The Airship Boys’ Ocean Flyer
OR
New York to London in Twelve Hours
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Aeroplane Boys Series
By ASHTON LAMAR
I. IN THE CLOUDS FOR UNCLE SAM
Or, Morey Marshall of the Signal Corps.
II. THE STOLEN AEROPLANE
Or, How Bud Wilson Made Good
III. THE AEROPLANE EXPRESS
Or, The Boy Aeronaut’s Grit.
IV. THE BOY AERONAUTS’ CLUB
Or, Flying For Fun.
V. A CRUISE IN THE SKY
Or, The Legend of the Great Pink Pearl.
VI. BATTLING THE BIG HORN
Or, The Aeroplane in the Rockies.
OTHER TITLES TO FOLLOW
These stories are the newest and most up-to-date. All Aeroplane details
are correct. Fully illustrated. Colored frontispiece. Cloth, 12mos.
Price, 60 cents each.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Airship Boys Series
By H. L. SAYLER
I. THE AIRSHIP BOYS
Or, The Quest of the Aztec Treasure.
II. THE AIRSHIP BOYS ADRIFT
Or, Saved by an Aeroplane.
III. THE AIRSHIP BOYS DUE NORTH
Or, By Balloon to the Pole.
IV. THE AIRSHIP BOYS IN THE BARREN LANDS
Or, The Secret of the White Eskimos.
V. THE AIRSHIP BOYS IN FINANCE
Or, The Flight of the Flying Cow.
VI. THE AIRSHIP BOYS’ OCEAN FLYER
Or, New York to London in Twelve Hours.
These thrilling stories deal with the wonderful new science of aerial
navigation. Every boy will be interested and instructed by reading them.
Illustrated. Cloth binding. Price, $1.00 each.
The above books are sold everywhere or will be sent
postpaid on receipt of price.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration: IN THE PILOT ROOM OF THE _FLYER_.]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Airship Boys’
Ocean Flyer
or, New York to London
in Twelve Hours
BY
H. L. SAYLER
[Illustration]
Illustrated by S. H. Riesenberg
Chicago
The Reilly & Britton Co.
Publishers
------------------------------------------------------------------------
COPYRIGHT, 1911,
by
THE REILLY & BRITTON CO.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
THE AIRSHIP BOYS’ OCEAN FLYER
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE MAKING OF A NEWSPAPER STORY 9
II WHAT A REPORTER SAW IN THE DARK 23
III THE VETERAN TAKES OFF HIS HAT TO THE CUB 36
IV THE AIRSHIP BOYS MAKE THEIR APPEARANCE 51
V A BEWILDERING PROPOSITION 67
VI AN OLD HOME AND A MODERN BUSINESS 83
VII NED NAPIER ADVANCES SOME THEORIES 97
VIII THE _Ocean Flyer_ CREW IS COMPLETED 113
IX DUTIES OF THE _Ocean Flyer_ CREW 127
X BUCK STEWART RECEIVES NEW ORDERS 141
XI SHAPING A NEW COURSE 156
XII HOW THE FLIGHT WAS TO BE MADE 168
XIII ROY OSBORNE’S “PICK-UP CRANE” 182
XIV CAPTAIN NAPIER’S NERVE IN MID-AIR SAVES THE 196
CARGO
XV IN WHICH NED’S LIFE IS SAVED 210
XVI AN UNEXPECTED TRIBUTE 224
XVII WHAT HAPPENED AT THREE FORTY-THREE P. M. 237
XVIII THE RACING PIGS OF FUNDY 252
XIX A CHANGE OF PLANS BY WIRELESS 269
XX THE FIRST SIGHT OF LONDON 284
XXI THE MARBLE ARCH GATE, HYDE PARK 298
XXII EXTRACTS FROM THE LOG OF THE _Ocean Flyer_ 312
------------------------------------------------------------------------
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
In the pilot room of the _Flyer_ _Frontispiece_
In the “local room” of the New York 45
Herald
Picking up the matrices 206
The end of the flight, London 305
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The
Airship Boys’ Ocean Flyer
OR,
New York to London in Twelve Hours
CHAPTER I
THE MAKING OF A NEWSPAPER STORY
It was a few minutes of eleven o’clock at night. One of the many
editions of the great New York _Herald_ had just gone to press. But in
the big, half-lit room where editors, copy readers, reporters and
telegraph operators were busy on the later editions to follow, there was
no let-up in the work of making a world-known newspaper.
