AEROPLANE DISTANCE AND SPEED RECORDS. The aeroplane devel oped increased speed in successive years as a result of improved construction and design and especially of improvements in engine-building. A speed of 61 miles per hour was the greatest reached up to 1910, when this speed was at tained in a Bleriot monoplane. This record was surpassed the following year when Weymann attained a speed of 78.7 miles per hour in a Nieuport monoplane. A speed of 100 miles per hour, the goal foryears of designers and engineers, was reached and passed in 1912, when Vedrines, in a Deperdussin machine, made the record speed of 107.4 miles per hour over a distance of 124 miles. This record was not to remain long unsurpassed for in 1913 Maurice Prevost made new records for all dis tances from 10 to 200 kilometers (6.2 to 124 miles), when, at the Bennett cup competition at Rheims, he traversed the 200-kilometer course (124 miles) in 59 minutes 45 3/5 sec onds, making an average speed of 126.5 miles per hour. This speed was made in a Deper dussin monoplane with a 160 horse-power Gnome motor.
In 1914 M. Garaix, in a Schmitt biplane, piloted four passengers a distance of 26.58 miles at the rate of 67.28 miles per hour; five passengers 12.5 miles at the rate of 67.28 miles, and six passengers a distance of 31 miles at the rate of 66.85 miles per hour.
In 1913 Deroye, in a Bleriot monoplane, made a non-stop flight of 486.87 miles, and in
April 1914 Garaix, with six passengers, covered a distance of 68.3 miles without alighting.
The European War completely paralyzed competitive aviation, aeroplanes being com mandeered for military purposes and aviators pressed into army service, and there were no records accepted by the International Aviation Federation during 1915, 1916 or 1917. Several important flights were made, however, of winch the following are the most noteworthy: On 20 June 1916 Lieut. A. Marechal of the French army made a non-stop flight of 812 miles, starting from Nancy, France, and alight ing at Chlom, Poland. On 3 November of the same year Victor Carlstrom flew from Erie, Pa., to New York city (515 miles) in 4 hours 11 minutes, and on the 19th of the same month Miss Ruth Law set out from Chicago on a flight to New York, reaching Hornell, N. Y., 590 miles from Chicago, in 5 hours 45 minutes; on the following day she completed the re maining 294 miles of the journey in 3 hours 10 minutes and 35 seconds. On 11 Dec. 1917 Miss Katharine Stinson established a new record by flying from San Diego to San Fran cisco, a distance of 610 miles, in 9 hours and 10 minutes, the longest non-stop flight hitherto made in America.