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Aviation History
1909
1909 - 0243.PDF
MAY I, 1909. - ; WELCOME TO ENGLAND. WILBUR AND ORVILLE WRIGHT ARRIVE ON MONDAY. THE honour and the pleasure of welcoming the Brothers already, should communicate at once with Mr. Harold E. wnrjur ana Urville W right to these shores is going to be Perrin, Secretary of the Aero Club, at 166, Piccadilly, W.conferred sooner than we had dared to hope on those " " .'--..' * who, in taking an interest in human flight, have become members of the two leading, and not in any sense rival British bodies established in connection with aviation On Monday the little brothers, who have earned immor- tality for themselves by gaining a fame that will last to the uttermost reaches of history, will arrive on these shores for a brief visit of two dr three days, which is the longest time they can spare at the moment on their way to America on the completion of their Italian contract. If any programme has been submitted to them con- cerning Monday and Tuesday mornings and afternoons, at least nothing is known at the time of writing of their having approved of such arrangements. But the evenings of both days will be gala and memorable ones in the annals of flight in Britain. On Monday the Aeronautical Society of Great Britain, which is the oldest established body of the kind in these islands, will entsrtain the famous American flying men to a banquet given privately by the Council at the Ritz Hotel, at 7 o'clock; while the Institution of Civil Engineers has been proud to lend its hall for a general meeting of the members of the Society, presided over by Mr. Edward S. Frost, at half-past eight o'clock, when suitable speeches will be made in connection with the presentation of one of the Society's gold medals to each of the brothers. F-- A more numerously attended function will be held at the Ritz Hotel the following evening, when Messrs. Wright will be entertained at a banquet given in their honour by the Aero Club of the United Kingdom, and hih b ito which a number of very distinguished men of the day have been invited and have signified their eagerness to •attend. Some time ago a special deputation of the Aero Club was sent over to Paris to wait on Messrs. Wright and to present them with special gold medals •designed and struck in their honour by the Club. Therefore on Tuesday evening there will be no function of presentation, but, it is assured, some speeches of brilliant, beyond ordinary after-dinner, oratory will be •delivered. Those who are desirous of attending, and who have not intimated their intention of doing so ® ®F. W. Lanchester's Cantor Lectures. ON Monday evening, April 26th, Mr. F. W. Lan- chester commenced a series of three " Cantor Lectures " on Aerial Flight before the Royal Society of Arts. The •second lecture will de delivered on May 3rd, and the concluding section will be given on May 10th. In so short a space of time as an hour it was, of course, impossible for even one so conversant with his subject as the author of " Aerodynamics" to do more than give the very briefest indication of the scope of the principles of dynamic support—which was the text of the first address. On the other hand, however, Mr. Lanchester made his lecture extremely interesting, and his remarks were enhanced by means of •some unique lantern slides and a very complete set of •diagrams. The full treatment of the points raised is to be found in Mr. Lanchester's book ; indeed, the lecture itself may be said to have been an abstraction of a few of the more salient problems with which that exhaustive treatise deals. It is certain, from intimations that have already been received at the headquarters of the two organizations in question, that the gatherings at Monday and Tuesday evenings next will be brilliant and numerously attended functions. This is but what was to be expected. And it is desirable, because it is meet to show the great American pioneers what a very lively interest is taken in the science which is honoured by their achievements, and in themselves personally on account alike of their great genius and superb example of tireless devotion to the service of human flight. At a moment like this, too, when hundreds of our fellow enthusiasts will have the privilege of extending a personal welcome to Wilbur and Orville Wright, we want those great men to feel that those who will applaud them are but a fraction of the vast number of intelligent men and women in these islands who have a sincere admiration for their work, and who take a very real and studious interest in the subject of mechanical aerial travel. Those who will be able to be present either on Monday or Tuesday night, or on both occasions, will be a mere hand- ful by comparison with the thousands who will long to be present, but who are prevented either by physical difficulties as in respect of distance, health, or what-not, or who cannot attend because they are not members of one or other of the organising bodies. We also wish the Brothers Wright to realise that their brief visit to London will serve materially to spread interest in the science of human flight, for beyond the matter of a doubt many folk who are not members of the Aero- nautical Society, or of the Aero Club, will realise that it essential to join one or the other, or both, of those bodies, if they are to be really in the movement. On behalf of FLIGHT, and speaking as the official organ of the Aero Club of Great Britain and Ireland, we extend the warmest welcome to England to the brothers, and we thank them heartily for the distinguished honour they are doing the Aeronautical Society and the Aero Club in attending the functions they are respectively organising. May this prove the first and briefest of a numerous and close series of their visits to Britain. ® ® The second lecture will relate to the principles of stability, and the third lecture to the flying machine as a complete unit. Spreading the Movement. THE first of the two lectures announced in FLIGHT, April 17th, to be delivered by Mr. V. E. Johnson M.A., headmaster of the Boyi' High School, Streatham, was duly delivered on Saturday last before an attentive and appreciative audience. Mainly historical in subject, Mr. Johnson's remarks were nevertheless given a most attractive air of reality by the use of lantern slides and models, and that he aroused enquiring minds may be judged by the fact that he was kept busy for long afterwards answering special questions. One of his experiments was the flying of a model " double-mono- plane " weighing 1^ lb., and a demonstration with a biplane running along the ground to show the disastrous effect of tilting the elevator too much when ascending, the model rising sharply into the air and turning over on its back. 245
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