There was the noise of many persons working swiftly; the staccato of
typewriters, the drone of telegraph sounders and now and then the sharp
inquiry of some bent-over copy reader as he struggled to turn
reportorial inexperience into a finished story. But there was no
confusion and none of the wild rush and clatter that fiction uses in
describing newspaper offices; copy boys were not dashing in all
directions and the floor was not knee deep with newspapers and print
paper.
Calmest of all was the night city editor. With a mind full of the work
already done and in progress, he was as alert mentally as if he had just
reached his desk. Five hours yet remained in which New York had to be
watched; five hours, in any one minute of which the biggest news on hand
might fade into nothing in the face of the one big story that every
editor waits for night after night. And the night city editor, knowing
this, dropped his half-lit pipe when his desk telephone buzzed.
“Stewart? Yes! Yes!” he answered quickly in a voice so low that not even
his busy assistants heard him. “Where are you? What are you doing?”
“In Newark,” came the quick response, “and we landed it. It’s a peach.
That aeroplane tip you know. It panned out all right.”
The night city editor had seemed perplexed for a few moments but at this
his face cleared.
“How big? What’s new?”
“Biggest airship ever made; biggest planes; biggest engines—cabin and
staterooms; two hundred miles an hour—”
“See it yourself?”
“Been workin’ in the factory three days; American Aeroplane Works; got
story cinched. Machine flew to-night first time. It’s a beat.”
“Got talks?”
“Not straight, but I’ve heard ’em talkin’.”
“What’s the idea? Is it a war ship?”
“Got everything but that. Will some one take it by phone? I can get to
the office quarter after twelve; got some stuff ready.”
“Who’s back of it? Whose machine is it?”
“Aerial Utilities Company; those Chicago boys, Napier and Hope and their
friends.”
The editor thought a moment, glanced at the clock on the wall where the
hands pointed to eleven and then said:
“If you can be here by a quarter after twelve, hurry in. If you can’t
make it, phone. Get up all the stuff you can. Are Napier and Hope at the
factory?”
“They made a test to-night. I know where they went. I was outside the
yard. They were gone from ten o’clock till ten twenty-five; were all
over New York and forty miles to sea. It—”
“Grab the eleven fifty express and hustle in,” interrupted the man at
the telephone. “It’s good stuff and’ll stand a couple o’ columns.”
Hanging up the receiver, the night city editor settled back in his
chair, finished lighting his pipe and then, his head leaning in his
clasped hands, seemed to be in a reverie. But this did not last long.
While he had talked to “Stewart in Newark” three young men had hurried
to his desk and laid on it stories or parts of stories on which they had
been working. These reporters were now standing a few feet away awaiting
further orders or dismissal for the night.
“Dick,” exclaimed the editor as he suddenly unclasped his hands, leaned
forward over his desk again and shuffled the copy on it into a little
bundle, “we’ll want about two and a half columns in the last edition.”
As he spoke, a middle-aged man in his shirt sleeves—for the night was
mid-June—leaned backward from a near-by big table at which a dozen men
were busy cutting, rewriting and pasting copy, and took the little
bundle of manuscript from his superior’s hands.
The waiting reporters groaned inwardly. They knew that this was probably
the death warrant for their own evening’s work. Dick, the man addressed,
asked nothing and made no inquiry. He knew that something big had turned
up. As head copy reader the securing of this “something” was no business
of his. Nor did the nature of it stir his calloused curiosity. His
orders were to save two and a half columns of space and this he would
do. When the story came, he and his assistants would see that it was two
and a half columns long and no more.
But this was not the attitude of the three reporters yet waiting near
the editor’s desk. This man was no longer in a reverie. In those few
minutes he had “blocked out” his big story; he already saw it in print
and, unlike Dick, he was now ready to go after it.
“Anything more, Mr. Latimer?” asked one of the reporters eagerly, for
each of them had now scented a “beat” and all, forgetting the probable
fate of their earlier evening’s work, were eager to be in on it.
Mr. Latimer arose and without reply hurried away in the direction of the
night editor’s desk. When he returned, his pipe now sputtering
viciously, he called: “Dick, make that two columns.” Then he turned
toward the still lingering reporters. They moved to his desk, each
trying to attract special attention.
