Vintage Airplane - Oct 1977

8/12/2019 Vintage Airplane - Oct 1977

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Restorer sCorner

flly R . N I L l \ n H JRWith the arrival of aut umn and an increase in inclem

ent northern weath e r, the fly-in activity begins t o grindto a halt signaling the close of another very successfulseason. With the exception of a few winter fly-ins in thesouthern states (Sun 'n Fun , Cactus Fly- In , etc.), thisbreathing spell wi ll permit us to repair and restore ourold birds so that they will again be in top shape by thetime that next year's fly -in season starts. Most of usenjoy flying so much that we really need this enforcedmaintenanc e period. If we didn't have it, we would figuratively fly the fabr ic right off our poor old birds, soit's nice to know that even our o ld airplanes a re includedin nature's master plan and have their place in the overall

scheme of things .Although we have not seen any actual tot a ls, webelieve that th is past season was probabl y the busiest inaviation histor y. Besides all of the regularly scheduledfly-ins , there w ere a who le series of addit ional aviationeve nts honorin g the 50th anniversary of Lindb ergh 'sNew York to Paris flight. Also, the EAA's Spirit of St.Louis replica, by its reinactment of Lindb ergh's goodwill tour aro und th e United States, has sparked manymor e aviation ac tivities on the local l eve l over the pastsevera l months.

Not a ll statistics for the biggest or th e mo st arenecess arily the best. Th e EAA convention w as the wet

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test in histor y with extensive periods of IF R wea th erhampering operations . However, the particip ants at th e

d k h h ' .d d Ievent seeme to t a e t e weat er In stn e a n n ot et Itdim in ish th e ir enjoyment of av iation . As we make ourplans for next yea r's eve nts, we can only hope that thesun will shin e down brightly on our efforts.

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For many months now eac h copy of The VintageAi rp lane has conta ined two new m em be rsh ip a pp Iica tio nblanks inserted between the pages, a total of fourteen so

far this year. Please remove these applications from the ~ A A. A n . t . . L q U ' - Cl ~ ; :~ D i V i S ~ . ' 0 W Fares;::';: ' '1emagazine when you receive it and keep them in a handyplace so that you can give them to your friends who areinterested in older aircraft. Also, please take them alongwith you to your local EAA chapter meetings or to yourlocal flying club, and give them to your fellow memberswho show an in terest. Your local fixed base operatormight like to have a few on hand, too. If each of youwill sign up just one new member between now and theend of this year, we shall be ab le to incr ease the size otThe Vintage Airplane . This increase will give us thenecessary space to print monthly features such as type

club news, calendar of future events, etc., on a regularbasis, as well as provide your editor with more space forfeature articles. Th e end result is a bigger and b ettermagazine for you, so please make the effort to sign up atleast that one new m ember.

Sp eaking of new members, your Division experienceda six percent growth in membership during the EAAco nvention and signed up more new memb ers thaneither of the other two EAA divisions. We sincerelythank our headquarters staff chairmen, Kate Morgan andDo nn a Bartlett, and our exhibit booth chairmen, AliciaSmith and Jackie House, as well as a ll of their vo lun teerworkers, for this fine achievement .

SlATEMENT OF O W N E R ;~ ; ;~; ; ~e: ~ ~~ ; . ; EN TANO CIRCULAT'ON

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By I Kelch Editor

The Johnson brothers' airplane, flown successfullyjust a few years after the Wright brothers' first flight,was apparently one of many built in the U.s.A. aboutthat time . "A the World Aircraft for 1919" states thatno less than 2,000 people in the U.s.A. had built flyingmachines, but that most of them were home madecopies of standard designs. Most of them being cop ies ofthe Wright broth ers' biplane . The percentage that wassuccessful was no doubt very few.

The Johnson brothers' airplane was a great advance inthe state of the art, but was never blessed by commercialsuccess . It would be interesting to know how many gooddesigns met the same fate. If Terre Haute, Indiana,which t hen had a population of 65,000 could have twosuccessful designers in 1911, namely The Johnsons andGus Riggs airp lanes, there must be hundreds of similarstories in the entire country. The tragedy is that peoplewho k now about them are rapidly passing from the

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scene, and if the stories of these accomplishments aren'trecorded, soon they will be lost forever.

While rummaging through ale Crites' collection ofmemorabilia, he called my attention to an Argosy Mag-azine for September 1961, which carried an extensivearticle on the Johnson brothers' airplane. I read it withcomplete fascination, and started immediately prospect-ing for further information to make up the completestory, and research the efforts of the J ohnsons. I soon

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struck two mother load sources - o ne through a chancelook in Weldon Ropp's scrap book, I found a picture ofthe Johnson airplane which I publi shed on the backcover of Vint age Airplan e in Jun e 1976. On askingWeldon where he acquired the picture, he advised thatMr. Jo hnson was a relative and that hi s son Harry Ropphad inh er it ed from the Johnson brothers, quite a collection of material on this early effort. Also, through thepublication of an article entitled One Man's Family inVint age Airplane October 1976 issue , I beca me acquainted with Dewar d Peter so n who lives in Terre Haute,I ndiana. Th e subject of th e Johnsons came up, and hewas very fa miliar with the story, since th e Johns o ns livedin T erre Haut e at the time they built the ai rplane. H eoffered to research at the so ur ce for me and has done anexce ll ent job. Credit for this art icle goes eq ually toHarry Ropp and Deward Peterson, my contr ibutionbeing to ed it it down from the volumes of material, andseparate the fact from fiction. Much of the material isoriginal hand written notes of Louis Johns on, the or igina l manuscript of the Argosy article, vo lum es of newspaper clippin gs besides a manuscript furnished by Mr.Peterson, researched from microfilm copies of a ll the

Terre Haute papers with some assistance by his son -inlaw. My regret is that we couldn't publish the wholepackage, but it would fill many volumes of our magazine. I wil l attempt to give you a capsule of the story,and then we will reprint several of the documents fromthat era, which will help to f ill in the fantastic excitement that these brothers caused in Terre Haute.

To start with, the early lethargy of our cou ntr y waswell known in the way that the public reacted, or ratherdid not react, to the flight of the Wright brothers. Ittook a trip to Europe and a presentation to the moreromantic Frenchmen to cause excitement, w hi ch spilledover to this co untr y, a nd finally got the ball rolling. Th atwas the first time that the French were involved - theseco nd being with Lindb ergh's f light to Paris . They wereconsiderab ly a head of us in their aeronautica l effo rts,havi ng so whole hea rtedly acce pt ed the a irplane. In thiscountry, scattere d efforts were made in many smalltowns, and it is hard to tell how m any good things werelef t to whither on the vine and nev er be accepted by theaviation industry.

The effort of the Johnson broth ers is a c lass ic in thatthey were at least 10 years ahead of their day in thecomplete effort, and would have no doubt stolen a greatdeal of the thunder h ad th e ir effort come to the public' s

notic e. Prob ab ly the first significant thing is that theyhad d eve lop ed an engine as early as 1900 , which was farahead of a ny engine of its time . The pictures will verifythe fineness of thi s piec e of mac hinery. Its performancewas unbeli evable for that day. While others were foolingwith make shift machinery , the Johnsons developed thefour cylinder V type engine, water coo led with a magnificent w eight to horsepower ratio, (65 Ibs.-65 hp.), andun b e lievabl e reliability. The workmanship and theengineering on the engine is startling even today. Theengine was not only a four cylinder V engine , it was afour cylinder two cycle engine with a very successfulpat e nted v alving arrangement. Th e engine developedacco rdin g to their figure s 65 hp , but it's probably likethe 90 hors e OX5 . On today's sca le it would be considerably better. Many updates on the engi ne were mad e andits provin g gro und was on boats of the day, which itpulled very successf ully. Th e f in al comp letion of theaero nautical V type motor to quote Mr. Johns o n wascompleted in 1909, the same year t hat t hey mad e theirfirst air pla ne. The straight forward type of thinkers thatthey were is ev ident in the following quotation from Mr.Johnson's notes. In our development we never tinkered

with anyth ing. Instead we prepared designs a nd workedout the problems with many drawings and mathematicalcalcu lations in a precision manner. Through our ca lcul ations we decided the monoplane would be much moreefficient t han the biplane that everyone was building,because of the less head resistance than the two planesand all the necessary wires ana structures between theplanes. Mind you they had a lready developed a verysuccessful engine, now they were going about it in thesame methodical manner to develop an airplane.

To quote the Argosy article if the world had noticedthem at the time, the name ' Johnson' would have been

emblazoned in aviation history. Lou, Harry a nd Juliu sJohnson, of Te rre Haute, Indi ana designed their plane inways that nobody else, not even the Wright brothers orGlenn Curtiss or Bleriot, had ever conce ived. Wh erethese immortals had used wood, the Johns o ns used aluminum, nickel an d steel, and a long s lender f use lage thatcould have been the prototype of the mo noco que fuselaged planes that are flying toda y. Like Bleriot, they sawthe basic correctness of the aerodyna mic s of a monopla ne. Th ey worked out a tricycle landin g gea r at a timewhen American plan es landed o n sk ids. I was very nearly the sa me sort of la nding gear you see today .

(Th ere is much discussion about there being or not

bei ng a steera bl e nose wh ee l. I ref rain from mak ing thestatement that there was but invite you to tak e a goodlook at the pictur es showing th e hing ed front wheel a ndthe stee rin g horns , a nd make up your o wn mind.)

