I am now beginning to see the advantages of the Blériot training. There is a great deal of preliminary work on or near the ground. In all other aviation training, such as at Newport News, 90 per cent of the work is in making landings—in piquéing down, redressing at the proper moment and making gradual connections with the earth. I haven’t made a really bad landing yet and the reason is that I have been in a machine so much on and near the ground, that I have sort of developed a sense or feel of it, and almost automatically redress correctly, and settle easily. Also I can tell pretty closely what is flying speed because of the work on the rollers. It’s the same way with all the other students only I know it now from my own experience.
And this morning I began to realize that my hundred minutes at Newport News was invaluable. I not only found out some of the tricks of a master hand (Carlstrom) but also developed a bit of confidence in the air, and air sense, without which I could have got into trouble this morning. My bumpy ride this morning is absolutely invaluable. I’ll probably never have so much trouble in the air again, because a fast machine or even a Blériot with a good motor, would hardly have noticed these puffs. It was a bit risky, I guess, or the head monitor would not have been worried, but now that it’s over, I know a lot more.
IV
August 11, 1917.
Dear ——[B]:
You have certainly developed into a wonderful correspondent. Honest-to-goodness, a letter you started my way about a month ago was quite the most satisfactory and amusing thing I’ve received since I’ve been over here. Based on practically no material, yet it was alive with interest, every line. There’s nothing like a finishing school education. If I thought that you could knit, I would immediately appoint you as my marraine (godmother), for it’s quite possible for one person to have more than one soldier and I am but a soldier of the second class in the French Army. As I understand it, the chief duty of a marraine is to write letters—you’ve started that in good style—and to knit wool scarfs, which the devoted soldier hands to a French peasant woman to unravel and make a pair of socks out of....
Many Yale boys have wandered in upon us of late, Alan Winslow, Wally Winter, George Mosely, and others. Also Chester Bassett, late of Washington and Harvard University, who I believe has the good fortune to be acquainted with you, a very recommendable young man. They tell me that Cord Meyer is aviating at some camp nearby, but, not having any machines, they have to spend their time touring the country in a high powered motor.
Had a long and gossipy letter from Pat the other day, containing details of many weddings and engagements, even unto young —— ——. All my classmates are doing the same stunt. How about being original and waiting until the war is over and seeing who of the competitors are left? I quite expect to be, but it’s luck I’m trusting to; there’s a lot of war left in the nations of Europe. One never can tell; I may come home on permission in a French uniform with a wing on my collar.... When the American Air Service is a little further along, it may be that we will be taken over from the French Army.