Appendix

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A NEEDLESS TRAGEDY (Author Unknown)

The Exposition authorities would now do well to consider whether they should rightly give their encouragement to aerial or other performances whose chief interest is derived from their danger. The tens of thousands of people who assembled to see Beachey’s sensational flights were attracted not by the skill of the performance, but by its peril.

If the peril had been abolished, the popular zest would have gone with it, and, that being so, it is hard to see that we have advanced very far since men fought with beasts in the Roman arena.

But, Aviation it may be said is the mark of human triumph over the forces of nature, and, as such, to be encouraged and rewarded by interest and applause. However generally true that may be, it is certainly not true of such tricks as looping-the-loop.Gymnastics of this kind have no conceivable value. Under no conditions could they be useful. They do not properly belong to Aviation and they are intended to do nothing but produce a thrill.

That Beachey would eventually be killed was absolutely certain. He was surely doomed from the moment when the intoxication of popular applause robbed him of his discretion. It’s said that he had discarded his biplane not because it was inefficient, but because it was safe. He chose a monoplane not because it was better, but because it was more dangerous and therefore more sensational.

Already, nine men have been killed in their efforts to imitate Beachey, and, had he been successful last Sunday, he would have given a fresh impetus to this insane competition. And, now it ought to stop! It is indecent! We cannot afford to demoralize large masses of people by the expectation of bloodshed. There is only a step between expectation and hope.

Aviation has certainly done nothing yet to justify it’s existence. So far, it has conferred no single benefit upon mankind, nor is there any positive promise that it will ever do so.

There are many thousands of air machines in existence, and practically every one among them has been dedicated to the destruction of life. Aviation has certainly given a new horror to war, but it ought not to be allowed to give a new horror to peace.

There will never be a check to any form of experimentation or adventure that is reasonably likely to result in human benefits, but to use a frightful and wanton peril to life as a mere bait for the assembly of a holiday making crowd is a barbarism, and a barbarism that ought not to be repeated.