Beside the tricycle gear, th e rea r wh ee ls were onhori zo nt a l V struts with verticle spring loaded tubularmemb ers very similar to oleos the later a irpla nes in the20s and ea rly 30s used. Now add to this the fact thatth ey had a brake to slow it up after landing, a controlarrangement that is entirely conventional today consisting of a stee rin g wheel, opera ting the wing warpingwhich when moved fo rward a nd aft operated the elevators, a nd a r udd er bar to activate the rudders, a ll this at atime when planes had barely co me out of the prone pilotstage operating the ailerons with the body and skids forlanding gear.

In look ing at the pictures, you will note that the mainfuselage tubes which are some 201 in diameter havecooling f in s a lo ng their length. Again in their inimitablemanner, they used t he actual fuselage tubes as the radiator in order to c ut down frontal area, an idea that wasre-enacted in mil itary planes of the early 30s with fuselage side radiators, etc. Now add to this a complete

forward section of all welded tube with not a sing lepiece of wood visib le, a monocoque tubular boom fuselage extending rearward from the tubular fuselage areato support the tail, this being braced with a minimalnumber of cables and again at a time when bamboopoles were being used to hold the tail on. If you willnotice in the pictures all metal on the tail section ishighly polished, a ll work on the tube is done in a veryworkmanlike manner that would put today's airplanecompanies to shame. The method of affixing the wingsto the fuselage was to butt them into shallow weldedstee l pockets held there entirely by the wire bracingstr uct ur e a feature that has cropped up many ti mes inlater yea rs. Thi s allowed the wings more f reedo m inwarping, which was used for control. The spars themse lv es did not twist due to not being rigid ly con nectedat the butt end s. By looking at the cover picture of themod e l yo u realize the exte nsive use of metal throughoutthe a irpl a ne the outside edge th at forms the wing s beingcompletely tubular and all of the emp e nn age surfacesbe ing welded aluminum tube. Th e o nl y ev ide nce ofwo od in the whole airplane can be found in t he propellerand the ac tual rib sections which hav e metal caps tostrengthen th em.


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The design features of the airplane are as follows:Wing spread 36'All over length 34'Weight empty 738 Ibs.

The fuselage was made of steel, the total tail unit Imade of aluminum. The fuselage consisted mainly of Ithree large steel tubes, rigidly assembled together bybrazing in cross tubes to form a bridge structure andfastenings for all the parts that were attached. Twoupper tubes were spaced apart to take the 90 0 V typeengine in a forward t racto r position, providing space be

hind the motor for gasoline tank and pilot's seat, thusbeing the first plane to use metal tubular constructionthroughout the fuselage and tail unit. The tail unit of thefuselage was a large tapered aluminum tube with re--enforcing structures throughout, including reinforcement at the large end with metal brackets to fit in theends of the three steel fuselage tubes, forming a rigidattachment (detachable for shipping).

The four cylinder V type motor was a 5 bore and 4stroke, developing approximately 65 hp. The motor waswater cooled, the water being pumped by a water pumpthrough the three large main tubes of the fuselage which

had cooling fins attached. The cooling was efficient andafforded very little frontal area as a radiator would onany other airplane.

Quoting Mr. Johnson "learning to fly when the planewas completed, confronted us with the risk of a smashup. We were v&"y cautious about it and went about itmuch as you would learn to walk. Stage one, I started installed, I could hold it down close to the ground andground work on a small field by doing considerable make short jumps and finally could make long curves,ground running to get well acquainted with the operat banking successfully. I soon left the field and returneding of the motor, the controls, etc., keeping all 3 wheels witho ut a mishap and felt very elated abo ut the wholeon the ground at all times. Stage 2, I planned to lift the thing. I made many flights around Terre Haute andplane off the ground and then right down, but instead of contracted many exhibitions away from Terre Haute.that, the machine jumped up about 50' in the air with Stage 4, I taught a stud ent to fly by the same method Ithe end of the field close, and high wires ahead. I shut used and he was successful in flying the machine and didthe motor off by the switch, made a rough landing very well. Stage 5, I took on a young fellow named Rossbouncing up about 30', and down just in time to avoid a L Smith who learned to fly in a very short time, andsmashup. There was no damage to the plane which provo was very good. He successfully carried out all our exhibied its strer;gth. This was an error due to our eagerness to tions and contracts without mishaps. Later he was a ci-see it fly. We had only a switch down on the control vilian flight instructor in the first World War. For threecolumn, but had not yet installed a push butto n on the years he flew exh ibitions for us."wheel. I tried it again with the same results, so we Mr. Johnson, in some notes written in the late 1950s,decided to place a push button on the wheel in the states that Tom Beldon for some time urged us to get inhands of the operator (blip switch in later jargon). We touch with the Smithsonian I nstitution about our earlythen took the plane to a large enough field for longer development work on the monoplane, and he finallyju mps. Stage 3, on a larger field and the push button connected us with his friend Dr. Paul Garber, resulting in

considerable correspondence with Dr. Garber, who wasat the time head curator of the Smithsonian. The 3Johnson brothers decided at their yearly reunion, totake on the task of reconstructing their plans and building a scale model to be placed in the Smithsonian. Theoriginal plane having been sent to the scrap yard afterapproximately four years of existence and the printshaving been thrown away, it was a momentous task toreconstruct from pictures and scattered notes the exactdimensions, and reconstruct the airplane. They had towork through much of the original engineering to do thisfeat. The model is complete down to miniature sparkplugs, carburetor and all parts in exact scale. The beautiful model stands as a monument to their supreme skill tothe last. At the time of the presentation to the Smithsonian, Harry John son and his wife were present at aceremony at which time Dr. Garber interviewed him,and with much foresight taped the interview. Transcriptof that tape follows, giving much insight to their work .

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SmithsonianPp 6s6o t a t i oo

By Dr Paul E Garber(Curator Emeritus)

A TAPED INTERVIEW WITH

HARRY JOHNSON AT THE TIME

OF THE PRESENTATION OF THE

MODEL PICTURED AT RIGHT

July 22, 1959 - This is Paul E. Garber, Head Curator,National Air Museum recording an interview with HarryJohnson who with his brothers Louis Johnson and Julius

Johnson constructed an airplane in 1911; an improvement on an airplane which they constructed in 1909. AsI arrived in our Aircraft Building Shop, I found Mr.Johnson and Mr. Shaw discussing this beautiful modelwhich Mr. Johnson is assembling, they are now puttingthe wooden figure of a man into the cockpit, but actually there is no cockpit, strictly speaking, because theman sits upon a band of canvas. There is no safety belt.Mr. Johnson explains that the hands of th is figure werecarved separately so that they could be fitted around thewheel which controls the airplane.

Mr. Shaw: Do you notice how the magneto is operated by a lever on the steering wheel and how cleverly it iscontrived so that the lever actually operates the magnetoin this model? Mr. Johnson has explained that the pilotwould hold that lever over in retard until the enginegets going.

Mr. Garber: No safety belt, I see. Did you ever flythis one yourself?

Mr. Johnson: No, No, Lou did it and then the fellowthat we taught to fly but I never flew as a pilot. Louflew th is for a whole year but it cost a lot of money toteach a fellow to fly . At that time we were interested inthe development and sa le of Marine engines and therewere some persons who thought we shouldn t waste our

I found Mr Johnson and Mr Shaw discussing this beautiful mo el which Mr Johnson is assembling .This model, currently on display at the Air Space Museum, has a 43 wing span.

time on airplanes. We had to make money so we finallygave up the airp1ane and went to Marine engines.

Mr. Garber: You carved your own propeller toodidn't you?

Mr. Johnson: Yes, I made that myself. I carved theone on the model and I carved the one on the airplane.

Mr. Garber: What wood was in the original,mahogany?

Mr. Johnson: No, spruce and walnut. But I made thisone of maple and mahogany because they are of a similar color. I wanted to put more strength in the propelleron th is small model.

Mr. Garber: Where did you get your basic idea forthis airplane? Was it from seeing another airplane orreading books or magazines?

Mr. Johnson: We made one like this before, youknow, but we didn 't have very good ideas then. We madethat in 1909. We wNen't trying to copy any existingairplane. There weren t any around at that time that Iknew of, but I remember a man named Benoist andanother named Bleriot. I think he crossed the EnglishChannel and I did see some pictures of that, but that sall the part I can remember having seen.

Mr. Garber: These wings are much like those Bleriotdesigned and used.

Mr. Johnson: The shape of them?Mr. Garber: Yes and Bleriot used wing warping like

you do here.Mr. Johnson: The Wright Brothers used warping too.

All of their airplanes were something like this but thesame principle of wing warping was not new with thisone here, we knew.

Mr. Garber: Now for your steering cont rol you have arudder bar there for your feet and that moves the ver-tical rudder, on a vertical axis. Were those contr ols crossed over, that is: when you pushed your right foot, didyou turn to the right or was it as in a sled or bicycle thatwhen you pushed the left end you turned to the right?

Mr. Johnson: We made it like a child s wagon.Mr. Garber: Yes thac IS quite logical and I have often

wondered why others didn't make the rudder bars movethe same way . I remember that it was awkward for meto learn to move the rudder bar in a different mannerthan I had been accustomed to on a sled and bicycle.

Mr. Johnson: We preferred to turn the bar the waywe were going .

