Pan-American Airways

Miami opened its municipal airport; Miami watched air races and stunts; Miami saw the Pan-American Airways begin U. S. passenger and mail service to the several West Indies. All this occurred the fore part of last week.

Of the three events, the opening of West Indies air service was the most important. In many respects, it is more important than U. S. continental services. In this country the railroads supply swift transportation. Among the West Indies and in Central America, relatively slow steamers furnish communication.

Last summer, a few months after Col. Lindbergh had flown the circuit of the Caribbean, Hayden. Stone & Co.. with other bankers, organized the Aviation Corporation of the Americas, which bought all the stock of Pan-American Airways Company already in the district. Richard F. Hoyt* became chairman of both companies, and transportation projects began to take shape. At once they started a Miami-Havana service.

Last week. Pan-American Airways, now operating company for Aviation Corp. of the Americas, started to carry passengers and mail from Miami to Nassau among the Bahamas, and from Miami to Havana. Camaguey and Santiago in Cuba, Port-au-Prince in Haiti, Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, and San Juan in Porto Rico.

Chapman-Burnelli Airliner

Another millionaire made his mark in aviation last week. Paul Wadsworth Chapman, Manhattan investment banker, had watched the profitable aviation promotion of Elisha Walker (Blair Co.), Charles Hayden and Richard F. Hoyt (Hayden, Stone & Co.), Charles E. Mitchell and Gordon S. Rentschler (National City Bank, Manhattan). Jansen Noyes (Hemphill. Noyes & Co.). James C. Willson (Louisville), Thomas N. Dysart (Knight, Dysart & Gamble, St. Louis), Clement Melville Keys (Manhattan). He had watched recent mergers in the industry: Fokker and Western Air Express. Transcontinental Air Transport. Curtiss Corporations and Sikorsky. Keystone and Loening, Pratt and Whitney. Boeing and Niles, Bement and Pond.

He decided he should get into aviation and he did. He made contact with Vincent J. Burnelli, 34, Texas-born plane designer, who calculated that he could design a monoplane's fuselage so that it would help in the flying lift.

Financier Chapman supplied ample money. Designer Burnelli built, last week, their product. The biggest plane yet built in the U: S. flew about the Newark, N. J., airport with a dozen passengers at 165 m.p.h. It has seats in its cabin for 20, plus a lounge, a kitchen and a washroom. With the 20 it can go 800 miles in seven hours. Altogether it makes a new competitor for the other great transport planes--Stout, Fokker. Boeing, Loening, Curtiss. Keystone and the new one Igor Sikorsky is designing.

The fuselage is distinctive. It is 12 ft. wide, 6 ft. high. 47 ft. long over all; very squat. The squatness makes the fuselage virtually part of the wings. In their 90 ft. span the wings proper have a lifting power of 142-Ibs. per sq. ft.; the fuselage 4^ Ibs. per sq. ft. The squatness also creates an air cushion under the plane when she lands, a benefit. To get figures on cost of operation, Mr. Chapman sent his airliner to Philadelphia last week, will send it shortly to Chicago, then to San Francisco. Then he expects to build a fleet of them and set up his own air transport system.

Customs

After this month airplanes and ships arriving in the U. S. from any foreign country must land at an "airport of entry," Secretary of the Treasury Andrew William Mellon decreed last week. Immigration and customs officers at such airports will examine persons and baggage.

*Hayden. Stone partner. Last week he sailed from Manhattan on his yacht for a vacation aiming the islands. His private plane was to meet him there for air jaunts.