to the airplane somewhat the same relation as the slower yacht bears to the swift speed boat.

International airship races will come into vogue and rival motor track racing. These will be in classes, the same as motor racing is divided into groups in accordance with cubic displacement, or as yachts are rated, by length. There has been no airship racing since 1909, but foreign governments, late in 1919, were planning competition calculated to stimulate the flying game, not only from the sporting point of view, but for the development of lighter-than-air craft. Airplane racing is definitely established in popular favor.

One obstacle, inadequate landing facilities, which stood in the way of the normal development of sporting aircraft, is being removed. Fortunate is he who has sufficient room on his country estate to construct a hangar and lay out a landing field, or who has a body of water near his home, upon which his flying boat may alight. Realizing both the need and the insistent demand, cities throughout the United States are preparing municipal air harbors for public use. In many places, provision is made for the shelter of land and water aircraft and it is planned to offer maintenance facilities wherever possible.

The flying sportsman has found a way to utilize the inland waters of the United States in a way undreamt of by those who improved them. All the way down the Atlantic Coast there are protected waterways, which were designed to carry slow-moving surface craft. This transportation, however, has never developed and it is entirely probable that, in the near future, these inland waterways will be more generally used by flying boats than by barges or vessels of similar shallow draft. Indeed, many believe that the flying boat and hydroairplane has distinct advantages over the land machine, when it comes to sport. For one thing, one never needs to seek out a landing place but is always within gliding distance of safety. Again, hydroairplaning provides all the thrills of motorboating to which are added rarer joys of actual flight.

However, each type of machine to its proper place. With the development of landing fields and with the improvement of land types, their use for sport is increasing rapidly. Machines have been developed with very low landing speed. This means that instead of a huge field being required, a comparatively small harbor is all that is needed.

All this is in process of evolution. Before long we shall see

The Glenn L. Martin Mail Plane

sportsmen and owners competing among themselves and with army, navy and special pilots, in the establishment of new speed, duration, altitude and climbing records.

Long distance touring, after-dinner spins, morning bracers, will come into vogue. Aircraft for golf, tennis, polo and the games, friendly brushes over the river; flying to the hunt-aircraft offer comfortable pleasure, exhilaration, speed, limited only by the everfleeing horizon.

ADVERTISING AND PUBLICITY

Does business believe in advertising?

Does it believe in advertising when such publicity can be combined with selling goods or making quick deliveries? The answer has as its corollary the use of the airplane, as clothing, chewing gum, spark plug, typewriter and fountain pen manufacturers and department stores have proven to their satisfaction. In repeated Curtiss and Aeromarine flights, notably one which the Aeromarine made to Cuba and the Curtiss to New York from Buffalo, the utility of aircraft in advertising and publicity opening the way to general business uses has been demonstrated.

Commercial photography is another of the general business uses to which aircraft are being put. Aerial photography as a whole, including commercial work, is of such importance that a section is devoted to the subject elsewhere in this chapter.

Newspapers have been quick to adopt the airplane in the gathering of news, the taking of photographs and the circulation of the various issues. Immediately after a marine accident of considerable proportion off New York City last summer, the manager of one of the largest press associations called the office of the Manufacturers Aircraft Association.

"Sometime we are going to need a flying machine quick,” he said, and we want to know where one can always be had and how soon it can be made ready for our use."

This service is now available.

AIDING THE EXECUTIVE

Why do we pay extra fare to ride on fast trains, or why pay 10 cents additional for a special delivery letter?

In the obvious answer lies the reason executives, who desire to keep in personal touch with branches, have found in the airplane a means of transport superior indeed to rail.

Airplane Architectural Studies-1. Plaza Hotel, New York City. 2. Manhattan Bridge as seen from the air.

Police Headquarters. (Courtesy U. S. Air Service.) tograph of Statue of Liberty. 4. New York City Sky Line photographed from the air.

3. Detail Aerial pho

5. Airplane view of New York City

In executive work in rural communities, the airplane has already become established. Sales in considerable number have been made to owners of great farms and ranches, and to oil and mining operators. Among the miscellaneous uses to which business is placing aircraft may be mentioned the exploitation of real estate. A New York firm had a client who wished to build a hotel, but was uncertain as to the location proposed. How would it look when set in surroundings of which he had seen but little, and that from the street or a near-by roof? So the firm employed a commercial aerial photographer, and the trick was done.

Great construction projects are being watched from the air, city improvements are being planned and fire and police patrols carried out. The aerial ambulance has been demonstrated in the Army and in civil practise and in at least one notable instance at Corpus Christi, Texas - airplanes have been used for flood rescue work.

AERIAL MAIL SERVICE

The Aerial Mail Service of the U. S. Post Office Department has been in operation daily, except Sunday, between New York and Washington for eighteen months; and between New York and Chicago daily for six months. It has been successful from the start.

To-day, the Aerial Mail' planes are daily covering a total distance of 1,906 miles of territory and are carrying an aggregate of 2,100 pounds of letters.

During the last fiscal year, only 4.4 per cent. of possible trips were not attempted, and that out of a total of 138,310 miles. There were flown 128,255 miles, a performance of 92.73 per cent. During the same period there were only 37 forced landings due to mechanical troubles in flight.

In the operation of the Aerial Mail for nearly one year and seven months, covering 405,563 miles of flying, there have been lost but four pilots in crashes, a ratio of one fatality to 101,391 miles.

The reception which the Aerial Mail met, when first proposed, March 6th, 1912, was similar to the popular indifference displayed by the American people for years toward the airplane itself. Congress refused to grant an appropriation of $50,000 for aeronautical experimentation requested by the Post Office Department. As a result, it was not until six years later-May 15th, 1918, that the first Aerial Mail route was established between New York and Washington.