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6 NATIONAL AERONAUTICS Activities Reported By NAA Chapters Lincoln, Nebr. The Lincoln chapter of NAA again this year awarded a scholarship for attendance at the National Aviation Education Workshop sponsored by the Civil Air Patrol and held last month at the University of Colorado. The chapter's scholarship went to Darrel Woods, a science teacher at Westside High School, Omaha. Two scholarships for the workshop were awarded by the Nebraska Air Age Education Division. They were awarded to Morton D. Johnson, physics teacher in the Alliance (Neb.) senior high school; and Miss Irene D. Eden, teacher of mathematics in Central High School, Omaha. In addition the Air Age Education Division granted a scholarship to Mrs. Velma Hodder, elementary supervisor of the Lincoln public schools, to attend the Air Age Education Workshop at Norwich University, Northfield, Vermont. St. Louis, Mo. The Greater St. Louis Chapter of NAA got quick results when it made a constructive presentation of the area's airport needs to the St. Louis Airport Commission should take steps to: • Develop a feeder-type airport on the present site of Weiss Airport in the Meramac Valley. • Purchase Parks Airport in East St. Louis and make some improvements, notably lengthening of the runways. • Continue to improve Lambert-St. Louis Municipal and provide an additional airport nearer downtown, either by expansion of Ross Airport or the development of a landing strip on the riverfront. Within a matter of days after the area airport plan was suggested to the Commission, the mayor named a committee to make a study of the feasibility, cost, etc., of city acquisition and development of the Parks Airport. Action on some of the other phases of the plan is expected later. Birmingham, Ala. The following committee will submit nominations for new officers and members of the board of governors of the Birmingham Aero Club, NAA affiliate, at the annual election on September 3: Arthur Allbright, chairman, Parker Osment, and Cary Nall. Capt. F. J. Schwammie, assistant to the general sales manager of Delta C&S Air Lines, will speak at the September 17 meeting of the club, by popular request. His speech last season is remembered as one of the year's highlights. On October 1, the club will install its new officers as a part of the "Miss American Aviation Day" program, with Ellen Watson, Southern Airways hostess and winner of the club's "Miss American Aviation" contest of last spring, as honor guest. Los Angeles The Aero Club of Southern California is moving ahead with its plans for making its Kitty Hawk Ball on December 17 one of the top aviation social events of all time. The famed Palladium in Hollywood has been engaged for that night, and one of the country's best known dance bands will provide music for the occasion. The committee also promises an outstanding speaker, whose name will be divulged at a later date. There has been some discussion of tying-in the Kitty Hawk Ball with the Wright Day Dinner in Washington the same night via a coast-to-coast telecast. Also being promoted by the Aero Club is a mass flight of personal and utility aircraft over Los Angeles at 10 a.m. on December 17, followed by the fly-by flights of all types of military aircraft to impress on the minds of the public the great results of 50 years' progress since the Wright Brothers' first successful flight. Washington, D.C. Board of Trustees of the Aero Club of Washington voted to put into effect an increase in the club's monthly dues from the present $6.00 per year up to $10.00 per year. Board is empowered to vote such an increase under the bylaws without membership action, but it submitted the proposal to the membership and won a better than 2-to-1 vote of approval. As in the past, $3.00 of each member's dues goes to pay for his membership in NAA. All of the proposed increase would accrue to the Aero Club's treasury to make up the approximate $1,200 per year loss the club has been incurring on its month-to-month operations. These losses heretofore have been made up out of profits from the club's annual Wright Day Dinner, and these profits will not be available for more constructive purposes, such as scholarship awards for high school graduates from schools in the Washington area who are planning aviation related studies. It has been recommended that the president appoint a committee to draft recommendations as to just what special activities and projects the club might support in the future. The special Finance Committee appointed by president Vernon A. Johnson to work out suggestions for bettering the club's financial situation was composed of George Gelly (past treasurer of the club), chairman' Frank Boesche, 1st vice president; Robert Sanders, current treasurer, and Robert Ramspeck and James Ray, Sr., from the membership at large. Obituaries HARRY BLOCK Harry Block, an aviation booster for most of his adult years and a life member of the National Aeronautic Association, died several weeks ago, it has been learned, at a hospital in his home city of St. Joseph, Mo. Mr. Block paid $206 on July 26, 191, for a round-trip flight between New York and Atlantic City, assertedly the first scheduled air passenger service to be flown in this country. He was quoted then as predicting that "This mode of transportation offers wonderful economic possibilities." Back home in St. Joseph, he sparked the construction of a couple of airfields and started the St. Joseph Aeronautic Association, which in the early 1920's boasted a membership of more that 2,000 and was said to be the largest aeroclub in the world. Aviation lost a great and good friend in the death of Harry Block. GERALD EAGLETON Gerald Eagleton, 49, who was long an active member of the NAA Chapter at Lincoln, Nebraska, was killed instantly when his J-3 spray plane went into a complete stall and crashed into a creek bed near Decatur, Neb., presumably during a take-off preparatory to spraying his crops. Leonard Hancock, state director of aviation safety, who examined the body and the crashed plane, said the cabin of the plane was not badly damaged and that Eagleton's death was caused by his head striking the instrument panel. Hancock said the flier might have survived the accident had he worn a shoulder harness and possibly a crash helmet. CMDR. G. S. SWEET Cmdr. George S. Sweet, 76, said to have been the first Navy officer to fly in a plane, died at his home in Miami last month after an illness of five years. A native of Watertown, N. Y., and an Annapolis graduate of the Class of 1898, he flew with Wilbur Wright in the early part of the century and recommended to the Navy the adoption of the airplane as a means of carrying war to the enemy.