Mr . Garber: Now for warping you turned the wheelitself, turning it as in an automobil e and I guess that asyou pulled down on the right side you wo u ld raise thetrai ling edge of the right w ing.

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Mr. Johnson: When you pulled down on the right sideyou raised the left wing of the airplane upward and theright side went down.

Mr. Garber: Then if you were making a right turn youwould push your left foot forward and that would bringyour right foot back a bit then at the same time youwould pull down on the right side of the wheel and thatwould raise the left wing upward so that you wouldbank to the right.

Mr. Johnson: Tha t's right.Mr. Garber: That is instinctive and logical; and then

to control the elevators the pilot would pull the wholewheel assembly to him and that would cause the airplaneto climb.

Mr. Johnson: Yes that would make the tail end ofthe airplane lower than the front end and set at such anangle that it would lift.

Mr. Garber: Now tha t's the controls and they certainly are understandable. I see that you have a brakehere; you have a long metal sleeve there by the pilot'sright leg. There is a handle on that rod in that sleeve andas the pilot pulls up on the handle a wire at the bottomend of that rod pulls up the front end of a drag bar, the

other end of which digs into the ground and acts as abrake.Mr. Johnson: The drag on the ground slows the air

plane after landing.Mr. Garber: That is certainly an early use of a brake .

You don t have the front wheel of your three-wheeledlanding gear steerable do you? Was steering on theground just by using the rudder of the airplane itself?

Mr. Johnson: It rolled on all three wheels but therewas light weight on the front wheel; that made it easierto lower the tail section of the airplane and lift theairplane off the ground.

Mr. Garber: That takes care of the controls. Of courseyou pushed the wheel assembly forward in order todescend. Now let's discuss the wings. Did you have metalspars for them(

Mr. Johnson: No those were of wood and so werethe ribs . There wasn't much metal in the wings.

Mr. Garber: Where did you get your wing sectionfrom? That is the curvature of the wing. Did you getthat out of a book? Did you just think that a curvedwing was a good idea or was it from looking at somebird, maybe?

Mr. Johnson: I don t recall seeing any curved wingsbefore. We just made the structure as light as possible

and also to have strength; that required the bridge structure as I call it. The cross pieces or ribs were made likebridge crosses and the spars were the same way. Theyhave longitudinal sections separated by upright sticksbetween them.

Mr. Garber: Then the wing section was not someparticular shape that you were copying from some book.You realized apparently that you had to have curvedwings but where did you get that idea from? Why aren'tthese wings flat like a kite?

Mr. Johnson : I think we must have gotten th at idea

from somewhere; maybe from some picture but I don teven recall the magazines that were out at that time.

Mr. Garber: There was Aeronautics, put out byErnest J ones and from time to time he would publishwhat he called, structural aids.

Mr. Johnson: We might have gotten something fromthose magazines.

Mr. Garber: Do you remember a book called Vehicles of the Air, by Lougheed? It came out about1909 and had drawings of a number of airplanes of thattime?

Mr. Johnson: No I don t remember that one.

Mr. Garber: Then apparently your information camefrom a few photographs and magazines that you mighthave seen, and in that way you learned something aboutwhat others were doing. But there is so much originalwork in this that it doesn't look as though you copied itfrom anyone except the shape of the wing. The tailsection is something like that which was on the Antoinette airplane of that day, and I think there was a Bristolwhich had a similar tail group.

Mr. Johnson: Wasn't Antoinette a man who tried torace an airplane across the Straits of Dover?

Mr. Garber: Antoinette was the name of the airplane;the pilot was Hubert Latham.

Mr. Johnson: Had a square-end wing didn t he?Mr. Garber: Yes, we have a model of that one here in

our Early Bird Case. The internal structure of your wing,then, was made from built up spars and built up ribs,each having a sort of a bridge truss shape, is that it?

Mr. Johnson: Yes that's right.Mr. Garber: The covering was what kind of cloth , was

it muslin?Mr. Johnson: No it was rubberized linen.Mr. Garber: Was that a commercial product or did

you make it up yourself?Mr. Johnson : We bought it that way .

Mr. Garber: There was a Goodyear cloth which wasrubberized and th en there was a material c a lled Pe na-cloth which was put out by the Pennsylv ania RubberCompany, so there were availabl e at that tim e somefabrics th at were impregnated.

Mr. Johnson: It might have been an experimentalcloth.

Mr. Garber: So then you put it on with the warp andwoof running at right angles spanwise and chordwise,parallel with the spars. The Wright brother s put theirs ondiagonally so as to get som e additional bracing from thefabric, but apparently you put yours on straight across.

Mr. Johnson : That's right. And then we put rib stripson like you see here to keep the fabric from tearingwhere the tacks are, and we also had rib stays insidewhich were wires to keep the wing from being b entbackward diagonally.

Mr. Garber: Th at takes care of the wing and thecontrols; now let's consider the construction of the fu-selage and landing gear. In the fuselage you used steeltubing. Did you braze it or was welding in use thatearly?

Mr. Johnson: No we had to braze it.

Mr. Garber: Langley used brazing on his aerodromes.The landing gear of your airplane I see is something likethat used by Glenn Curtiss, so although you may havecopied the Bleriot wing you did not copy the chassisfrom that airplane. This longitudinal boom whichconstitutes the principle member of the fuselage, aft ofthe pilot, is very unusual. I had once seen a somewhatsimilar structure in a Smith Monoplane but apparentlythis idea was original with you.

Mr. Johnson: With us it was just a means of carryingthe elevator and rudder far back.

Mr. Garber: I notice you don t have any long guys orstays, extending from the front of the fuselage outdiagonally to the entering edge of the wing, to serve as apreventer for any tendency to backsweep, nor do youhave any stays extending from the trailing edge of thewing back to the tailboom. Apparently you have all thestiffness that you need there in the tailboom itself andyou have told me that you made that out of pieces ofsheet metal that you formed into conically-taperingtubes and then riveted th em togeth er; but in th e modelhere you have turned the boom out of a piece of aluminum rod. This is certainly beautifully done.

Mr. Johnson: That cooling system is inter esting.Mr. Garb er: Yes I thought we ought to tak e up next

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the engine. /

Mr. Shaw: I think he was one of the first to developthat method of coo ling.

Mr. Garber: The Antoinette used surface cooling/ / ~

a long the fuselage. You have no drag at a for yourradiator. In most airplanes the radiator was placed upfront and was of a square shape. I created more dragthan any th ing e lse.

Mr. Johnson: That's right.Mr. Garber: This engine here you tell me is based on

those that you had been making for use in boats. This is

a four-cylinder shape with the cylinders arranged liketwo vees staggered with one another. What was the boreand stroke?

Mr. Johnson: The bore was five inches and the strokewas four inches. It was two cycle.

Mr. Garber: Those little spark plugs on this model arecertainly well made; did you use a Mea magneto?

Mr Johnson: No it was a Bosch magneto.Mr. Garber: Then I guess the distributor was on the

magneto itself. Did you use dry cells for starting theengine?

Mr. Johnson: No we didn ' t need that. Turning the

propeller would start the engine all right.Mr Garber: Did you use any booster?Mr. Johnson: No we didn't need it.Mr. Garber : Where is the carburetor?Mr. Johnson: We had a pipe here for carrying the

gasoline through a needle valve. That's the needle valvethere, where we would adjust the gasoline while theengine was running and get the maximum speed out ofit the right mixture. There was no throttle on theengine. It was a one-speed engine and to start it wewould prime the engine put gasoline through theexhaust opening here and turn the propeller to start, andwhen the engine starts, the aviator pulls on this littlevalve control here the one here by his right knee andopens up to allow the gasoline to run through the screen;and with the engine running we adjust this lever here andthen that can stay that way. I usually stayed that wayfor a long time and to control the engine he has a pushbut ton on the steering wheel which grounds the magnetoto kill the spark, and he just cuts the engine in and outfor control as when coming in for a landing on theground . It had no throttle on it and it works very wellthat way and we had the advantage of not needing anythrottle. And then when the engine is running the aviator only has to fly the airplane.

//

johnson Aero Engine 2 cycle - V 4 - water cooled 65 lb = 6 HP

Mr. Garber: Then you didn ' t move the spark leverback and forth in order to control the speed of theengine?

Mr Johnson: No we never did that.Mr. Garber: With the rotary engines there was a

button on the top of the control stick called a blurpbutton which was depressed to cut out the ignition forthe engine. Sometimes when it would be cut in and out,the pilot would get a face full of castor oil. What kind ofoil do you use in your engine?

Mr Johnson: We used a good boat oil like we hadused in Marine engines but I can't think of the make ofoil we used at that time.

Mr. Garber: Now in this tank here which is even withthe entering edge of the wing this triangularsectionedtank, - does it include an oil tank? Did you mix the oilwith the gasoline?

Mr. Johnson: Yes we did mix oil in the gasoline tankhere and there was no other oiler on it.

Mr. Garber: Now what is this header on top of thetop of the gasoline tank?

Mr. Johnson: We called it the steam dome at thattime. It collected the water as it came hot from theengine and the steam collected in this. It has the steamescape here just as you have in the automobile at the topof your radiator, and here is an overflow tube the same

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as in an automobile so that the water and steam couldescape down here. The water was in there only about2/3 full.

Mr. Garber: Oh yes, you are speaking of this smalltube that comes out of the front center and bendsaround to go down toward the left side, and I guess thistop opening is where you put the water in.

