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[[red underline]] 35 lbs. weight [[/red underline]] necessitated by self starter. One of the flying machines was provided with a [[red underline]] Bakelite [[strike-through]] self starter [[/strike-through]] ^[[propeller]], [[/red underline]] made of impregnated canvas [[red underline]] laminated, [[/red underline]] probably made by [[red underline]] Westinghouse Co. [[/red underline]] It looks well and strong They tell me they have been able to run it [[red underline]] twice as fast [[/red underline]] as any other propellor before [[red underline]] rupturing by centrifugal [[/red underline]] - force. I believe it was [[red underline]] 2700 [[/red underline]] rev. per min (or was it 27000?) [[red underline]] The only objection is its weight and perhaps its price. 
That German plane [[/red underline]] marked [[red underline]] Vera [[/red underline]] with a Mercedes engine was tried and maneuvered beautifully making all kind of difficult evolutions and flying fast and climbing high. [[red underline]] Young ⌃[[Lawrence]] Sperry [[/red underline]] comes 
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around with heavy canvass overalls over his uniform and wears a buckled rope belt and ropes and hooks. [[red underline]] He is to try dropping from an airplane in full flight at great height by means of a [[/red underline]] [[double red underline]] parachute. [[/double red underline]] The parachute is strapped underneath of fuselage. [[red underline]] This explains why his father looks worried and paler than ever. I tried to dissuade young Sperry [[/red underline]] on the ground that this experiments [[red underline]] can be carried out by any flier who has skill and daring but that we need his brains and knowledge too [[/red underline]] much and therefore he [[strikethrough]] sh [[/strikethrough]] can [[red underline]] not afford to take chances. His superior officers felt the same [[/red underline]] and tried to find a pretext to eliminate this from the days program. 
There was about [[red underline]] two feet snow on [[/red underline]] the field and this in itself made starting difficult but [[strikethrough]] they had [[/strikethrough]]