We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
18 Su
kind of race, long legs of the foursided course are about 4,000 feet and short ones are about a thousand. Pilots belly down to 50 feet above the ground, but must stay at least 600 feet from the stands. This puts the whole spectacle approximately a thousand feet away from the onlookers — much closer than the fight fan in Madison Square Garden ever seems to get. Speed, therefore, is not as important as in the Thompson Trophy meet. Swift straightaway dashes, steep turns, the whine of the motors — all are more exciting close up. And that's the key word — closeup.
Like the midget autos, these small planes are piloted by old hands who at one time raced larger machines and then realised the midgets were the coming thing. There's lanky H. R. "Fish" Salmon, veteran speedster and test pilot who once flew in a secondhand Mustang and a battered fedora. There's "Hot-shot" Charlie Tucker, believed to be the original inspiration for Hotshot Charlie of the comics because he looks the part and because he flew with the Flying Tigers. Steve Wittman, who designed the slab landing gear now used by other racing pilots and the Cessna Company, is another. And there is Tony Levier, Lockheed test pilot who copped fourth place at Cleveland one year even though he had a ship conceded by one and all to be the slowest in the air that day. Hours before the race he memorized every inch of the course, and later when the fast strangers roared by him, he waved good-naturedly and mushed along right on the beam while his confused competitors wandered all over Ohio
'9
February, 1949
searching for the turns. Art Chester, quiet, sandy-haired old-timer, won a race one time because he carefully chalked off each lap as he completed it, figuring somebody else might lose count. His hunch was right. The lad in front throttled down one lap too soon, and Art putt-putted in ahead of him.
These are a few of the flyers who are pioneering a new sport in the air. Before the second World War they had taken part in mad scrambles involving expensive made to order planes. Later, when the surplus combat types went on sale cheap, these racing pilots were able to buy them at greatly reduced prices. Everybody seemed as happy as oysters in a bed. But at a meeting of the Professional Race Pilots Association a couple of years ago. President Art Chester had a worried look.
"Boys, I think we're hanging ourselves," he announced. "How long can we hope to fly these tired old 38's, 39's, and Jl's? When they fold up, we will each have to pay maybe 100,000 dollars to build a racing plane, or we will have to get out of the business. And of the 25,000 or so put up for prizes, the most a pilot can win in one race is about ten grand. Right?"
Interested, the boys did some fast mental arithmetic, and then as one man they nodded: Right!
"We've got to start a new light class of racing plane," ' Chester said, aglow with the Big Idea. "A little something that might cost no more than $5,000 to build and still leave race winners a profit."
The club members saw the chal