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Show ijwCDr FLIERS AND Business Up in the Air! At least five manufacturing companies com-panies are busy fixing up surplus army medium bombers as "flying offices" for business executives. They are adapting Douglas B-23s, Lockheed 12s and Lodestars and Cessnas into planes suitable for the business man who must fly 100,000 to 500,000 miles a year, and who is prepared to pay from $80,000 to $100,000 for his flying office. Representing a 40 per cent Increase In-crease over the largest previous air hop to Florida of aircraft limited to 125-horsepower or less, a total of 2,500 light planes or "puddle-jumpers" "puddle-jumpers" attended the annual Ail-American Ail-American air maneuvers at International Inter-national airport, Miami, in January. The show was a demonstration of the utility of private planes. Prices of two-passenger planes now on the market range from $1,500 to $3,000. Family This prediction is based on Civil Aeronautics administration figures. John C. Leslie, a system vice president of Pan American Airways, Air-ways, was technical advisor in charge of the historic flight of Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt to the Casablanca Casa-blanca conference. Leslie joined PAA in 1929. e Dr. William F. Durand, one of the original members of the national advisory committee for aeronautics appointed by Pres. Woodrow Wilson in 1915, was recalled by President Roosevelt to serve on the same board again In 1941. He resigned last October, Octo-ber, however, at the age of 86 years. One of the new types of planes has controls so simplified that beginners be-ginners have learned to fly it in less than three hours. To fly in any direction, the pilot has only to turn the steering wheel just as in an ! i .:-,. ' i ' - ' . j MARTIN 202 TRANSPORT . . . Four airlines, Pennsylvania Central, Eastern, Colonial, and Chicago and Southern, have placed orders for the new 30-passenger high-speed luxury liner known as Model 202. Cruising speed is near the 300-miie-an-hour mark. planes with room for four or ; five cost $3,000 to $5,000. One single-seater is priced at approximately ap-proximately $1,000. Skypilot a Pilot The Rev. Emerson Miller, pastor of St. Paul's Lutheran church, Davenport, Dav-enport, Iowa, started flying a little over a year ago and has now earned for himself the title of "Flying "Fly-ing Pastor." He flies a three-passenger cub-type plane to fulfill a busy schedule which includes conferences con-ferences in other cities. Last winter, win-ter, when the snow was too deep for other forms of transportation, the Reverend Miller had skis put on the plane and flew to Machusa, 111., to attend a board meeting of the Lutheran orphanage there. The chief limitation to flying is airfields. Of 17,000 incorporated incorpor-ated cities and towns In this country, only 3,000 now have airports. Cows Can't Fly! One of the largest manufacturers of light planes expects to make 60 per cent of its sales to farmers and ranchers. Many of them can find space on their own property for landing fields, use their barns or sheds for hangars. Planting seed, dusting crops and orchards and inspecting in-specting ranges and herds are only a few of the uses to which they can put aircraft. Before the war, airlines carried only 13 per cent as many passengers passen-gers as sleeper trains, but by 1955 they'll carry about half as many. automobile. It is a plane that won't go into a spin. As yet, only an expert pilot can handle a helicopter. The lowest priced helicopter is around $5,000. Surveys from Planes Such representative cities as Detroit, De-troit, Pittsburgh, Richmond, Lansing Lan-sing and Miami Beach have used aerial surveys in community and industrial planning. One midwest-em midwest-em city recently assured itself an additional major industry by providing pro-viding an aerial survey for a prospective pros-pective industrialist. "Aerial photographs pho-tographs provide an over-all picture of the community that cannot be obtained in any other way," the American Society of Planning Officials Offi-cials has pointed out. Even Grandpa Does It! Men of all ages are learning to fly airplanes. Recently an old gentleman of 73 showed up at one of the country's flying schools with written permission from his doctor to become a pilot. After 10 hours Instruction, he soloed and In doe course got his license! Flying Salesmen The practical use of planes by salesmen was recorded recently in the Mason County Democrat, Havana, Ha-vana, 111., which told of two salesmen sales-men flying to that town to do business busi-ness with the Bonnett hatchery. One of the salesmen, John Dahl-heimer, Dahl-heimer, is a representative of the Smith Incubator corporation of St. Louis and the other, Virgil Helgren, is sales manager for the Salsbury laboratories of Charles City, Iowa. |