Mr. Johnson: Yes th at s right. The water starts toflow here from the water pump which is at the back ofthe crank shaft. From there, the water is carried fromthese tubes here and up into here, and enters the waterjacket here on the left side along this tube of the fu-selage, and goes right and left, and then circulatesthrough the four water jackets, and then comes out hereinto this hose and then through that hose and thenenters into the steam dome.

Mr. Garber: Oh yes, I see that it flows out from thesetubes just behind the aviator s seat where one bends tothe right and the other bends to the left and then thewater flows into the center unit and then is piped intothe longitudinals. It comes out of that tube just in frontof the foot bar and then it goes from there to the pump.That is a complete circulation which continues all the

time that the engine is running. The air-cooling flangesare fastened to the longitudinal tubes to increase theirradiating surfaces. Those longitudinal tubes are not onlythe structural members for the fuselage but also, beinghollow, provide pipes through which the water flows sothat it can be cooled before re-entering the engine, andthese flanges increase that cooling.

Mr. Johnson: Those flanges were .soldered on to thetube to improve the heat conductivity. The air streamhelped to cool the water. This system worked very well.

Mr. Garber: It almost looks like you would have hadmore cooling surface than you required, but that iscertainly better than not having enough. Now we havecovered the construction of the wings, engine, fuselage,tail group, and under-carriage. Next: how about flying it.You say that the center of gravity is located just aboutin a line forward of the rear wheels of this three-wheeledlanding gear.

Mr. Johnson: Yes and the center of pressure wasabout 1/3 back from the front of the wing.

Mr. Garber: Then your center of pressure was forward of your center of gravity, and your center of thrustwas in a straight line from the propeller shaft backthrough this long telescoping boom to the tail group.That is a good distribution of forces. With the engine

started, could you hold the airplane back with thebrake? I mean, this brake here that is pushed into theground when you pull up on this handle. Or do you haveto have someone to hold the airplane back for you whileyou were revving up the engine?

Mr. Johnson: We had around 250 pounds of thrust,measuring it with a spring balance and a rope tied to atree. Sometimes we would tie the airplane to the treeuntil the engine was running up or sometimes we hadsome men to hold it back. A man on each wheel here atthe back could hold it. We have a picture of two mendoing that, but most of the time we used a rope tying itto a fence or a tree, but out in the field sometimes whenthere wasn t anything to tie it to we would use men tohold it back and that gave them quite a lot of work todo, too.

Mr. Garber: Did you have a slip knot in the ropewhich the pilot could release or did you have someoneon the ground to let the rope 100se7

Mr. Johnson: A fellow on the ground would do that.The pilot has to use a step ladder in order to get into theseat.

Mr. Garber: I see, and so with th e pilot at the

controls and the engine running, the airplane would bereleased either by cutting or untying the rope or byhaving the men let go, so then the airplane would rollalong the ground and when it gained sufficient speed thepilot would pull back on this wheel column, thusdepressing the tail, inclining the airplane upward, and uphe would go. Did you ever measure the rate of climb orthe extreme altitude?

Mr. Johnson: No we did not have any way of measuring it. We probably could have arranged a way but wedidn t do that. I imagine that the speed at which wetook off was about 30 miles an hour. We would find thatout by an automobile running along side of it while theman in the car would watch his speedometer.

Mr. Garber: How fast was the airplane flying as itcame in for a landing?

Mr. Johnson: I guess that speed was about 35 milesper hour maybe, just a little faster then what it took offat. We could slow it down by this push button whichwould cut the engine in and out. I n the air the speed wasabout 50 or 60 miles an hour, straight and level withouta tail wind; but at that time we had no way of measuringit. That is just our guess. We never tried for altitude,sometimes we would say it was up about a mile high butwe just said that. The airplane would look pretty small if

Steering yolk is conventional - it straddles themain lower tube o f the fuselage. Forward isdown, back is up turning the wheel creates anormal bank. Note the rudder bar at ottom o fphoto, with leather loops to hold flier s feet.

it was as much as a mile high up. We have some picturesof it way up high and it looked pretty small. It couldhave been a half a mile high, but that is just a guess afterall. We had no way of measuring how high we were, butLou always said that it felt mighty high.

Mr. Garber: Well now Mr. Johnson you have beenvery obliging and patient to answer all of these questions. We have discussed this airplane along the samemethod that I used in the Navy when I was teachingrecognition of enemy airplanes. We have also considered

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the structure and performance, but I wish that I couldhear from you some anecdotes of the times when youand your brothers were building and flying this airplane.You have told me that th is was constructed as animprovement over the one you and your brothers madein 1909. May I suggest that Mrs. Johnson and you mighthave lunch with me. We can continue our conversationthere.

Mr. Shaw: While you two are at lunch I ll glue thesehands together around this wheel.

Mr. Garber: Thanks, Win. We ll be back before long.(Later)Mr. Garber: Now we are back from lunch. It was

particularly enjoyable to have Mrs. Johnson with us.During lunch we spoke further about the airplane. Mr.Johnson said that there were two things which in-fluenced their discontinued operations of the airplaneand their further interest in aeronautics. One factor wasa cyclone which demolished their factory, and anotherfactor was their hope to get a contract for some airplaneengines from Russia. That was after the beginning ofWorld War I in Europe, 1914. The Johnson airplane hadconti nued in flight through 1913 and during that year

the brothers were thinking of developing a more powerful engine. The engine as shown in this model had 4cylinders but the brothers intended to develop the typewith 6, 8, and possibly 12 cylinders. The Russiansbecame interested in the most powerful Johnson engine,and the Johnson Brothers invested a great deal of moneyand effort into the development of the 8 and 12 cylinderengines. The Russian government was rather unsettled atthat time and it seemed difficult for the agents of thatnation to make up their mind. When the JohnsonBrothers learned that the Russians preferred a 12 cylinder engine they decided that it should be of the 4

cycle type, but the brothers could not obtain a magnetoof sufficient power and reliability to use in the ignitionsystem. Had the Russian government ordered the 8 cylinder engines in quantity or had the brothers been ableto get an experimental contract for development of the12 cylinder engines and been able to produce a prototype that was satisfactory, the Johnson Brothers mightwell have gone into the business of manufacturing airplane engines and developing more advanced examplesof their airplanes. But, not receiving such encouragementthe brothers decided to concentrate on Marine engi nes.Also there were some financiers who were consideringinvesting money in the Johnson Company. The investors

believed that aviation was an unstable field and theywould not agree to put their money into the JohnsonBrothers enterprise when the state of aeronautics was soindefinite, and considered to be unreliable. Moreover,there was the thought on the part of these investors thatif any of the Johnson Brothers were injured in thecourse of their flying, that their company would therebybe deprived these services, thus reducing or even closingthe operations of the Marine engine plant. So those threefactors: the severe damage to their plant by the tornado, the loss of the Russian contract, and the attitude ofinvestors caused the brothers to give up airplanes andairplane engines and concentrate on Marine engines. Fora while the brothers made a small gasoline-engined unitwhich was attached to a bicycle and called the Johnsonmotor wheel. (I remember that these were sometimesbuilt into 4-wheel wagons and used by boys fortransportation around the neighborhood. A friend ofmine had one about 1916 which he and I would frequently go from my home which was then near theNaval Observatory, all the way over to my friend sfamily s summer home in Virginia.) After that thebrothers got into the making of outboard motors, they

being the first ones to use a rope for starting the engine.Now, of course, Johnson outboard motors are famousand the company itself is very substantial. Mr. LouisJohnson and Mr. Harry Johnson are retired from theirbusiness and Clarence is continuing it. Julius Johnson Iwas told had withdrawn his investment several years agointo another line. Clarence was the youngest of a familyof 7 children but at the time when the airplane wasbeing made and flown he was too young to participateother than by lighting bonfires so that the pilot couldland the airplane when evening was coming on. Atpresent time one of the five brothers and one of the two

sisters have passed away. Mr. Johnson is there anythingthat we haven t covered in our discussion here in theshop or at lunch?

Mr. Johnson: How about the springs on the landinggear. You notice that they extend upward at an anglefrom their lower connection near the rear wheels. Thosesprings were very useful when we were rolling over roughground, and then when we landed th ese springs wouldstretch upward so that the skid would touch the groundand help to slow us down for landing.

Mr. Garber: I see that you have made miniaturesprings here, and that they operate the same as in theoriginal airplane.

Mr. Johnson: Yes, I have put it all in there exactly asit was nearly 50 years ago.

Mr. Garber: I notice that you have some heavysprings up here in the horizontal section of the controlcables where they connect to the cables coming off ofthe control wheel. They look like whiffletree springs.What were they used for?

Mr. Johnson: Well, when the aviator pulled hiscontrol wheel back it would tend to shorten this cablehere but the springs were so arranged as to take up thatextra play, and similarly permitted the connections toelongate when the aviator pushed the wheel forward.That would keep the chain from coming loose on thesesprockets over which the length of chain passed. Thus thespring would expand or contract to compensate for theover-all differences in the lengths of the connections tothe elevators. Now, for take-down purposes we couldtake the wings off and lay them alongside of the bodywhen we were going down the road or moving it fromone place to another. One end of the wings would reston this pin here and the other end on this cross bar,while the trailing edge would lay against the upper structure of the fuselage. We would tie the wings in place and

then we could pull the whole machine along acountryroad behind a horse-drawn wagon, and then bring it intoa field where we could take off. One of the fields thatwe used had a b luff there and we would usually take offfrom the top of the bluff.

