MEN OF MARK IN THE WORLD TO-DAY

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 220, 17 September 1938, Page 5 (Supplement)

MEN OF MARK IN THE WORLD TO-DAY

"THERE have been many men urged on to daredevil feats by the rest for 6peed. Filled with, the wish to make new records on land, in the air and on water, they have risked, and in many oases lost, their lives in the quest that never ends. By their efforts the world has been able to learn much that has helped the development of cars, aeroplanes and boats. Such men have assisted progress and none of them more than Sir Malcolm Campbell, speed king on land and water. Few men can have led a more exciting life than Sir Malcolm Campbell. Frc.;i his schooldays he showed a love of adventure that was to take him to many strange parts of the world on errands as far apart as attempts on speed records and looking for buried treasure. Born on March 11, 1885, at Chislehurst in Kent, Malcolm Campbell wa* the eon of a wealthy London diamond merchant. He went to school in England, then in Germany and France. As a high-spirited boy he was often in trouble at schooL He walked through a -railway tunnel once as a dare, and, meeting a train in the middle, nearly paid for the escapade with his life. While he was in Germany during the time of the South African War he and a friend wondered how soldiers felt under fire. Campbell wanted to know, so the two lads got guns and stalked each other in a field, firing live ammunition. They soon knew how it felt to hear the whine of bullets just above their heads. The two boys set out to dig a cave in a hillside. One morning, just after Campbell had left the cave there was a landslide and hundreds of tons of earth and rock crashed down on the place where he had been digging a few minutes before —another narrow escape. School days over, young Campbell was placed by his father in the insurance business. He did very well in this work and ultimately became a ■ wealthy man. It was at this time that he first felt the real craving for speed, although he had taken part in bicycle races in Germany. The first experience of speed was a motor cycle and he had many adventures with this ancient machine. One accident resulted in his being thrown right over the top of a high wall and landing semi-conscious in somebody's back garden. Then came an event which startled the world. The famous Frenchman Bleriot flew across the English Channel. so Campbell decided to build an aeroplane. It cost him a great deal of money and his machine never rose more than a few feet in the air before burying its nose in the earth. Finally he decided to give up flying and he began to take an interest in racing ears. He won a good many race* at

—: Fort/ Years Of Land Speed Records:—

[ high speeds and was making a name for himself when the Great War broke out. The war had not been in progress long before Campbell joined the Hoyal Hying Corps and learned to fly. He was given the task of flying new machines to France and returning with those that had been condemned as dangerous or unfit for active service. Flying these warscarred machines was a dangerous business and gave the pilot plentv of thrills. Less than four years after the war Malcolm Campbell made his first big motoring record, reaching a speed of 136 miles an hour at Saltburn. He went on step by step until

at Daytona Beach, Florida, in 1928, he set a new mile record of 207 mile* an hour, actually reaching 220 mile* an hour at one part of the run. Within a mouth this record was beaten by an American, so Campbell made plans to go one better. In a search - for a suitable surface on which to make new records, he visited Denmark, America, the Sahara desert and South Africa. He decided on South Africa, choosing the bed of a dried up lake where there was a surface of sun-baked clay. Her had a new car, the Blue Bird, sj>ecially built. The work of preparing the lake bed proved difficult and an army of natives had to be employed picking

No. XI:-Speed King On Land And Water; SIR MALCOLM CAMPBELL

18W— P uat 3924 1904—Bara* 104.53 1927— H. O. R hfnn .... 208.Ttl 65 79 1905—A. Mardonald 104.65 1928—M. Campbell 200.096 lws_Komni!fr 1905— H. L. Bowden 109.75 1928—Ray Seech 207.882 lW—inrt?,* - 6KO 1»0«—F Marriott 127.659 1929— H. O. D. Be*rave 281.362 l^o 7 ! nnrlt. 'T l3 1910— B. Oldfleld 131.724 1931—M. Campbell 245.788 l'<;— s f--l 1911— B. Buruian 141.723 1932—M Campbell 258.968 l««,4_w K- .„> iV 'H 7 1919— K. de Palma 149.875 1933—8ir M. Campbell 272.108 1504-Ki™ii; Vanderbllt •••• ?-'•»« 1920— T. Milton 156.046 1935— Sir M. Campbell 276.81« i i-nL f' Ur. 9 2 20 1925—M. Campbell 160.766 1935—Mir M. Campbell 804.811 l!»o4—ifUr fl n ' * , 97 2 S 1926— J. G. parry Thomas .. 168.076 1937—0. K. T. Kyston 811.42 Hifcolly 103.56 1926— J. G. Parry Thomas ... 170.624 1988— O. K. T. Kyston 845.49 J927—M. Campbell 174.224

up thousands of stoma and levelling hummocks to prepare t smooth surface. At length *11 was ready and the great driver made his dash. He reached a speed of 224 miles an hour end set new records for the five miles end five kilometres distance, but did not manege to break the mile record

of 231.3 milc» an hour, made by Segrave only * month before. . Campbell returned to England disappointed, but had the Blue Bird completely overhauled and took it to Daytona Beach, where Segrave'* record had been made, for an attempt to beat it. In a trial run on February 2, 1981, he reached 240 miles an hour, and three daye later he made the official attempt, beating the record by 14 miles an hour. He also drove a "baby" car at 04.001 miles an hour, thus achieving his ambition to plaeu British cars, big and little, first in the world for speed. For this great effort, Campbell was knighted, but he was not prepared to reat on hia laurels. In 1032, 1033 and twice in 1035 he broke his own record. On the la«t occasion be waa the first man to travel over the ground at 300 in ilea an hour, setting a new mark of 304.311 milea an hour. There was not much left to be done on land, so Sir Malcolm turned hi* attention to water. The water apeed record wai held by America, and be wanted that, too, for England. An attempt on thia record had killed Sir Henry Se grave, and the laat Englishman to hold it had been the famoii* Kaye Don five years before. Just a year ago, on Lake Maggiore, Sir Malcolm won the record for England. Hi* apeed boat, the Bfoe Bird, reached an average apeed over the meaaured mile, of 120.5 milea an hour, beating the previous record, held by Gar Wood, of America, by 4.04 milsa an hour.

Sir Malcolm's land speed record* have now been beaten by Captain (i. K. T. Kygton, who only a few week* npo reached the a«tounding *p®*d of 345.49 mile* an hour on the bed of an old salt lake in Utah. Tliii will not worry Sir Malcolm, because Gaptain Eyston is an Riißlishinan, and Sir Malcolm has said that the only thing that would tempt him out of his retirement would be if England last the record.

A list of land speed records over the last 40 years is given at the top of this page.