“Chambers,” said Mr. Latimer to the youngest of the trio, “get
Governor’s island on the phone and see if they’ll put you on Colonel
Fred Grant’s wire. If you can’t raise him by phone go down to the Ship
News office and have the boys take you over in the boat. We want a good
talk with him on this idea: What military prestige will it give the
country that is the first to perfect an airship that can travel two
hundred miles an hour—an aeroplane that can actually carry men and
bombs? Point out that this means across the Atlantic in fifteen hours.
Make him talk new stuff, practical, and cut out the Jules Verne patter.”
Chambers, young and inexperienced, hurried away without a question,
knowing well enough that this interview was to fit into another story
and that it was his business to get it, and the earlier the better.
“Glidden,” said the night city editor, turning to the oldest reporter of
the three, “didn’t you write a Sunday story a few weeks ago on ‘The
Limit of the Automobile’?”
“Yes, sir,” was the prompt reply of the pleased young journalist.
“Have you some ideas on the possibilities of the aeroplane?”
“I have,” was the prompt reply. If Glidden had gone further he would
have added, “I’m getting up another story on that line now.”
“That’s good,” broke in Mr. Latimer. “We’re going to print a big
aeroplane story in the morning. I want a ‘lead.’ The man on the story
can’t write it. I can’t tell you anything except that this story
concerns the first real airship. Give me half a column of what a real
aeroplane ought to do—”
“It ought to go ten miles up in the air,” broke in Glidden impulsively
as if anxious to demonstrate that he really had some ideas, “and the
time will come when the flying machine will stay in the air more than
five days. It will carry fifty people, cross the Atlantic or Pacific and
sail two hundred miles an hour—”
“That’s enough,” laughed the editor. “Our machine does two hundred
miles. Go to it.”
Glidden, who should have had Stewart’s assignment on the aeroplane
story, wanted to ask more but he was too wise to do so. A few minutes
later he was back at his typewriter, nervous and excited over the part
he was to take in the making of the next morning’s “beat.”
The work of the third man was better known to Mr. Latimer.
“Winton,” he began as if sure that his orders would be carried out to
the letter, “you’ve heard of the Airship Boys—those Chicago youngsters
who have been starring in aeronautics for several years?”
“I know Bob Russell personally,” answered Winton. “He’s the newspaper
man from Kansas City who has been with the boys in all their stunts.”
“Did he ever work in New York?” inquired Mr. Latimer.
“I think not. I believe he’s in business with the Airship Boys. Used to
work on the Kansas City _Comet_.”
“Couldn’t get hold of him?”
“If it’s about some new project of these boys,” laughed Winton, “it’s
not worth while. They’re all clams concerning their own affairs.”
“But is this the outfit that interested Mr. Morgan in the Universal
Transportation Company last summer?”
“I never worked on the story except once when I tried to get Russell to
talk and couldn’t. They had a suite of offices in the Waldorf last
July.”
“Call the Waldorf and see what you can find.”
Five minutes later Winton was back at Mr. Latimer’s desk.
“Five or six persons connected with the Aerial Utilities Company had
apartments and offices in the hotel until the middle of last August.
Then the offices were moved to Chicago. There seems to be a group of
these people, all interested in aeroplanes on a big scale and their
headquarters I think are in Chicago.”
Mr. Latimer touched a button and hastily wrote a note.
“Hand this to the telegraph editor,” he said to the messenger as he gave
him this message:
“_Craig, Tribune, Chicago. Rush anything on Aerial Utilities Company,
organization and business. Also matter concerning Airship Boys, Napier,
Hope and Russell._”
Then he turned to Winton again.
“Story in to-night about those boys and a big aeroplane. Napier and Hope
and maybe Russell are not in Chicago, but somewhere in Newark. Their
newest idea was manufactured by the American Aeroplane Company in
Newark. Call the works on a chance; like as not you won’t find any one
there. Look up the head of the company. Raise him on the phone. If he
won’t talk about the new airship make him tell you where the Airship
Boys are. Try the hotels by phone. Must have something about these young
men. The man on the story missed a talk with ’em.”
Winton rushed to the telephone room and Mr. Latimer, with another glance
at the clock, put the Newark “beat” aside for a moment while he gave his
attention to the accumulating copy received from the local news bureau
and late evening assignment men. With instructions for each, he had
“covered” an East Side tenement fire by rushing four men to the scene
and had personally called up and talked to a leading financier on a
financial story when Winton returned.
“J. W. Atkinson is president of the Aeroplane Company,” Winton reported.
