“pointed its nose directly”: Ibid.
Hoxsey was in his hangar making: The encounter in Hoxsey’s hangar was described in “Fatalism of the Fliers,” Century Magazine, November 1912.
“Brookins whirled round at the sound”: Colorado Springs Gazette, January 1, 1911.
“Hoxsey’s dead. I know it”: Ibid.
“Tear down the bunting, lower all the flags”: Indianapolis Star, January 1, 1911.
“I wish I had gone up with Arch”: Coshocton (OH) Daily Times, January 2, 1911.
“I shall not look on his dead form”: Ibid.
“Oh, dear, dear. Stop your spoofin’”: Cedars Rapids (IA) evening Gazette, December 1, 1910.
“Foolish, unsportsmanlike and grasping”: New York Morning Telegram, November 1910.
“Britons never shall be slaves”: New York Town Topics, November 5, 1910.
“they had promised they wouldn’t make trouble”: Warren (PA) Evening Mirror, November 30, 1910.
“The same judges acclaimed him the winner”: London evening Times, December 9, 1910.
“concluded that Mr. Grahame-White could not compensate me”: Lima (OH) Daily News, May 22, 1911.
“We’ll all be killed if we stay in this business”: Villard, Blue Ribbon of the Air, 76.
“I would like to make a bet”: The discussion between Walter Brookins and Claude Grahame-White, and a third aviator, Harry Atwood, was reproduced verbatim in the New York World, December 31, 1911.
“here we are sending up sputniks to the moon”: Wallace, Claude Grahame-White, 27.
“There’s really no sensation in the world”: New York Herald Tribune, November 14, 1910.
“Some of my friends claim you”: Ibid.
“The love of excitement, of fame, of money”: “Martyrs of the Air,” Chicago Daily Tribune, November 19, 1910.
GLOSSARY
Appendix: The neck or snout of the balloon envelope for venting expanded gas.
Ballast: Anything used to stabilize and equilibrate a vessel. The competitors in the 1910 International Balloon Cup race carried cloth bags filled with sand.
Barograph: An instrument that records the changes in atmospheric pressure on a roll of paper without the use of fluids such as mercury. For this reason it’s also known as an aneroid (without fluid) barometer.
Barometer: A word derived from the Greek words for weight and measure. A barometer is an instrument that uses mercury to measure the pressure of the air due to the weight of the column of air above.
Dirigible: From the French word for “to guide,” it was also the early name for an airship, a lighter-than-air craft that uses gas to rise and propellers and rudders for propulsion and steering.
Drag rope: A long, weighted rope that can be trailed from a balloon and used as ballast in influencing the rate of ascent and descent.
Elevator: A control surface on the tailplane of an aircraft allowing it to climb or descend.
Envelope: The fabric of a balloon that encloses the gas. Nowadays balloon fabric is made from nylon or polyester, although in the early days silk was the norm.
Equilibrator: A derivative of equilibrate meaning “to balance”; the name given to the ballast carried on Walter Wellman’s airship America.
Guy rope: A rope, wire, or chain used to anchor or steady an object.
Plane: A flat surface and the early-twentieth-century name for an airplane’s wings.
Pusher: The name given to any airplane in which the propeller and the engine were situated behind the aviator.
Rip cord: A cord extending from a long strip sewn into the balloon material near its upper shoulder called a ripping panel. Pulling the cord rips away the panel, releasing the gas and causing the immediate descent of the balloon.
Terracing: An early aviation technique for landing in blustery conditions whereby the airplane flies forward horizontally for one hundred yards, for example, drops vertically for one hundred yards, flies forward horizontally for one hundred yards, and so on.
Wing warping: The system devised by Wilbur Wright of twisting the wings of an airplane to raise or lower the tips, thereby allowing the aviator to achieve roll control. The system entailed bracing the tips of the wings with wires that the aviator manipulated from his seat.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY AND SOURCES
Books
The Aerial Age: A Thousand Miles by Airship over the Atlantic Ocean by Walter Wellman. Keller, 1911.
The Air Racers: Aviation’s Golden Era, 1909–1936 by Terry Gwynn-Jones. Pelham, 1983.
The Bishop’s Boys: A life of Wilbur and Orville Wright by Tom Crouch. Norton, 1990.
Blue Ribbon of the Air: The Gordon Bennett Races by Henry Villard. Smithsonian Institution, 1987.
Claude Grahame-White by Graham Wallace. Putnam, 1960.
Cruisers of the Air: The Story of Lighter-than-air Craft by C. J. Hylander. Macmillan, 1931.
Dictionnaire universel de l’aviation by Bernard Marck. Tallandier, 2005.
The Eagle Aloft: Two centuries of the balloon in America by Tom Crouch. Smithsonian, 1983.
First to Fly by Sherwood Harris. Simon & Schuster, 1970.
500 fahrten im freiballon by Hugo Von Abercron. R. C. Schmidt & Co., 1929.
Heroes of the Air: A book for boys by Claude Grahame-White and Harry Harper. Oxford University Press, 1918.
J. M. Barrie and the Lost Boys by Andrew Birkin. Constable, 1979.
Learning to Fly: A practical manual for beginners by Claude Grahame-White and Harry Harper. Macmillan, 1916.
Maria Chapdelaine: A Tale of the Lake St. John Community by Louis Hémon. Kessinger, 2004.
Memories by Harry Preston. Constable, 1928.
Notable Flying Men by the staff of The Motor. Temple Press, 1910.
Pionniers de l’aviation by Louis Blériot. Hachette, 2004.
The Romance of Ballooning by Edita Lausanne. Viking Press, 1971.
Skycraft by Augustus Post. Oxford University Press, 1930.
The Story of the Aeroplane by Claude Grahame-White. J. B. Lippincott, 1911.
The Story of the Airship by Hugh Allen. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, 1931.
Unlocking the Sky by Seth Shulman. HarperCollins, 2002.
A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR
Chasing Icarus is Gavin Mortimer’s sixth book. His most recent, The Great Swim, was published in 2008 by Walker. He has also written numerous books for children and contributed articles to a wide range of publications.
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
The Great Swim
Copyright © 2009 by Gavin Mortimer
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First U.S. edition 2009
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