Viewing page 4 of 16

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

27th Martin flew for four days at an air meet in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada with McCurdy and Witmer.

Following this he was a contestant at the famed Chicago Aviation Meet at Grant Park August 12th to 20th, flying his Farman-type machine. There he competed in the major contests and won the accuracy-in-landing event of the meet. From Chicago Martin flew at Barton, Vermont and had a smashup, damaging his plane so badly he was unable to compete in the Harvard-Boston 1911 meet August 26th to September 6th. On October 12th Martin and George Dyott spoke before a meeting of the Aeronautical Society of New York on their experiences during flight training in Europe.

Martin began preliminary test flying of his new Queen-Martin biplane at Nassau Boulevard, Long Island, New York early in October and continued these tests that month. It was a fuselage-type, tractor biplane with Farman-type landing gear, and a 14 cylinder, 100 H.P. Gnome engine. This machine was undoubtedly one of the first tractor-type biplanes, and toward the end of October he had a bad smashup with it at Nassau when he was forced to land in the back yard of a Garden City residence. After repairs to the plane Martin installed a Kirkham engine and continued flying it in November.

[[left margin]] [[stamped]] FROM THE FLYING PIONEERS BIOGRAPHIES OF HAROLD E. MOREHOUSE [[/stamped]] [[/LEFT MARGIN]]

Martin moved his activities to the Pacific northwest early in 1912 and on March 10th he spoke at the Seattle Press Club. That spring he procured a Gage tractor biplane with an 8 cylinder Hall-Scott engine, with both land and water landing equipment and flew it in the Seattle area that season, including exhibitions at the annual Potlach Celebration that fall.

In 1913 Martin took this plane to Alaska through July and August made the first exhibition tour of that area before crowds of startled miners and natives. Returning to the States, Mr. and Mrs. Martin spent the winter of 1913-1914 in San Francisco.

During 1914 Martin returned to the sea and was in command of the U.S.S. Lake Fray, but in 1915 he reportedly again did some test flying for the Aeromarine Company of Keyport, New Jersey. At that time Martin was actively turning his attention toward aircraft inventions, and in December, 1916 was conducting tests