In Philadelphia

As was fitting, the costly Sesquicentennial ceremonies at Philadelphia, commemorative of the country's founding fathers, were planned with the inclusion of an aeronautic program--meetings of societies, plane races, demonstrations of commercial craft, etc. Last week this program got fully under way.

Engineers. The aeronautics section of the Society of Automotive Engineers went into session. One speaker was Professor Alexander Klemin, onetime aeronautics editor of TIME, lately head of the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aeronautics at New York University. He spoke of the "foolproof" plane that must some day be developed to make flying as general as automobiling; promised that the international competition, made "interesting" by $150,000 to $200,000, which the Guggenheim Foundation is to conduct over the next three years, would turn designer's minds from the speed craze* to safety. The principal factors to be developed: slower landing speeds, steeper landing angles./-

Engineer William B. Stout, Henry Ford's air chief (TIME, Aug. 9) predicted: "Airplanes will be made so safe and at such a reasonable cost during the next five years, that the average man who owns an automobile will be able to buy a plane. . . . The man on the ground has an idea that airplane riding will make him sick and be too thrilling. As a matter of fact there is not as much 'kick' in flying as there is in fast automobile riding."

Races. To the southwest corner of Philadelphia, at an establishment called Model Farms, flocked planes from far and near for the National Air Races.

The first event was a "flight frolic of clowns" to attract the populace. Then civilians flew an elimination heat for low-powered ships entered to win the Aero Club of Pennsylvania trophy, the first home being Basil Rowe of Keyport, N. J., in a Thomas Morse SE-4. Pilot C. S. "Casey" Jones, a celebrated, daring and slightly comic figure from Garden City, L. I., placed third in this event, then stepped into a wing-clipped Curtiss Oriole and won the 84-mile Independence Hall free-for-all, tipping around the pylons at an average speed of 136.11 m.p.m., ahead of the "mystery" racer of Harry F. Pitcairn, Philadelphia millionaire enthusiast.

Thirteenth Contract The longest contract airmail route yet (1,099 mi.) was about to start operating, between Seattle and Los Angeles. Trains take 63 hr. up or down this stretch of coast. Eight planes were in readiness to fly it, four each way daily, in 13 1/4 hr. Night flying was planned for the beginning of each trip, the planes setting out at 3:45 a. m., arriving at 5 p. m. with five stops* on the way: Portland, Medford, San Francisco, Fresno, Bakersfield. When begun, it was to make the 13th operating contract route that has been instituted in the U. S. since February--a network that now totals some 5,000 mi., over and above the U. S. Post Office Department's own transcontinental route.

S-35 Fonck-Fonck, Fonck-Fonck! For weeks the press has been full of the ace of allied aces, M. le Capitaine Rene Fonck, who came to the U. S. to fly from Long Island to Paris for a $25,000 prize offered by Hotelman Raymond Orteig of Manhattan, (TIME, Aug. 23).

Fonck-Fonck, Fonck-Fonck! Two U. S. flyers were chosen as Captain Fonck's companions for the flight, Lieut. Allan Snody of the Navy and Captain Homer Berry, who won his commission flying for (and against) Pancho Villa in Mexico "for the fun of it." Mr. Berry was a friend of Col. Harold E. Hartney, manager of the Argonauts, Inc., the organization backing M. Fonck.

Fonck-Fonck, Fonck-Fonck! With the big Sikorsky ship S-35 a-testing and a tentative hop-off date set (Sept. 21), it developed that Mr. Berry was no choice of M. Fonck. In fact M. Fonck quite objected to having him along. There was Mr. Berry's guerrilla Mexican commission; there was a personal factor. After several days of squabbling, Mr. Berry withdrew "for the good of aviation." Sick, ecstatic, M. Fonck embraced Mr. Berry in the French manner, liked him better.

Fonck-Fonck, Fonck-Fonck! Every one likes the bullet-headed little Frenchman. His great gallantry aside, he has a winning personality. But unfortunately there was a misunderstanding between the Argonauts Inc. and Engineer Sikorsky, builder of the S-35, in which M. Fonck sided with the Russian. At a warm moment in the Berry-Fonck difficulty, the Argonauts gave orders to Engineer Sikorsky that no one was to touch the plane that was not in the Argonauts' employ, including Captain Fonck. Engineer Sikorsky said that the Argonauts "had a nerve," since they had paid only $20,000 so far for his $100,000 plane. Engineer Sikorsky had evidently forgotten a contract that he had signed to build the plane for $43,000, at a time when he very much wanted a contract. The plane had, with publicity, become worth some $150,000. The Argonauts promised to produce this contract, adding that if Engineer Sikorsky continued unconvinced they would pay him a balance due of $8,000, attach the plane through a writ of replevin, drop Capt. Fonck from the project and send the S-35 to Paris with a U. S. crew, perhaps captained by Lieut. Commander Richard Evelyn Byrd.

This, however, did not seem likely. The S-35 continued to drone about over Westbury, with saucy little M. Fonck at the controls. She behaved perfectly. So, it appeared, did he. Two clergymen--Protestant and Catholic--were invited to come and christen the ship. In the cabin were placed two ikons--St. Nicholas, patron saint of Russia; St. Christopher, the traveler's guardian. As the week ended all seemed prosperous and amicable for a valiant attempt to have the S-35 descend in Paris some day this month, amid joyous French throngs shouting, "Fonck! Fonck! Fonck!"

*That the speed craze is on the wane was seen in the lack of entries for the 1926 Pulitzer Races, which were cancelled last week.

/-Among the patient experimenters is Leonard W. Bonney of Flushing, L. I., who, after exhaustive research at Boston Tech and Professor Klemin's laboratories, is building a plane modeled after a seagull, with wings which will depress sharply upon landing or rising to make steeper the angle of ascent or descent and shorten the run. Mr. Bonney experimented long with a pair of live gulls, tying various weights to their feet to test their wing power. Later he worked from a plaster-cast of a gull.

*Stops will soon be necessary only to take on mail and to refuel. Just last week a despatch from London described a clockwork parachute to enable pilots to drop mailbags from 5,000 ft. without damage at email waystations.