SKY-WRITING

Greymouth Evening Star, 22 July 1927, Page 8

SKY-WRITING

NOVEL PUBLICITY STUNTS. LONDON, June 2. “He left the earth to the creeping things and wrote his name in the sky,” though said as long ago as 1913 of another and equally daring airman, is a sentence that might well be applied to Major John Clifford Savage, one of the few men in the world who has specialised in what is known as “sky-writ-ing.” He does this by means of an aeroplane, and his inscriptions, which are traced in smoke at an altitude of thousands of feet, consist of letters each of which is at least half a mile across.

It was Major Savage’s intention to visit Australia this year, there to give an illustration of his art. Pressure of business engagements, however, forbade this; but he hopes to make the journey next year at the latest. He tells me that he lias just returned from a trip to Germany, where he successfully fulfilled the first contract for sky-writing for commercial firms in that quarter of the globe. Although he was advertising only one commodity, he carried out. during the few weeks lie was there, double the volume of work he has done in England; and he is very well satisfied with the results. It, is a. coincidence that, contemporaneously with Major Savage’s return to England, Messrs Selwyn and Blound have just published Arnold Palmer’s “Straphangers,” an attractive series of London sketches, reprinted for the most part from “The Sphere.” One of the best, printed for the first time, is “The Sky-Writer,” which deals so interestingly with Major Savage’s work, that it is well worth quoting here. I first met Major Savage some two years ago, in an assemblage of cheery sportsmen who, after an aerial demonstration, were crowding the little wooden office labelled “Sky-writing.” which constitutes his office at Hendon aerodrome. It nestles in the lee of a hangar which moans and rattles in the wind as if it were itself anxious to take flight.

ADVERTISEMENTS ON THE SKY. Here let Mr Palmer take up the tale: — “This office and this hanger,” he writes, “house a business which is the only one of its kind in the world—the business of writing advertisements in the sky. Major Savage, after twelve years of experimental work, in 1922, succeeded in using the sky as a slate for the first time. The place chosen for the introductory display was Epsom Downs, the day Derby Day, and in tellin'g you that Captain Cuttie won the race I am telling you something that, sky-writers themselves don’t know, even yet. They had a big gamble that, day—a lot of money 12 years’ income, a bet out of all proportion to any other bet booked in the enclosures. . . The result of this first effort was a contract with the ‘Daily Mail.’ Encouraged, but not satisfied, Major Savage, with two machines, two pilots, and a few’mechanics, sailed for New York late that year in search of a new continent and a new climate.

“All the sky-writing in the world has always been done by British pilots in British machines. They have worked, for various manufacturers in the air of France, Holland, Belgium, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Cuba, and Canada, as well as the States. “The little party reached New York late in 1922. In a few days’ time, a machine ascended during the lunchhour and wrote, straight above the Wall-street district, ‘Hello, U.S.A.!’ The sensation was profound, the results negligible. Everybody talked of it, but nobody knew what to make of it. Throughout the following morning Captain Turner (who had made the Derby Day ascent, and was thus the first to sign the sky in two hemispheres) waited beside his machine while his companions wooed the shy Inspiration.

“The idea, when it came, sent the machine rising, again at luncheon time, and spelling out, ‘Call Van 7100.’ This is the number of the Vanderbilt Hotel, where the other two Englishmen were waiting in their room. Presently, their telephone rang.

60 TELEPHONE LINES BLOCKED,

Someone wanted to know why he should call that number. Half an hour was spent in answering someone’s as fast as possible, and then there was a knock at the door. A lady entered. She explained that she was in charge of the hotel telephonic room. She said that the entire sixty lines at her disposal were blocked by people ringing up in response to Captain Turner’s invitation; that no other guest in the hotel could give or receive a message; and that all the bulbs on her board were blazing so fiercely that unless the apparatus blew up beneath the strain, her operators would lose their eyesight. “About ten minutes later the calls ceased, as if by magic. The manager had instructed the operators to deal with the inevitable, ‘What’s it all about?’ by replying, ‘Vanderbilt Hotel. Dinner dance in the Della -Robbia room every Thursday. Three dollars a head. Book your table.’ ” Mr Palmer goes on to describe how Major Savage secured a contract of 350,000 dollars (£70,000) from a tobacco company for giving 350 displays all over the States. In all, quarter of million miles were flown, and the consumption of the brand of cigarettes which was aerially advertised had increased from 24 to 32 millions a day. “The writing of words in the sky, ’ continues Mr Palmer, “is not, as flying jobs go, a dangerous one, for the reason that it can be attempted only in a calm, clear atmosphere. In England, a sky message, on the stillest summer day, will not be legible for more than ten minutes after completion, whereas on a good day in America, the letters will re-main stationary and clear for an hour.” (In Australia, under favourable conditions, the period of legibility should be at least as long as in America —for Australia is the airman’s paradise). “The work is carried out at an altitude of from nine to twelve thousand feet .... In a steady gale the message though becoming elongated, will be more enduring than in a gentle yet puffy breeze. “The machines employed are singleseater fighting machines, fitted with a cylinder (i.e., the inkpot, containing in liquid form the material for writing) and two large absestos-covered pipes, like a racing car’s exhaust down which the ‘ink’ travels on its way to the air and conversion into smoke. The flow *of ‘ink’ is regulated by a knob in front of the pilot. The difficulty lies in knowing and controlling the precise line of flight: Many of the spelling manoeuvres are actually fight-

ing manoeuvres; and as all the letters have to be made backwards, and are illegible to the writer, his success depends on the precision of his calculations and skill in carrying them out. PRACTICE WITH A BICYCLE. “To accustom himself to the formation, in reverse shape, of hidden letters by means of manipulating a mechanical vehicle, the novice practices on an ordinary bicycle with a kettleful of whitewash, such as is used for marking out tennis courts, tied on behind. The letter presenting most difficulty to the sky-writer is the small ‘b,’ and the second most difficult is the small ‘c.’ “When Ihe aviator is sufficiently advanced to practice the actual writing in the sky, his early writing is very slow and large, the letters frequently measuring a mile or more across. Speed and smallness are the signs of the heavenly artist. He flies at 80 to 120 miles an hour, and his- letters (capitals excepted) are never more than half a mile across. Writing the same words, he gains in. facility as the weeks or months go by. Even a highly proficient writer like Captain Lingham found himself able to reduce gradually from twelve to four minutes the time required to ginger up heaven on the question of its morning newspaper. Mr Palmer’s sketch concludes with an account of the dreadful contretemps which befel a sky-writer who was practising his art above a country club at North London. He felt, rather than saw, that something was going wrong; and, by the time he had completed the fourth letter, he deemed it wise to descend and investigate. He found everybody pointing upwards, except those who were huddling ladies into the building—for “white, fleecy, motionless, and, to his agonised eyes, the size of Europe, floated perfect in every detail, a common, low, vulgar—in fact, a very rude word, indeed.”— (“Sydney Sun” correspondent).