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meet the General Aviation Company went out of business, leaving their students stranded. In addition to Hodgdon there were Roy Waite, Harry Jones, Jack McGee and several others. 

As the company folded they had two partially completed Curtiss-type planes under construction by the students at a shop in Boston. [[crossed out]] and [[/crossed out]] Hodgdon's father obtained one of these as payment [[crossed out]] of tuition for [[/crossed out]] in lieu of lessons not received. Hodgdon and his brother completed this plan, with a 60 [[crossed out]] H. P. [[/crossed out]] h.p. Fox deluxe engine, and Paragon propelloer, [[crossed out]] and fitted the machine [[/crossed out]] equipping it as a 2-seater with dual controls. By July the plane was ready for tests and Hodgdon's father hired Ripley Bowman to fly it, with instructions to first make sure it was safe, then teach both boys to operate it. Bowman crashed on his initial hop, then disappeared.

Several prominent flyers came to the flying field  [[crossed out]] that [[/crossed out]] the summer of 1912, including Ruth Law, who made her [[crossed out]] first [[/crossed out]] solo flight there. Farnum Fish brought his Wright biplane there for repairs [[crossed out]] and [[/crossed out]] when he started flying Hodgdon paid for and obtained several flying lessons from him before he left in August. 

Hodgdon then started taking lessons from Roy Waite on his Burgess-Wright biplane. [[crossed out]] and [[/crossed out]] The [?] continued on occasion until the spring of 1913 when Waite told him he needed no more instruction. He did not solo at that time, however, because he could not put up the heavy bond necessary to cover possible damage to the plane in case of accident, but he had learned to fly.

At that time Waite was also teaching Sr. Pedro Z. Coronel of Argentina and Sr. C. F. Gomez of Honduras. In partnership with Coronel, Hodgdon rebuilt the Curtiss-type plane Bowman had wrecked during the summer of 1912 and started flying it, first making a number of short flights, then they decided to attempt a longer one. While over a marsh away from the field their engine quit, causing a forced landing. The nose wheel sank into the soft marsh, the plane turned turtle, and was wrecked again. Hodgdon received a broken collarbone and Coronel a badly cut leg. This ended Hodgdon's flying activities for 1913. He was attending high school at that time and graduated in the spring of 1914. 

He managed to repair the plain [[crossed out]] in 1913 [[/crossed out]] that year and [[crossed out]] learned [[/crossed out]] lent it to a Mr. Shaw to make