuver it held considerable importance. Plane and engines functioned perfectly, so the flight was without particular incident. The difficulties of navigation with the instruments we carried were not great. Three magnetic compasses and one induction compass were installed. A bubble sextant enabled us to learn our position from astronomical observations, if necessary. Drift indicators were carried to be used in connection with smoke bombs to get the wind direction and ground speed. An interesting item of radio equipment was a small battery operated transmitter set, to be used as part of the equipment of the rubber life raft.
"The trip back lay over magnificent scenery. We had the contrast of mountain peaks, with many smoking volcanoes, and dense tropical jungles. The Mexican people in Tapachula we found exceedingly gracious in their treatment of us. Everything possible was done to make our stay interesting and comfortable and to facilitate our return home."

W.I. McNeil called on his visit to greater Boston where he is parking his family for a few months while he visits Colgate-Palmolive-Peet plants at Milwaukee, Kansas City, Berkeley, Calif., Mexico City, Toronto, and possibly Germany. After his world tour of the next few months, he expects to be located permanently at Chicago. he is now assistant comptroller of Colgate-Palmolive-Peet. 

From Alvah E. Moody comes the following: "I am still building pipe lines on my own hook, and had a pretty good year in 1929. Natural gas is the big thing out here now, and I am beginning to break in on that work. I also did the pipe work around three golf courses last year, on one of which I put in about five miles of pipe. I went to Los Angeles in January and while I did not see Deac Young, who was in San Francisco, I saw his brother Herb'19, who is flat on his back to being gassed during the War. I believe I told you that Cy Medding is a captain in the engineers and is stationed at Fort Logan just outside of Denver. He is the only '17 man that I have seen."

C.H.M. Roberts sends in the following bit of news: "I emerge from the tomb to notify you that Patricia Roberts was born here on February 20. As Mrs. Roberts is a Smith graduate (1919), it may be taken for granted that Patricia will be applying for Tech Show reservations at Northampton along about 1948. In this far-off part of the world I see very few Technology men, except those permanently located hereabouts. Among these are a number of men with the Humble Oil and Refining Company - including Brian Mead, Jimmie Harrop, and Stewart Coleman. Other local Technology men whom I see occasionally are Fritz Staub, a rising architect of Houston, and Kenn Dean, now in the cotton business on his own account. George Maverick, in charge of research for the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, drops in occasionally as does Ras Senter, who is in the oil business in Dallas.
"Although I haven't seen Ridley Stribling recently, we are regular correspondents - that is, as regular as I ever am. He is still in the Army and is in Washington, in charge of design, manufacture, and test of aerial bombs - the job which I had prior to leaving the Army in 1922. My work, since the fall of 1923, has been with William I. Barnickel and Company of St. Louis. This company manufactures special demulsifying agents, for use in the oil industry. My work with the company has been largely on research - partly in the laboratory, partly in the field. In the course of my work I have lived in most of the oil fields west of the Mississippi River. For the past two and a half years I have been working on the solution of basic problems in physical, colloid, and organic chemistry. My laboratory here, which I have developed from the start and in which a goodly part of the apparatus was designed and built on the spot, is located in Houston because of its proximity to the coastal oil fields, from which I procure samples for study. The work is extremely interesting - although often most exasperating - and seems to be yielding results of both scientific and commercial interest."

Unfortunately the rules and regulations of The Review do not permit us to say anything here about what happened at the Reunion. At the time this was written, it has not happened. Probably the majority of the readers of this column will have been at the Corinthian Yacht Club; it is safe to say that the absent minority missed a grand good time. - Raymond S. Stevens, Secretary, 30 Charles River Road, Cambridge, Mass.

1918
Before this is embalmed in printer's ink, the 1930 All-Technology Reunion will be only an unalterable memory and the Class Dinner at the Engineers Club will have become synthesized into ligaments, nerve tissue, or possibly medulla oblongata. Whisperings of what the committee has up their sleeves for the occasion have just penetrated as far south as the Everglades, for a dispatch from Lomax Clark reveals that he has deserted his pet Florida alligator in order to be at the Reunion. The for-the-man-who-came-the-farthest chair is now being tailored to his coefficients of form.

Tom Kelly reports that his fourth child and oldest son now has four teeth. Research, which has behind it all the thunders of Professor Park's course in mechanism, leads inevitable to the conclusion that this indicates the boy's preference