Volume 15 No 6 Dec 1964.pdf - Lakes Gliding Club

deep inversion. He also tells of how he sometimes slope-soared up the sides of
big cumulus clouds in his famous Tiger Moth .. Brolga". In chapter 8, there is
a hair-raising description of how to lose control of a sailplane if you venture into
cloud ~ithout prope: instruments and trainin~ -:- all ~rospective cloue!- fliers should
read thiS, although It may alarm the more tImid! His account of hiS attempts to
teach himself aerobatics in a plane he subsequently discovered was only stressed
for level flight also contains a valuable lesson. The book ends on a sad and sligbtly
sentimental note as he tells of the death of his little son, Ricky, from leukemia.
Altogether this book is a good memorial to a brilliant pilot and a fine person.
B. K1RX..
The WooJacombe Bird, by ANN WELCH, illustrated by JOSEPH
AClffiSON. Published 1964 by Jonathan Cape, London. Price 16s. (Also
obtainable from B.G.A. Office: postage extra).
ERE at last is a book for all those children whom one would like to see
H grow up with a .. gliding" mentality, or possibly even become glider pilots
themselves_
Mrs. Welch sets this adventure in the West Country during Armada year,
although it cannot be said to be an .. hist-orical" novel in the usual sense. The
joy of this book is that it conveys the author's enthusiasm for the open air, and
for those people who get on and do things in spite of the prejudices of others. The
development of the plot passes my test for an adventure story - I was thoroughly
objectionable to anyone who interrupted my reading - and at the finish still .had
that feeling that it could have happened.
The Woolacombe Bird can be thoroughly recommended as a present for nieces,
nephews and god-children, after you have read it yourself! Now Mrs. Welch has
written a book for 10 year olds and under, can we expect a competitor for
Winrtie the Pooh? I hope so.
PAUL MlNTON.
Octave Cbaoute: A Bibliography, by PEARL I. YOUNG. Published
1963 by Edward L. Steme. 2949 Balboa Street, San Francisco 21, Calif.,
D.S.A.
NLY 250 copies of this valuable booklet were printed for sale. No doubt
O because of this the price in England is D. 10s., if obtainable. Pearl Young
had a grant from the American Philosophical Society, and used it since 1947 to
pursue her research .. in libraries and archives from Paris to San Francisco."
A short biography begins the book. Born in Paris in 1832, six years before
his father emigrated to America, Chanute became a naturalized Amencan in 1854
and took up the profession of railway engineer. He began collecting infoI'lJlation
on aeronautics in 1857; but, the author says, .. finding himself neglecting both bis
family and professional duties for the new hobby, he resolutely filed the aeronautical
material away for 14 years". Then, at the age of 64, Ch:anute began the
famous series of gliding experiments over sand dunes on the shore of Lake
Michigan near Chicago. He collected three young men to do the fiying, as take-offs
and landings were done with the legs, but nevertheless he conscientiously tried Qut
each new model or modifiC3JtioJl ~imself before allowing others to fly it. For the
first experiments he took along six pairs of wings to be tried out in different
arrangements; oddly enough, they found the machine flew best with two pairs
in front and four behind.
The bibliography is in three sections: Writings and Printed Speeches, Notebooks
and Diaries (including press cuttings and photographs), and writings about
Chanute by others (this does not include a biography of him in SAU.PLANE AND
GLIDING on the centenary of his birth). It is to be hoped that Pearl Young will now
use this material to write a full-length biography.
A.E.S.
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