Mr. Garber: About dimensions, you have told me thatthe scale of this model is 1: 1 O That is 1/10 size, everypart being 1/10 tha t of the original. A decimal scale.

Mr. Johnson: Yes that is right; the wing span was 36feet and the length was 34 feet. That was measured fromthe front of the front wheel to the extreme rear, over-all.The propeller was 8 feet in diameter and the width of

the wing was 8 feet.Mr. Garber: Do you remember the pitch of thepropeller?

Mr. Johnson: Yes that was 4Y2 feet. The revolutionsper minute were about 1200 on the ground but I don tknow how fast the engine turned up when the airplanewas in the air. In the air it must have been more than onthe ground. We had no indicator on the machine, however. Here is another thing I had not mentioned. Thecables extending from the rear spar connections on theright side of the wing to the corresponding fittings onthe left side would pass over the pullies on top of theseupright cabane braces here, and in that way they would

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move span wise from side to side when the wing waswarped.

Mr. Garber : You told me during lunch that in all ofthe flights with this airpl a ne there had never b ee n anyserious crack-ups. You said a few minor damages hadoccurred that were easily repaired and that the airplanewas flown until 1913 .

Mr. Johnson : Yes right up to the winter of 1913 butnot over into 1914.

Mr . Garber : Was there any change in the designduring that period?

Mr . Johnson: No, thi s model shows how it was at thebeginning and how it was al l the time we were flying it. Idon t recall any changes that were made all that timeexcept these flanges here on these longitudinal fuselagepipes. At first we didn t have them on, and then weadded them in order to help make the engine run cooler.They were on in 1911 however, so we must have putthem on rather soon after we built it. On the model Ihave made them out ofrsheet brass , but on the airplanethey are made of copper and were of L-shaped section.On the model it was quit e a problem to figure out howto make them but first I ran the brass through a set of

gears so as to form these parts that expand up, and thenI made a tool for pinching those U-shaped parts flat.That formed the shape that would fit around the pipe.Th en I soldered them together, soldering the joint onthe unerneath line of the tubing on this model, but inthe original airplane we soldered each piece onseparately.

Mr. Garber : That is certainly a wonderful story and Imarvel not only at your ingen io us craftsmanship inconstructing the original but also in the exquisite jewellike precision and beauty with which you made thisminiature reproduction. Is this to be accessioned as a giftfrom all three brothers?

Mr . Johnson: Yes that s right, from all three of us. Weare very honored to have it here in the National AirMuseum.

Mr. Garber: Well I assure you Mr. Johnson, and Iassure your brothers that we ourselves are honored toaccept it from you and to display it. I know that ourvisitors will be thrilled by the excellence of this beautifulmodel. Those brothers are yourself, Louis whom I met,and Julius who I have not had the pleasure of meetingyet .

Mr. Johnson: Tha t s right, tha t is Louis J. Johnson,Harry L. Johnson, and Julius M. Johnson.

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Mr. Garber: The correspondence clearly indicates thatth is is being given by the three brothers to the NationalAir Museum. At the time when I had the pleasure ofseeing Mr. Louis Johnson he mentioned also a trophyand said that would be available, and I assured him thatwe will be pleased to have it. I will contact Mr. Beldonabout that. May I confirm the address please?

Mr. Johnson: Yes. Louis J. Johnson is now at Drummond Island, Michigan. Julius M. Johnson is at MeadowCourt Hotel, Bradenton, Florida, and after Mrs. Johnsonand I return from a little trip we are taking, we will beback home at R. R.-1, Culver, I ndiana. We will stop off at

Washington as we turn back toward home after we visitsome friends up North.

Mr. Garber: Thank you again Mr. Johnson; and Mrs.Johnson, we are further ind ebted to your husband forbringing you. I hope that you have enjoyed your visit tothe Museum. We will proceed to put this beautiful modelon exhibition so that we and our visitors can enjoy it.Again and always our sincere appreciation to you.Letters of acknowledgment will be sent to you and toyour brothers, and we are very grateful to you personal[,y for assembling the model her e, and informing usa b o u t i t ~

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~ i f Story of

LouJOHNSONPioneer Airplane Manufac-

turer and Aviator Developer

o the Vee Type Motor nd

Modern Outboard Engine

s Recorded in an Interview

By Dorothy Jefferson

Konold

Especially for MoToR BoatinGMarch 927

Lou Johnson grinned cheerfully s he answered myquestions concerning his initial flight. Lou is the eldestand the leader of those four red-headed Johnson brothers who designed, constructed and flew the first successful American monoplane in Terre Haute, Indiana, eighteen years ago, and who have taken many remarkablesteps in the perfection of V-type motors.

Kind of funny, he s id , with that quiet, reticenthumor which is so much a part of his p ersonality, Whenthat machine was ready to go up I had not the remotest

Continued on page 15

Louis johnson makes first st/ccessful flightwith johnson Aeroplane

"

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VintagUpper Left: Note the brasssteam condenser tea kettle)ju st behind the engine. Infront o f the condenser s theignition system. Large box wasmagneto and selective cylindercontrol, later substituted forblip switch.

L o we r Left : The johnsono t o r wheel served the

Company for a period o f time- after aeroplanes and beforeoutboards . As a child I remem-ber a johnson motor wheelpowered buckboard. a bicyclewheeled contrivance abouttwice the size o f a child swagon, accommodating twopassengers).

3


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Album

Upper Right: A good shot oth e east s ide o the engin e,with Louis John son s w if e atth e controls. The propell e rw s made o alternate strips ospruce and walnut.

Lo w e r Right: This enginecou ld en han ce my l iving roomanytime Everything the John-son brothers did was done toperfection. Imagine what a 7cylinder cyc le engine couldhav e done for an aeroplane -t oo bad they were neversuccessfully applied .

4

idea how to fly. Had to learn that at the same time I wast ti h l Q i diff d l i

from the first, hi s so ns were benefited by an interest andi hi h f f h k h i


16/28

testing out the plane. Quite different now adays, learningall the principles in an aviation school and then having aperfectly good, standardized, thoroughly inspected planedelivered into your hands. In the old days you had tokeep your wits about you, all right. You never knewwhat might happen next. I'll never forget the first time Iwent fifty feet off the ground. It was lots more of asurprise to me than it was to the spectators "

We were sitting in the cheerful, home-like living roomwhere Mr. johnson does most of his reading and much

of his designing. A log fire snapped on the hearth andthe atmosphere suggested such peace and retirement thatit was almost impossible to see in the modest, kindlyman who sat before me, that rugged, grimly determinedHoosier lad who never allowed a class-mate to pass himin school, who dreamed fantastic things with his boyishbrain and carried them out with his amazingly skillfulboyish hands, who permitted no failure, even heavensentdestruction in the form of a tornado that completelywiped out his entire motor plant in a few hours, to comebetween him and his goal, and who has accepted successwith an unconscious grace known to few. At forty-fiveLouis james johnson occupies an enviable position inthe engineering world, yet one has only to converse withhim a few moments to be certain he feels that only avery small portion of h is work has been accompl ished.

And what he admits of success he attributes in nogreat measure to his own ability. He tells you, gravely, oftwo paramount influences in his youth, and insists that aboy, given these, could not have failed.

The first influence, as you may have guessed, was hishome life.

Meeting Mr. johnson's parents as they are today, it isnot difficult to understand the reverence that is accorded them by all of their five children. Father johnson, at

eighty-four, has the keen clear eye of a man of sixty. Hismost prized possession is a motor wheel presented tohim when his sons were manufacturing them, and herides daily. During the war he was called by the government to take over an important task in an ammunition factory, for though he had been long in idleness, hisability as an expert tool dresser was well known, andthey were unable to find skill in younger men thatmatched his. Coming from Denmark when he was ninehe went at a very early age into a machine shop, reachingthe place where he could gauge steel by his senses asaccurately as other men ga uged it by instruments. And,

cooperation which very few fathers know how to give ."We always had our own tools and work-benches,"

Lou explained, "Father indulged us in these things aswealthier men indulge their children in expens ive toys.We were encouraged to try our hand at any sort ofconstruction that appealed to us. And father was alwaysthere to advise and assist. No task, even the building of asled, was regarded as trivial. We were taught to putsincere effort into everything and to finish whatever webegan."

Mother johnson, quietly sitting, softly rocking,speaks in a low, almost awed tone of "her boys," andyou know at once what her part in their story has been.

"When Lou was only twelve," she says, "he decidedhe wanted a new sled. We couldn't afford to buy him thekind he selected, so he took an axe and went out intothe woods and cut down a tree. He worked at it until hehad his lumber ready. Then he sat down and drew adesign. We didn't think he could carry it out , he wassuch a little fellow, but first thing we knew he had something that looked like a real sled. The only trouble waswith the runners. Finally he took the rim off an oldbuggy wheel, pounded it down flat and fastened it to hiswooden runners. Father got him some red and black . 1paint and I want to tell you he had a sled to be proudof I have it in my attic now, and you couldn't buy a Abetter one." ,

The second influence you cannot guess.It was the Wabash river. \When the johnson boys were still youngsters the

family moved from Effingham, Illinois, to Terre Haute,I ndi ana. All of the boys, Lou, Harry, julius, Clarenceand Arthur, (the latter being the one who lost his lifesome years ago in a factory accident) were enchanted .with the river.

