IN HONOR OF THE ARMY AND AVIATION 



271 



is dependent on good 

 weather. They started 

 several times when the 

 weather conditions were 

 not satisfactory, and the 

 results, as you know, have 

 been several accidents. 

 But it is to be hoped that 

 in future, when more 

 garages have been built 

 and people are more care- 

 ful, such accidents will 

 not happen again. 



In former times there 

 were two names in Ger- 

 many whose bearers have 

 done much to promote the 

 cause of aviation. One is 

 Gottlieb Werner Daimler, 

 who constructed the first 

 light motor to be used in 

 airships. Without these 

 motors flying would have 

 been impossible. 



The other was Otto 

 Lilienthal, of whom I can 

 perhaps say a few words 

 without being afraid of 

 having it said by our dis- 

 tinguished fellow - guests 

 that I have been talking 

 nonsense. Otto Lilienthal 

 was one of the first ex- 

 perimenters who used a 

 flying machine. He con- 

 structed a very simple 

 machine with canvas and 

 wooden wings, and started 

 first to dart down hills, 

 and afterwards tried to 

 tiy through the air. These wings were 

 at first perfectly straight. But later on, 

 by observing the flight of birds and 

 continuing his experiments, he found 

 that it was necessary to curve these 

 wings ; and, after having made this ex- 

 periment, he managed successfully to fly 

 for several hundred yards. In one of 

 these flights he died. But he wrote many 

 essays on aviation, and I think I may say 

 that his essays have been read and have 

 been followed by the most successful 

 aviators of today. 



Now my knowledge about aviation is 



Photo by Prof. Robert W. Wood, Baltimore 



OTTO LILIENTHAL MAKING ONE OF HIS LAST GLIDING 



PLIGHTS 



really at an end. So I will sit down, 

 thanking you again most sincerely for 

 your kind invitation to spend this charm- 

 ing evening with you. 



THE TOAST ^ I ASTER, GEN. JOHN M. WILSON 



It has been my good fortune for the 

 last few hours to be sitting with the most 

 charming gentleman I have met for a 

 long while. He represents our neighbor 

 republic down along the Rio Grande — 

 the land of sun and flowers ; the land 

 whose mountains and hills are filled with 

 gold and silver and whose fertile valleys 



