Harry N. Atwood Cross Country Flight Record – 1911
Harry N. Atwood, (1883 – 1967)
The following article appeared in The Washington Times, June 30, 1911, page 10.
ATWOOD FLIES 107 MILES WITH PASSENGER TO SEE REGATTA
Aviator Harry Atwood
NEW LONDON, June 30. – Harry N. Atwood, the boy aviator, with a passenger, made a flight of 107 miles in order to witness the Harvard-Yale rowing regatta today.
Leaving the Harvard aviation field at Squantum Mass., at 7:05, he crossed the states of Massachusetts and Connecticut and arrived at his destination at 9:10 o’clock.
With weather conditions ideal all the way, he covered the 107 miles in 125 minutes, an average of a fraction over 51:56 miles an hour.
Atwood broke the American record for a single flight across country, and established a world’s mark for passenger carrying flight across country.
One hundred thousand visitors who jammed into New London and were ready to leave for the race course, forgot all about college rooting and cheered themselves hoarse when Atwood circled twice around the Groton monument, directly across the Thames River from the New Haven Railroad station, passed over the big drawbridge, and flew over the two-mile course at a speed which the waiting oarsmen at Red Top and Gales ferry envied.
The Yale and Harvard crews for the moment turned loose all their enthusiasm and cheered the daring aviator.
Secretary of the Navy Meyer and party aboard the Untied States dispatch boat Dolphin applauded Atwood wildly and the great fleet of yachts on both sides of the race course tied down their whistles and fired salute after salute from their cannon.
After passing the Dolphin, Atwood picked out the west bank of the river for a landing place. He volplaned from a height of 1,000 feet in two magnificent sweeps and landed lightly on the ground in Riverside park to the south of the drawbridge.
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Atwood would break his own record thirty days later when he flew from Boston to New York, a distance of 139 miles. This trip received much more attention by the press than the one to New London.
Click on image to enlarge.
A vintage postcard view of Harry N. Atwood and his airplane.
On December 20, 1911, Atwood made another record breaking flight from Massachusetts to Rhode Island.
He left Point of Pines near Lynn, Massachusetts, at 10: 55 a. m. and landed on the water of Narragansett Bay near the Edgewood Yacht Club in Cranston at 1:40 p.m., having covered a distance of 130 miles. He’d followed the coastline during his trip having passed over Boston Harbor , Hingham, and the Massachusetts’ south shore along the eastern shore of Cape Cod Bay. He then passed over the Cape Cod Canal and was later seen over Horseneck Beach in Westport before passing over Little Compton, Rhode Island, and the Seaconnet River. He then headed northward towards Narragansett Bay.
He’d used 12 galloons of gasoline during his flight and by the time he’d landed the tank was nearly empty. He was met by a reception committee in a boat which towed him to shore.
It was reported that he was suffering from the cold having flown at altitudes of 2,000 and 3,000 feet in the cold December air.
Source: (Woonsocket, R. I.), Evening Call, December 21, 1911, page 5.