"Our Danish blood," Lou smiles quietly.

.,t seemed to them that life would not be worth living ,until they owned a boat."Make i t ," their parents encouraged.So the boat was begun, and before the summer ended 'it was an admitted success. But another summer cameand brought new ambitions. Lou johnson and Nell Cockerham johnson.

Louis and Harry wearied of rowing each other about It is rumored that she flew the johnson air-one day and began to dream. plane. The family doubts that she did

"If we had a motor - " Pictures o her in the plane may have been"We couldn't afford to buy one - " responsible for the rumor. See page 74)"We could race, n'everything."

5

Gee h ow fast d 'you suppos e we co uld go? of so rcery Th e original motor was mount ed on a wooden fra me,


17/28

Gee, h ow fast d you suppos e we co uld go?They a pproach ed their father a nd mother.

Make it , said the parents fi n a y, with less enthusias m than they were wont to show . Gasolin e mo t orsw ere strange to y s in thos e times.

But the mo t o r, s lowl y asse mbl ed, pr ove d the e nv y ofa their sm a ll assoc iates. It was t he two-horse pow er,inboard type, a quaint a ncestor for the outboard oftoday, but it ch a enge d , a nd defeated, m an y a marinemot o r of prouder or igin.

The influenc e of the Wabas hHigh Scho o l was comp let ed, with so exce e n t arecord in mathematics that T e rr e Hau te prof esso rs stillspeak of Lo u's asto nishin g ab ilit y in that lin e, a nd theyo ung inventor, for h e was now recognized as that,sought hi s father's consent to engage i n m a rin e moto rman ufactur e .

As usua l, hi s parents nodd ed approval. They hada lw ays wished their boys to be in business for t h emselves, a nd there was money ready for a sma factory .

He re it is interesting to m ake a no te on the progressof Louis Jo hn son's educat ion. N o m ore schooling, yetsyste m at ic stu d y, never n eg lected in the press of anyc irc umst a nces whatever. Mor e mathematics, a keenerint e rest in everything pertaining to the mechanicalsciences, e ngin eeri ng co ur ses. Constant reading, evid e nced today by the books that surround him in hishom e .

A few years of this marine work, and then the brainthat dreamed and the hands t h at were ever ready tocarry out those dreams united in a burni ng desire todrive somet hin g far m ore romantic than river boats witha gaso lin e e ngine.

He wanted a s led, and made o ne. He wanted a la un ch,a nd h e made o n e. H e wanted an air pl a ne, and he made

one. It was America's first triumph with a monopl a ne.No o ne, pr obab ly, will eve r know just what th o sebroth e rs suffered in the w ay of ridicule, disappointm e nta nd discour age ment in the first period of their strug glewith th e unknown a ir monst er. But they dr o ve a h ea d ,un d a unted, and fi nally so mething that resembled a nominous bird of pr ey wa s hatch ed.

Not only the I ndiana town in whi ch it was b o rnthought thi s creation a fantastic f ledglin g. Looking overMr. Johns o n's scrap-book one co m es to hi ghl y amusingcomments by the press in various parts of the co untr y .Wri ght and Curtiss were ex perim e nting at the sa me ti m e,of course, but air asce nsion was still regar d ed in the light

of so rcery.Working fev er ishly day and night and with th e

utmost secrecy the John so n brother s of T err e Haut e,Indi a na, are said to be toiling and sc he min g to puttogether a huge bird-like machin e which is slat ed eitherto f ul f ill their fo ndest hopes or pro ve their bitterestdisappointment , says a c l pping of Se pt e mber 26, 1909.

D esp it e the Jo hnson' s effo rt s at secrecy, spectatorsbegan to throng the camp in the old reservoir bed ear lySaturday afte rnoon, a nd lat e r automobiles could be seen

on every road lea ding to the hiding pl ace of the Fly er .A ll the fa r m ers took the afternoo n off to view them ach ine , news of which h ad leaked out in spite of thecovered e n tra nc e to the farm where the try-out is to beh e ld.

This, a li tt le later, in the Terre Ha ut e Tribune.Mr. Joh n son ch uckl es soft ly as h e reviews these

notices.The betting ran hi gh at those fi rst ex hibiti ons, he

says . Bets ran about two to one that we'd not get offthe gro und . Peopl e a lwa ys paid to s the ma ch ine, too.On e day in Hill sboro, Illin o is, we took in 2500 gateadmiss io n s of twenty-five ce nt s eac h .

Gasoline, of co ur se, was regarded with much fear andthe greatest caution used. Before the engine was starteda crier ran down the f ie ld warning spectators of theimminent danger and forbidd ing them to smoke.

But the queer creature t hat the J ohnson brothers hadlabored w ith was now winning wagers for those who hadfaith in it. Th e press spoke of a f light as a lift, a nd ,fo owi ng a discouragingly ra iny sum m e r when muddyfields delayed the tests for weeks, we read :

After a period of experiment covering some time,the Jo hn son brothers made a s uc cessf ul lift at their ca mpSund ay evening. The machine was started on the aer

d ro me track fr om which it was run down the field in aneffort which finally succeeded in raising it clear of theea rth . Sev e ra l times the craft rais ed for d ista nces of fromfifteen to twenty feet, though th e height a ttained w asnot mor e th a n a foot from the ground at any time.

Among the things that the history of tomorrow willcarry will be the inv e ntion a nd construction of the firstsuccessful American monoplan e . It will recount theyears of un a ided struggle by those red-he aded Johnsonbr o th e rs in T e rr e Haute , I ndiana, who brought out of achaos of thought the mo st wonderful th ing, up to th ey ea r 1912, in the way of an aero engine mounted on asteel flyer that really flew.

Th e original motor was mount ed on a wooden fra me,the wings w e re of silk and the po s ition of the flyer wasperilous. Th e impr oved monopl a n e boasted a steelframe, stronger win gs, and the aviator was pl ace d aboveand be hind the m ac hinery , eliminating the danger ofbeing crushed by th e e ngin e in a fall.

This successful ai rplan e had a s pread of 36 feet, alength of 34 feet, 260 square feet of plan e surface, andweighed 750 pou nd s. I had a speed of better than sixtymil es a n hour and was driv e n by a V-type motor , whichwas in the na ture of a revolution.

Th e n came the Johnson School of Aviation.Now that there were pla nes to fly there mu st b e

av iators to fly them. But , while many young men took akeen int erest in the sport fro m the sidelines, most ofthem were sti d ec id ed ly ea rthb o und. Howeve r, therewere two imm ediate ap plic a nts and Ross L Smith , whotrained one hundr ed a nd fifty m en during t h e war, wasLou Johnson' s first pupil. Frank Schutt was the ot her,a nd to him befell the thrill of crashing to groun d from aheig ht of 1500 ft. a nd la ndin g unhur t. Hi s acc ide nt wascaused by a s horta ge of gas, as were many ot h er s imilarcatastrophies of the time.

But there is a more perso na l note to be sounded inconnection with Mr . J o hn so n' s f ligh ts . S omet hin g ot herthan motors a nd his aviatio n schoo l engrossed him.Th ere was a charming young person in the hood a nddust coat, suppos ed to represent the ideal sport costumeof the day a lw ays ready to assay the c louds with him.Up to now spectators had gazed in obvious ad mirati o n atthe mother who bade her son s uch a brave god-s peedwhen he starte d up o n those fearsome, uncharted voyages . Her gallant b ear ing un fa ilingly ca us ed a little rippleof co m m e nt. But now a noth er woman stood at h er side,eq ually anxious, yet equally h ero ic. It was whisp ered

that Miss Ne

Cock e rham, a lso of Terre Haute, hadoften been up in the m ac hine with Mr. Johnson, a ndthat sh e evidently took a keen int e res t in monoplanes

Th e story is briefly told in two headlin es from thelocal pap er:

DISCOVERED - PRETTY MISS WHO FLEW ISI NTERESTED IN BIRD MAN . THEN , AVIATORJOHNSON UP IN AI R - MISSED TRAIN ONWEDDINGDAY.

A n e w partnership was formed, for it is evident toeve ryone who contacts the J ohnsons in e ith e r a businessor a social way that theirs h ad proven a ver y successfulmarri age, and that Mrs. Johnson's int e re st has been

16

manifested in every phase of the inventors' work.


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manifested in every phase of the inventors work.But the influence of the WabashFlying was all very well, Mr. Johnson admitted when

questioned concerning his return to motor -boat building,but the call of his first love was too strong to ignore forlong. Of course, during these remarkable three years, hehad never ceased to manufacture the Johnson marinemotor, but following his marriage he devoted himselfintensively to the development of several ideas he hadheld in embryo while he sought the conquest of the

clouds.Soon the Johnson brothers were offering twentymodels of marine motors. Racing motors ranged fromsingle cylinder to twelve cylinder type. One of these heldtherecord in the 320 in. class for four years.

But the fates, having accorded this much in justice tothe originality, persistency and energy of the Johnsonfamily, evidently decreed that the number thirteen mustcast an ominous influence upon the new industry. Thetornado of 1913 is well remembered by all who lived inthe vicinity of Terre Haute at that time, but to none,perhaps, was it more devastating.

