Word: bellanca
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...ship, sat in the becurtained and be-flowered parlor of the Fokker Super-universal, peeked into the baggageroom and the lavatory boasted by the Loening Amphibian. Army and Navy officers inspected the two Corsairs done in navy blue and silver by Chance Vought. Mail pilots peeked at the streamlined Bellanca, made for speed flying. Collegians assembled about the first plane built with a rumble seat...
Picturesque Bert Acosta, who later flew to France with Byrd, and ill-starred Lloyd Bertaud, who later was lost attempting the flight to Rome in Old Glory, were favored by Mr. Levine. Col. Chamberlin got the job because Inventor Giuseppe M. Bellanca, designer of the Columbia, said he flew well no matter how he filmed and weighed a lot less than either Acosta or Bertaud...
...Inventor Bellanca holds Col. Chamberlin's unqualified admiration. He reveals that Bellanca was spurned by the War Department in 1917 and 1918 when he offered to build a bombing plane, powered with two Liberty motors, that would have a speed of 183 miles an hour fully loaded with bombs, machine guns, and crew. The Government laughed at this Sicilian dreamer, although he always lived up to his promises. Incidentally, the plans still exist today and Col. Chamberlin believes that the ship, if built, would "outperform any bombing plane now in the possession of the Army or Navy...
Others recognized Bellanca's merit. Col. Chamberlin reports that Lindbergh tried to buy the Columbia from Mr. Levine and the Wright Company, which supplied the motor. Both refused to sell, satisfied that his attempt to fly to Paris alone and in a land machine was "suicide...
Clarence Duncan Chamberlin was twice displeased last week by leaks. A fuel pump failed on his Bellanca plane and brought him and his companion Roger Q. Williams down to earth. Soon they went up again, circled, idled, wandered back and forth, wasting time, waiting. A tiny hole drained tiny drops from their gas tank. They came back to earth again 51 hours, 52 minutes, 24 seconds later, defeated by this tiny hole. They failed by half an hour and seven seconds to supplant the German world's record (TIME, Aug. 15) for endurance flying...