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6 FLY MAGAZINE April 1913

The Need of a National Aeronautical Laboratory

Scientific Study Essential to Progress and Development

WHO will deny that to make the aeroplane commercially available scientific research must be continued with indefatigible perseverance?

And who will contradict the statement that in order to continue such research a National Aeronautical Laboratory should be established?

While men able to carry on such a work are few, the number that would benefit are legion. It is evident that none of our philanthropists are willing to invest some of their wealth in a private institution of this sort without Government initiative, and it is admitted that there are no aeroplane companies in America that could afford to establish and carry on the work of scientific investigation of the problems of the air, so we must look to the Government for aid.

Those who are in the vanguard of progress asking for such a laboratory, face a situation that is not the most encouraging one in the world. Not that they are without faith in their proposition or that they lack the ability to carry on the experimental work that would be developed in such an institution, but because, Friend Reader, you are not "backing them up."

One may take the hypothesis that you would not read these lines if you were not interested in aeronautics. If you are seriously interested in aeronautics you must realize that all real progress in aviation is due to scientific research.

The most vexing problems of the air must ultimately be solved by continued scientific work along certain lines, The solution of these problems must lead to the making of aerial transportation as safe as railroad travel today. When this time comes, the aeroplane as a commercial vehicle, and as the product of a great industry, will rank above every known means of transportation.

One may go further and say that when the industry reaches this stage, thousands will be employed where only scores are working today; that where it is possible to secure only limited capital for the most meritorious of aeroplane inventions, unlimited resources will be opened to legitimate business interests. At that hour will occur an opportunity for engineers and business men such as comes but once in a generation, if then.

Where we are guessing at results or spending months with practical experiments, European aeroplane designers, from their respective aeronautical laboratories, can secure accurate tables of the actual results that will be obtained, before a rib is made or a strut fashioned.

Without such assistance, it is not to be wondered that American aeroplane constructors are years behind their European competitors.

With these facts before you, Friend Reader, is it asking too much to request you to write your Congressmen to support a bill for the immediate establishment of a National Aeronautical Laboratory? Unless there is an interest shown by the general public in such a bill, its passage might be delayed indefinitely; with the clamor of the general public for it, the Congressmen, because they are your servants, must give such a petition their intelligent and careful attention.

It is better, if you can, that you see your Congressmen personally. If they must be educated to the necessity of such an institution, you will be aiding a great cause be doing all in your power.

There are a hundred reasons why we should have a National Aeronautical Laboratory, but the most convincing one is that we need it. 

By such missionary work as you are able to do, you are striving for your own interests. Such a laboratory is necessary, and absolutely essential, to the growth of aviation in America. We cannot progress rapidly in this country until we are able to study it in this way without competent and able men to do the work, and then only when they are equipped with delicate apparatus that will give accurate results. And to carry on this work an institution is necessary.

An aeronautical laboratory is to the best interests of the aeroplane industry. As one attains success by serving the best interests of his field of business or of his employer, so you will be working for your own success by serving the best interests in the field of aeronautics. 

With the Government support of such a laboratory, the individual and the corporation will meet on an equal footing. Experiments that you have neither the ability nor the apparatus to carry out, can be taken to this institution and the results secured for you. It might be discovered that this or that calculation was wrong. Then you would have gone no further than the draughting room; if you had not been able to turn to this source for information, you might have built several machines and discovered the error by actual experiment. But this method would have cost you hundreds and probably thousands of dollars. On the other hand, the cost of the laboratory experiments would be only an infinitesimal part of the sum that you would have had to invest to secure these results by practical experiment.