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Aviation History
1911
1911 - 0970.PDF
EDITORIAL Before us lies the draft prospectus of the ConcemS" ImPerial Aero Club—very much in the Scheme. draft, for although its inner pages contain the anticipatory particulars of a scheme more ambitious than anything that has gone before in the world of aviation, the title-page is almost completely a blank. It has taken us a little time to grasp all the possibilities of the scheme. No names of President, Vice- President, Committee, Secretary or other officials, no indication of its locale, except that in the meantime its head quarters are at Port Meadow, Oxford—literally nothing to imbue us with confidence in its organisers and its propa ganda. The prospectus gravely informs that the Imperial Aero Club has been formed—to encourage aviation in the United Kingdom. "It is well known," says this precious document, • that the great difficulty in founding a representative successful and popular aviation club lies in the fact that those interested in aviation belonging to the upper classes have been few in number hitherto, whilst those of the middle and lower classes are much more numerous, and generally form the majority amongst members of aviation clubs, so that gentlemen of good social position may find themselves in uncongenial society, and as a rule carefully stay away from such club rooms owing to the very mixed society and impossible people who have been admitted. The founders of the Imperial Aero Club, desiring to avoid forming another 'Aviation Trade Thieves' Kitchen,' propose in the new club to separate the members into two classes, each having its separate club house, but all being equal at the aviation ground of the club." We are sadly afraid this will not work, for it is quite conceivable that although these nasty middle and lower class people may be carefully segregated in their own club house, if they are allowed loose at all times on the club's common aviation ground, some of them will get between the wind and the gentility of the "gentlemen of good social position "—and then what would happen ? The bare thought of such a thing makes us shudder! It is true that the trouble might be minimised by a liberal use of disinfectants and eau de Cologne, but then prevention is such a lot better than cure, and it does seem to us that it would be far better that these low persons should be confined to their own " Thieves' Kitchens " and that the gilded darlings of the prospectus' " upper classes" should have the promised Elysium all to themselves. Having been duly impressed with the high tone of the new club, we proceed to wade through several pages of this wonderful document—and, truly, there never was such a club as this will be—until we come to certain paragraphs which set forth that the club intends to establish a school of aviation, in which members will be taught to fly in return for fees which, as set forth, are something more than the current market rate. Immediately we begin to wonder whether there is not a nigger in the wood-pile here, and if the new club of high- sounding title and exclusive personnel is simply a commercial enterprise, to wit a common or garden flying school out to make money by teaching the art of aviation. But farther on we find that this most marvellous club proposes—proposes is an excellent word to use under the circumstances—to offer prizes of ^20,000, ;£ic,ooo, and such like sums, showing that whatever its faults may turn out to be meanness is not going to be one of them. True, the prospectus cautiously informs us that " it is anticipated " that these handsome sums can NOVEMBER II, I911- COMMENT. be raised—we wonder whether it will be on the family plate of the " gentlemen of good social position "—which is rather different to having the money in hand. But still, people do all kinds of wonderful things nowadays— they even fly kites, and in the City, too. Then the Imperial Aero Club intends to be quite patriotic as well as very select. We do not quite like that word select—it sounds so horribly suburban, and quite like the sort of thing one might hear in one of those Thieves' Kitchens which are miscalled aviation clubs—but in our middle-class ignorance we know no better. But let us get back to the club. It proposes— proposes, again !—to form a " National Air Battalion," whose principle duty will be to wear a uniform of brown leather tunic and puttees. What the rest of the costume will be is left to the imagination, but in order that the social standing of the members may not suffer degrada tion through looking too much like those horrid middle and lower-class aviators it may be hazarded that they will wear kilts. Unfortunately we have not sufficient space at our command to do adequate justice to this really humorous prospectus, but we may note in conclusion that if any of our readers desire to serve on the executive committee, for which they will be paid—the club again proposes— ^£"300 a year, all they have to do, according to an advertisement appearing in one of the London dailies, is to write, enclosing ^1,000 by way of director's qualifica tion, to a box number at the offices of the journal in which the advertisement appeared. Our space is valu able, so we refrain from quoting the advertisement in question, but if any reader of really good social standing would like to take advantage of the offer, we will gladly send him on the address. • • •*• "I A ' tion ^n a Dundee journal, a correspondent Immoral ? " wno signs himself " Terra Firma " asks : " Is it moral, by the bait of considerable sums of money and of prizes to lure young men, fiery with intrepidity, to a death, if not certain, at least very probable ? " " Is it not cruel to tempt foolhardy men to their deaths by these gilded baits ? " " Are we to demand gladiatorial sacrifice from our aviators ? " These are some of the passages in a letter which is a veritable masterpiece of hysteria and which we have neither space nor inclination to quote in full. We are not concerned to even attempt to answer in detail the questions propounded by the writer, but we still stretch the point far enough to say that, in Parliamentary language, the answer to each is in the negative. We do dispute, however, the premises upon which the queries are founded. In the first place, the records of contests for these considerable sums of money show that death as the portion of the competitors is neither certain nor in the least degree probable. That being so, there can be no question of "luring foolhardy men to their death, &c." The " gladiatorial sacrifice " business we can dismiss as a mere rhetorical flight—the only kind of flight, apparently, of which " Terra Firma " has any close knowledge. It is inevitable that a science like that of flight should have its opponents, and, on the whole, we prefer this sort of attack to the more insidious kind born of some knowledge and a good deal of reasoning power. The one may produce some effect, but the other is harmless from the ignorance displayed in its violence. 97 2
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