Bendix & Thompson

"If everyone takes off under these conditions, someone will get killed," snorted Colonel Roscoe Turner, stamping about in a heavy Los Angeles fog one night last week. With eight other pilots, he was awaiting the start of the dangerous Bendix Trophy Race across the nation to Cleveland in the opening event of the 15th annual National Air Races. Presently the fog began to lift, allowed the nine racers to take off in the dark. Last to roar down the field, just as dawn broke, was Pilot Cecil A. Allen, 33, alone in a tiny, fat, Gee Bee monoplane, immensely powerful, but frowned on by the air-wise because of its radical design. Down the runway it careened like an insane bumblebee, finally bouncing into the air at the very end. Three minutes later, still out of control, it somersaulted into a potato field two miles from the airport, smashed to pieces. Pilot Allen was killed instantly.

Unaware of his death, the eight other racers dashed on into the rising sun, fighting rain squalls most of the way. Soon three of them were forced down by minor troubles. The remaining five pressed on, managed to finish. First to swoop down over the 2,500 hardy enthusiasts who braved a Cleveland drizzle was Mister Mulligan, a white, high-wing monoplane designed, owned and flown by meticulous Benjamin Odell ("Benny"') Howard. Jumping from his plane, Pilot Howard stilled congratulations with: "I haven't won yet." He was right. Hard-driving Colonel Turner, Bendix winner in 1933, had started almost two hours later, was hot on his heels, had an excellent chance of beating Mister Mulligan's time.

As the headstart ticked away, Pilot Howard watched the clock, listened nervously for the roar of Colonel Turner's low-wing monoplane. Just as time was about up, he heard it, saw the golden Wedell-Williams racer streaking out of the murk for the finish. Ever the showman, Pilot Turner zoomed into a grandiloquent flourish over the stands, banked off into the haze, landed. Excitedly, the timers calibrated their watches, finally announced the closest Bendix finish in history. Pilot Howard had won the 2,046-mi. race by 23 1/2 seconds. Third was handsome Russell Thaw, son of Evelyn Nesbit & Harry Kendall Thaw.

To Winner Howard the $4,500 prize money came in handy. A married airmail pilot with a distinguished racing record, he constantly designs new racing planes, had sunk his last cent in Mister Mulligan. A dark, lanky, unostentatious man of 31, he contrasts strongly with swashbuckling, peacocky Colonel Turner, who last week thirsted for revenge, waited impatiently for the final spectacular Thompson Trophy Race in which he hoped to regain his laurels as No. 1 U. S. speedster.

But when this climax to the three-day aerial spasm finally arrived, vengeful Colonel Turner was sorely disappointed to learn that United Air Lines had forbidden its valuable "Benny" Howard to fly in any of the hazardous pylon races. Still, the Colonel found some consolation in the thought of beating Mister Mulligan, which was entered under the skillful guidance of little Harold Neumann of Moline, Ill., who had already walked off with the rich Greve Trophy in Designer Howard's atom-small White Mike. The Labor Day crowd of 80,000 was overwhelmingly behind the gaudy Turner and the same golden plane in which he had lost the Bendix Race.

As the 150-mi. spin around the triangular course got going, it seemed their choice was wise. Out into the lead of the five other planes shot Turner, ''polishing pylons" with his usual wizardry. For nine out of the ten laps he apparently had the race won. Suddenly, near the finish, the crowd was stunned to see a thick black plume of smoke belch from his Hornet motor as an oil-line clogged. Out of the race dropped Favorite Turner, managing to land safely in his oil-spattered racer. Into the lead went steady Mister Mulligan to win in the slow time of 220.1 m.p.h. on the first occasion that one plane had ever captured both Bendix and Thompson Races. Watching the big white plane whiz past, unhappy Colonel Turner consoled himself with: "It's always better to get down and walk than win a race when the plane's about to catch fire!"

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.