“No one at works. Got Atkinson on phone. He won’t talk but acknowledges
Airship Boys are in Newark. Won’t say where. Can’t find ’em at hotels.”
Without answering, the night city editor turned to his telephone.
“Get me the Newark office,” he ordered. “Nathan, if he’s there. Go to
the library,” he added, speaking to Winton, “and dig up a story on these
kids. There’s plenty there. Get half a column. See if we have any
pictures.”
While Winton hurried away on his new task, the telephone rang.
“Newark?” asked Mr. Latimer. “Is that Nathan?”
“Mr. Nathan’s out eatin’ supper,” replied a juvenile voice.
“Go get him. Tell him this. Ready? Put down J. W. Atkinson. Got it? J.
W. Atkinson, president American Aeroplane Company. Tell Nathan to see
Mr. Atkinson at his home and find where Ned Napier and Alan Hope can be
found. Put the names down: Ned Napier and Alan Hope.”
“I know ’em,” interrupted the youthful voice. “Them’s the Airship Boys.”
“Tell Nathan not to leave Mr. Atkinson until he learns where those boys
are stopping: where they are in Newark. Got it?”
These events had taken place within fifteen minutes. At ten minutes
after eleven Mr. Latimer again put the Newark story aside temporarily
and gave all his time to rounding up his part of the next edition. At
eleven thirty o’clock Glidden, who was to provide the material for a
general “lead” to the big “beat”—none of the details of which he even
knew, turned in five hundred words. Mr. Latimer paused in his other work
and glanced hastily at the pages. Then he looked at the clock, leaned
back in his chair and read each page.
“Good stuff,” he announced without even a smile as he finished. “That’s
the idea; just what I wanted. Stewart is coming in from Newark with the
story a quarter after twelve. Get your supper and be back by that time.
I want you to help him shape up his stuff. Chambers and Winton will have
‘adds’ to the story.”
A quarter of an hour later Winton reported with his sketch of the
Airship Boys. His superior did not read the matter—he was sure enough of
Winton—but spiked it with Glidden’s copy.
“No pictures,” explained the reporter, “except one in the _Scientific
American_ of last July showing working drawings of a steel monoplane—the
one they used in the New York-Chicago flight.”
“Get it and take it to the picture man. Tell him to make a two-column
cut of it. No pictures of the young men?”
“Not on file.”
“That’s good,” said Mr. Latimer with his first smile of the evening.
“It’ll make a good ‘follow’ to-morrow. By the way, did you get a story
of these youngsters right up to date?”
“No,” answered the reporter, somewhat regretfully, “I couldn’t find
anything about them after their record flight in a steel monoplane
between New York and Chicago last July. I know they were in New York at
their Waldorf offices until August. But I can’t find anything about them
since that date. If they’ve got a new idea, they’ve had since last
August to work on it unmolested by the newspapers.”
Mr. Latimer was shaking his head as he refilled his pipe.
“Get your supper and hurry back. Stewart’ll be here in fifteen or twenty
minutes. Then we’ll see what we can all do to find out what they’ve been
doing since August. The story is gettin’ to look good.”
Winton was about to hasten away when his interest got the better of his
judgment and he violated one of the unwritten rules of the _Herald_
office: he questioned his superior.
“I know it isn’t my business, Mr. Latimer,” he began, hesitatingly, “but
didn’t Stewart say they have made a new machine that can fly two hundred
miles an hour?”
The night city editor nodded his head.
“And he has the details of the machine?”
“All of them,” replied the editor. “But he’s missed the main thing—the
story. What are they going to do with such a craft? Why should they test
it out in secret—under cover of night?”
“And that’s what we are trying to find out?” asked Winton, showing
confusion.
“Certainly,” was the response. “The mere account of a new aeroplane
isn’t worth two columns in the _Herald_. That’s only half the story. Its
purpose and possibility make the real story.”
Winton leaned over the desk, his face flushed.
“I know what those boys have done in the past,” he said in a low voice.
“There’s only one thing left for them to do now. If you can’t find them
and don’t know what that is I’ll make a guess for you: they’re going to
cross the Atlantic.”
“Certainly,” was Mr. Latimer’s response. “My own idea precisely. And
that is the story the _Herald_ is going to print in the morning.”
But the night city editor was wrong. The _Herald_ did not print such a
story in the morning, as will be set forth in the next chapter.