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mail pilot at Chicago, then on May 23d she started on a non-stop flight from Chicago to New York carrying mail. On the flight she encountered strong head winds and ran out of gas, which forced her down new Binghamton, New York after ten hours in the air. In landing she nosed over, damaging a wing and broke the propeller, but she was not injured. The distance flown was 783 miles. After repairs were made she flew on the Sheepshead Bay, Long Island, New York where she and Ruth Law flew and races each other on May 30th. 

In mid-summer, 1918 Katherine returned to Canada for another series of exhibitions engagements, first Calgary for the week of July 9th, then flew to Edmonton, 175 miles in 2 hours, 5 minutes, which was then a Canadian distance-and-duration record. There she raced Leon Duray, the automobile race driver, then flew on to Saskatoon, Red Deer, and Camrose, leaving Canada August 3. While there she also carried the first government-authorized air mail in Canada, on July 9.
 
On September 26 she made an air mail flight from College Park, Md., to Bustleton, Pa., these being the flying fields adjacent to Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia, Pa., respectively used by the Post Office. Air Mail has begun, for the first time as a continuous scheduled public service between permanent stations of May 15, 1918. Previously there had been about a hundred instanced of airplane -flown mail including that of Katherine Stinson at Helena, Montana in 1913, previously described, but all of those so-called "pioneer" air mails were temporary and usually a novelty rather than a useful service. But on Katherine's flight with mail in 1918 she was piloting an official governmental air mail plane and carrying official public mail. To do this she had received special permission from the Postmaster General. This required the mechanics at College Park to remove the then-customary stick and rudder controls and make and install the two-lever system (the right-hand lever having an upper hinged portion for rudder control) that had been originated by Orville Wright in 1909 and which Katherine had been taught in 1912. Air Mail Maurice Newton escorted her to the Bustleton field, and also for the return flight, each time permitting her to land first. 

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