"Lou and I had been in the theatre while the stormwas at its worst," said Mrs. Johnson, when we had cometo this part of the narration, "And Lou spoke of thesatisfaction of being in a nice new brick factory. Wewent home and knew nothing of the damage that hadbeen wrought until the following morning. Then, whenthe men reported for work, they saw a pile of wreckagethat would have sickened any heart. The highest portionof the plant left standing was a bit of the brick wall,three feet above the ground."

Wea ker men wou Id have broken, perhaps, butapparently Lou and his brothers bowed to the will of thegods and accepted their loss calmly. I n humbler quarters

but with no lessening of spirit they designed somethingnew in the manner of a racing craft.In 1914 Johson's most famous boat, Black Demon

III entered a special match race against some of thefastest boats in the country, on Lake Michigan. Disturber I V of Ch icago took first honors, but Black Demonwas a close second, out-classing a number of favorites. Itwas a recognized triumph for the V-type motor, whichhad been exhibited in Chicago a few months before andwas causing much comment. Black Demon I II was a23-footer, powered with two 12-cylinder high speedmarine motors, each having 18 0 horse-power.

Ever casting about for new transportation methods,

Black Demon w s a 3 footer powered with two 2 cycle 7 cylinder high speed marine motors e chhaving 780 horsepower.

the red-headed John son boys now wondered whether abicycle driven by their motor would compare favorablywith types already on the market. Apparently it did, forin 1917 the Johnson Motor Wheel Company was a goingbusiness with an output of 10,000 machines a year, andthe slogan - "SIXTY MILES FOR TEN CENTS" wasfamiliar to many of us.

Warren Ripple, Chicago financier, was especiallyinterested in this new venture, and through his influencethe factory was moved to South Bend in the early partof 1918.

In eight years the growth of the Johnson MotorCompany has furnished South Benders with an in-exhaustible subject of conversation. First, it was

"Did you hear about those Johnson people? They'vetaken over the o'd Bottling plant next to them.Then:"Have you heard the latest about Johnson? They've

leased that whole block of stores on Lincoln Way andput their offices over there."

On and on it went, this amazing growth. Soon avacated portion of a large underwear mill across the riverwas commandeered, neighboring houses, sheds, buildingsof any type whatever were given over to the manufacture and housing of Johnson motors. It was said that onemust carry a road map to complete a tour of the plant.

The wheel had gone into the discard, but there was

never a lull in activities. The out-board marine motorhad quietly taken the place of the motor-driven bicycle- and Lou Johnson was back again doing homage to hisfirst love

Strange influence-"On the Banks of the Wabash - "tho' now, of course, it was the St. Joe river that knewhis experiments.

Mr. Johnson's smile changed as he finished the littleresume of his work and, walking to the fire-place framedby the well-filled bookcases, looked thoughtfully intothe flames for a few seconds.

Of course it is only a beginning," he said, "This isthe age of mechanical development and no one canforetell the progress that will be made in the next ten

years, even though one may feel it coming. Naturally thething that interests me most, and always has, is theimprovement of water transportation. Better boats, faster boats - "

He paused, and the smile was again in his eyes."America is only beginning to enjoy water sports.

presume we Johnsons have that in the blood "And suddenly I saw him as he is, a tall Danish

American captain, commanding in spite of his reticence,who began his voyage about three decades ago on achildishly constructed raft in the Wabash river and hasbeen coming, fearless of current and snag, upstream eversince.

7


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Wednesday August 3, 1910

JOHNSONS PREPARE TEST AIRPLANE - machinestands ready after more than a year s work for its initialflight - brothers guard secret of place of first trial. Airship has as original feature V type 2 cycle engine builtfor strength and lightness .

Harry, Louis and Julius Johnson, the Johnson Brothers who have been at work for more than a yearmanufacturing an aeroplane at their shop, 717 N. 10thSt. have at last completed the machine and will leaveFriday for a place in the open country near Terre Haute,

to make the first attempt at flying it.Thus far, the Johnson Brothers have kept the location

of the place where they will try to fly the machine, anentire secret. t s desired to have no crowd about tobother while the machine s being tried.

Everything was completed Wednesday with theexception of putting the parts together. The machine,which weighs 650 pounds complete, will be shippedknocked down to the scene of the first attempted flight.The propeller, which s over 10 in length, the wings seatand balances will not be attached until the scene of

try-out has been reached.Wednesday morning the airplane stood in the big

building erected especially for the purpose of building itat the rear of the Johnson home on North 10th St. t is36 in length and measures the same exactly from tip totip in width. Every part of t has been manufactured bythe three young men while they at the same time carriedon their occupation of gasoline and marine enginemanufacturing. t was begun just a little less than a yearago.

The wings which are to extend on either side from

8

the front of the machine, measure 6 z x 8 ' and ared f li ht f h d t t

Sunday, August 7, 1910 distinctive feature of the new machine , is especiallyd t d for the use on airplanes The Johnson brothers


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made of light waterproof canvas, s tretched over stoutframework. The engine is a V type 2 cycle engine , theonly one of its kind to have ever been made .

There are V type engines said Mr. Johnson, butthey are 4 cycle. The 2 cycle engines have previouslybeen built straight, causing increased weight. Everythingabout the machine has been built for speed and light ness.

Two 7% gallon gasoline tanks will furnish the propelling power for the machine. t is expected it will take aday and a half to set the machine up after it's beenshipped to the place where it will be tested.

- ,'-

Saturday, Augu st 6 , 1910LOCAL AVIATORS MAKE READY FOR FIRSTTRIAL. JOHNSON BROTHERS MOVE AIRPLANE TOFIELD NEAR BLACKHAWK AND SET UP MACHINEFOR TES T everything was hustle and bu s tle at theJohn son brother s aero camp, a few miles from Blackhawk , Saturday , where the three young men , manufacturer s of engine s and incidentally builder s of an airplane ,

were engaged in putting together their airplane preparatory for a trial flight . One of the bu siest of the worker swa s Clarence John son , a 12 year old broth er , whoshowed him self a handy m an about the place. Owing tothe fact that due to their hurried move from Terre Haut ewith their machine Friday , the John son brothers leftbehind some n ece ssar y block s and braces , and the flightthat was s cheduled for Sa turday , will be po s tponed untilsome time Sunday. The strange man by the name ofZakariu s, s uppo sed to be from Indianapolis and wellverse d in aviation , was with the three brother s Saturdayas they worked on their machine , which wa s enclosed ina 40' tent, to shut out the view from the spectators.Another important per sonage at the scene was Dr .Dupui, of Riley, who wa s on hand in ca se a flight shouldbe made, to see to the injurie s of the aviator in case heshould meet with an accident.

The t r y o u t ground s are admirally situated in thecenter of a 100 acre farm in the reservoir of the oldWabash and Erie Canal. There is a wide stretch of clearcountry , without any woodland within its radiu s of twomile s . t is believed the airplane will be assembled andready for a trial late Saturday afternoon, but it is notthought a flight will be attempted before Sunday.

- ,i _

JOHNSON BROTHERS PREPARE FOR INITIALTEST OF BIG AIRPLANE . CONFIDENCE PERMEATESCAMP S TIME FOR TRY-OUT NEARS thefirst flight , if flight is to be , of the Johnson airship, nowresting in all readiness for its try-out at its camp atsoutheast of Terre Haute, will come at about noontoday, and the re sult of a year 's work and effort to builda successful airplane will be determined .

In spite of the Johnson effort at secrecy, spectatorsbegan to throng to the camp in the old reservoir bedearly Saturday afternoon, and later in the eveningautomobiles could be seen on every road leading to thehiding place. The farmers also took Saturday evening offto take advantage of the opportunity to see the machineand the men.

A heavy steel roller was brought to the scene Sat-urday evening and the Johnsons will l ayout the courseearly Sunday morning on which the aviators who drivethe machine in the preliminary try-outs will score downfor a s tart. The meadow as it stands , is rough , andtrouble was feared when the wheels of the flyer werestarted over the ground before the machine raised intothe air .

Just who would be the first man to steer the machine

on it s initialeffort

,the Johnsons refused

to s tate, butthe crowd of sightseers who have been watching theprogre ss of the work at the camp picked the man whothey believe will be in the seat when the airplane raisesfirst. t is William Zachow , the stranger from Racine,Wiscon sin who arrived in thi s city just in time to take anactive part in completing preparation s for the try-out.Zachow refused to give out hi s name, but the above isthe name he regi s tered under at the Philbeck Hotel.Gossip has it that the Wi scon s in man is an experiencedaviator , and it i s on thi s fact that the spectators ba setheir belief that he will be the one to drive the machinewhen it is tried out.

There is no s pirit of speculation in the air about the

Johnson camp, but in plain , busine sslike manner , themen are carrying forth the work which is to determinewhether or not Terre Haute has produced a parallel tothe Wright Brothers. There were several men on theground Saturday afternoon who profe ssed some knowl -edge of mechanic s . All the men who have seen themachine since it has been brought near enough tocompletion for an idea to be formed as to its efficiency,has had nothing but prai se for the thoroughness withwhich it has been finished, and experienced mechanicssay that from a mechanical standpoint, the machinelooks good.

An experienced mechanic who examined the machineSaturday , stated that the V type , 2 cycle engine , a

adapted for the use on airplanes. The Johnson brothersclaim the distinction of having made the first engine ofthis type , and mechanics say that it is the coming enginefor use on aerial machines.

