Flights & Flyers

Spartans Triumphant. True to their boast, John and Kenneth Hunter were still flying their Stinson monoplane City of Chicago on July 4, the 23rd day after their takeoff from Chicago's Sky Harbor airport (TIME, July 7). Then a clogged screen cut their engine's oil supply. Kenneth tried to remove it for cleaning but the oil spurted out. They had to land-- with a new endurance record of 553 hr. 41 min. 30 sec., more than 133 hr. better than the previous mark. Followed the frenzied aftermath, no less dizzying to the humble family from Sparta, Ill. than had been the three-week ordeal. With their brothers Walter and Albert of the refueling plane, and Sister Irene who had cooked for them, and their 62-year-old mother, Mrs. Ida Hunter, the flyers were whisked to a roof-bungalow atop the Hotel Sherman, there to blink at unaccustomed splendor, to listen-dazedly to the bickerings of a half-dozen self-ordained managers, to rehearse a few lines for their week's vaudeville engagement, to try and reckon their rewards. Having reduced their expectations from $200,000 to half that sum, the Hunter family last week could count about $25,500 in hand: from an oil company, $10,000; radio. $7,000; field gate receipts, $5,000; vaudeville, $2,000; instrument makers, $1,500.

King's Cup. Some 20,000 persons crowded about Hanworth aerodrome near London last week, waiting to cheer the winner of the King's Cup race around England. Most expected to see famed Flight Lieut. H. R. D. Waghorn, last year's Schneider Cup winner, or Squadron Leader A. H. Orlebar, speed record holder, drop out of the sky ahead of the other 87 planes. Others hoped to salute Prince George's Hawk Moth, or the Prince of Wales's Tomtit, as winner of their father's trophy.*

Instead, flying enthusiasts found themselves, for the second time in a month, paying homage to a woman. Miss Winifred S. Brown, 26, daughter of a Manchester butcher, won the 750-mi. free-for-all handicap, took her place on a popular pedestal beside Amy Johnson, London-to-Australia flyer (TIME, June 2). Betting odds against Miss Brown were 49-to-1. In her AvroAvian biplane she started 14th, pulled up to seventh at Bristol, third at Manchester, disposed of Waghorn and Orlebar on her way to Newcastle. Her average speed was 102 m. p. h.

Right of Way. With his wife and small daughter, one John E. Lamb of Cleveland was driving along a clear road near Canandaigua, N. Y. on his way to Manhattan. Without warning an airplane dropped from the sky a short distance ahead, landed on the paved highway, taxied toward the Lamb car, its wings barring the way. Driver Lamb swung into a ditch to escape a collision, damaged his car though not himself & family. The airplane pilot, en route from Boston to Chicago, had made a forced "deadstick" landing for lack of fuel. He obtained some at a nearby gasoline station, taxied to a field, flew away, leaving the shocked, shaken Lambs to extricate their car, repair it.

*Their royal highnesses entered their planes but did not fly in them.

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