The Johnsons, themselves, though they do not talkmuch, have all confidence in their creation. The menhave had years of experience in the manufacture of allkinds of engines, and in addition have put in consider-able time in research work on the subject of airplanesand other flying machines . They have been closestudents to the methods of the Wright Brothers.

I i _ ,'

Monday , August 8, 1910MAKER LAYS PLANS TO PILOT AIRPLANE ONINITIAL FLIGHT with the airplane removed from thetent in which it has been housed , and the engine of theplane in perfect running order, the Johnson brotherswere expected Monday at noon to make an attemptedflight at any time.

The field , located near Blackhawk , south of the city,

where the first trial will take place, i s in perfect condition for the flight. The only thing that may cause a delayof the flight i s the lightnes s of the wheel s which s upportthe airplane on the ground at the st a rt. t wa s fearedMonday that heavier wheel s would be necessary . In casethis is decided on , the trial of the machine will not takeplace for a day or so. One of the Jo h son boys will pilotthe machine on it s initial attempted flight. This wa sdefinitely announced Monday. t was thought at firstthat William Zachow, who wa s present at the aviationcamp would pilot the machine , but it ha s developed thatthe stranger is a sale sman for an airplane supply company. He is said to be thoroughly fa miliar with themechanism of airplanes, however, and has been of greatvalue in getting the machine ready for flight.

A test of the engine was made Monday morning , itdeveloped 40 HP. Confidence was expressed by theJohnsons that the engine could develop 20 HP additionalif necessary.

....-

Saturday , August 13 , 1910WEAK SPRINGS POSTPONE JOHNSONS' TRIAL OFFLIGHT . CROWDS GATHERED AT AVIATION

1 9


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t _Consequently, when the speed attained by the motor

in the first trials Friday proved insufficient , one of theproven the puzzle and that is the very point the John-sons are seeking.


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Sunday, August 21,1910FOUR DEVOTEES OF AERONAUTICS MAINTAINCHEERFULNESS IN FACE OF PARTIAL DISAPPOINTMENT . WAITING FOR CALM. JOHNSONSADVANCE IN CONQUERING AIR. SIX TRIALS OFMONOPLANE PROVE MANY THEORIES CORRECTBUT BRING PARTIAL DISAPPOINTMENT. LOWSPEED PROPELLER PROVES TOO WEAK TO RAISEWEIGHT. DIFFICULTIES AT FIELD AND APPLICATION OF MOTOR'S ENERGY PRESENT PROBLEMSTHAT MUST YIELD BEFORE PERSEVERENCE - Sunday, the Johnson brothers, who are now so earnestlyengaged in the attempt to fly a monoplane in the oldcanal basin near Blackhawk, are going to demonstratethat they can build a high power, low speed motor fullyadapted to the needs of the aviator.

Just now they are encountering difficulties thatwould discourage many, with a patience that meanssuccess, they are working under handicaps that appear asinsurmountable , but must give way before their determination.

Saturday morning, the last of six attempts to maketheir machine leave terra firma failed and they wentback to their tent disappointed after two weeks of thehardest kind of labor. In spite of the cheerful attitudethey assumed, there was an air of disappointment allaround the camp and even the jokes of the jolly partydid not dispel it.

The disappointment lay not so much in the fact thatthe machine failed to leave the ground in its trials, as inthe evidence that higher speed would be necessary forthe proper operation of the motor. t is the object of theJohnsons to develop a motor that will run a monoplanewithout the terrific speed common to those in use. fthey succeed n securing one of this type, they have afortune at their command. They do not desire toconstruct an airplane merely for the purpose of flying. fthey did, they could easily obtain the pattern of theWright brothers' machine or other machines and buildaccordingly, or they could purchase a machine at lesscost and trouble than they have encountered. But,having as their object the development of a low speedmotor, the failure of the one now in use to do the workexpected, was disappointing. Although it whirled thepropeller at a speed that astonished the spectators, it wasnot operated at a rate of which it is capable, but at a ratevery much lower, and which the builders hope would besufficient for its purpose.

phopes of the Johnsons was dashed.

Reluctantly they cut down the size of the propeller,knowing that every inch shaved from it would increasethe speed of the engine . Two inches all around weresacrificed in the desire to raise the skybird, and theresult was a perceptible increase in the number of revolutions and consequently a steadier engine. Some consolaLIon was offered by the fact that even with the reducedpropeller there was little vibration noticeable about themachine.

Late Friday night the airplane was run out of its tent,and the motor started . The effect was extraordinary andthe hopes of the Johnsons that they had accomplishedtheir purpose ran high. Saturday morning, early , thefourth attempt to fly, and the first with the reducedpropeller, was made.

Whether the alterations had any effect on the raisingpower of the motor was difficult to determine, becauseof the conditions under which the trial was made. Asteady breeze from the south, made it necessary to startthe machine .from the north end of the field at the footof the small incline, and on ground that was wet andsoft. The machine behaved no better than before, blltwhether it was due to the propeller, the grade or the softground, was a question the Johnsons were not ready toanswer. To eliminate the grade is almost impossible. Towait for a more favorable wind is nerve racking , yet theJohnsons will have to do all of these things beforemaking sure that they have the propeller rightly propor-tioned for the task.

Whatever may be determined regarding the propeller,it remains that the Johnsons have demonstrated anengine that is remarkable for its power and speedcombined with its steadiness and construction. Themotor is of the 2 cycle type, 4 cylinders. This meansthat an explosion occurs in each cylinder just twice asoften as in the more common 4 cycle 4 cylinder type.

More power is the result and 75 hp is the indication.This is accomplished by combining the Johnson patentvalve with cylinders set at an angle of 18 0 0 and bigcarburetors. The patent valve is one on which the menhave worked for a long time and they have shown by it amethod of allowing more gas to enter the cylinders without increasing the size of the valve, a point, of corisiderable value in construction. Then, they have obtained amotor that will run at great speed and create so littlevibration that it scarcely causes a tremor in the lightwooden frame of the airship. All in all, the motor hasconducted itself in a manner that is deemed mostsatisfactory. t is applying it to the airplane that has

gThe Johnson monoplane will fly because it is

constructed on the proper principles for flight. That ithas not been successfully launched as yet is due to twothings - the experience in designing and operating of themen in control of it and the unfavorable conditionsunder which the trials have been made. Both of the sepoints will be overcome in time. While they are eliminating the unfavorable conditions, they are learning fromexperience the points they have overlooked in de s igning,and they are learning rapidly how to operate it.

The story of the con s truction of the Johnson monoplane is one of hard work and persistent effort. TheJohllsons have had no teacher in the art. They havestudied much, observed a great deal, and gathered fromexperience a great deal more than the average man willever know about airplanes. No one realize s more thanthey that there is a great deal more to be learned. That iswhy, after months of work they took their machine tothe Blackhawk basin. t was two weeks ago today thatthey arrived there, and since that time they have foughtmosquitos, malaria and rain in a most credible effort towork out the theories they have formed. t is not apleasant task, but one that requires thought , constantexperiment and careful reasoning. They are not particularly interested in what the public thinks about theirwork. They want to apply the Johnson motor to aeronautics.

As one enters the aviation field, he is greeted by asign that reads Welcome - Outside the Tent . The signis expressive of the attitude of the Johnson boys. Theyare willing that anyone watch them at work, free aboutgiving information when asked, but they promisenothing, and consequently are not responsible for thedisappointment of the many who have come to see themfly, and have left without that satisfaction.

Julius Johnson expressed their attitude well when hesaid, while waiting for a wind to subside, we have

waited a year to get to this point with the machine , andwe can afford to wait another day rather than run thechances of breaking up the airplane .

Last week's activity at the camp became intensive.Thursday morning, when the machine was run out of itsprotection for the first time, the frame buckled. Thiswas immediately repaired and trials of the engine andframe made that evening. Friday, three unsuccessfulattempts to raise the machine were made, and Saturday,with an altered propeller, three more efforts brought nobetter success.

When the last visitor departed from the aviation fieldThursday night, the Johnsons rested content with their

2

preparations for a flight on the early morning air. Time work, until, as the crowd left the field Thursday night , noon for further tests to be made solely on the ability ofand again the builders had been disappointed in not they saw the end of the last bit of preparation for an air the machine to lift. t is expected that the trial will1akehaving it ready for flight at the time agreed upon. Little test. place about an hour before sunset. No effort at flight


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p gweaknesses that could not be foreseen became apparent While it has been disappointing to visit the aviation will be made at this time, the test being confined towhen the machine was started across the rough field, had field and fail to witness an attempt to fly, the chagrin of determining the buoyancy of the machine, its balanceyielded one by one to careful attention and ingenuity . the Johnson brothers and Pearl Conover has been and general fitness for flight.Every nut and bolt on the unwieldly looking skybird had greater. Living in a single big tent pitched in a malariabeen inspected and found in first class condition. The breeding district, pestered by insects and blistered with ..... r t _alterations made necessary by faulty calculations as to the heat, they have put up with all kinds of inconven weight and pressure on the running gear were completed iences since leaving Terre Haute, and every hour's delayand the new woodwork covered with a preserving paint.In the center of the structure the light, but powerfulengine, shown in polished brilliancy. Just in front of itthe big propeller, built of many pieces and smoothed toa surface like glass, was perfect to the last detail. A sliverthat had been knocked from it was replaced withcement, and its bearing was as true as science couldmake it. Stretching away on each side for 16', wereribbed wings on which so much depends ,

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Vintage Airplane - Oct 1977