In a Cage

Like lions in a cage, 70 airplanes made to fly were wheeled last week into Convention Hall in Detroit. In a day, 30,000 persons came to the All-American Aircraft Show to see and marvel. Some stayed to buy, for this was a business show, with salesmen talking turkey, not an exhibition of good will.

As always, business was stimulated by the spectacular. Spread out over the waspish little ship in which Bleriot first flew across the English Channel, stood the huge trimotored plane in which Commander Richard E. Byrd hopes to conquer the Antarctic. Opposite stood a model of the first Wright machine, in which man first made an honest flight a quarter of a century ago.

Beside the huge Fokker in which Byrd flew over the North Pole, the Josephine Ford, stood the yellowed Pride of Detroit, one of three trim Stinson planes, in which William Brock and Edward Schlee flew from Newfoundland to Japan, almost three-quarters of the way around the world.

This might have been an automobile show. Glib salesmen talked of beauty of line, color, luxury of appointments. Wise-appearing men and smiling women climbed into the cabin of the comfortable Fairchild ship, sat in the becurtained and be-flowered parlor of the Fokker Super-universal, peeked into the baggageroom and the lavatory boasted by the Loening Amphibian. Army and Navy officers inspected the two Corsairs done in navy blue and silver by Chance Vought. Mail pilots peeked at the streamlined Bellanca, made for speed flying. Collegians assembled about the first plane built with a rumble seat. . . .

Designers and builders trod on each other's toes: Anthony H. G. Fokker, Sherman M. Fairchild, B. F. Mahoney, Igor Sikorsky. The operators of 15 air lines met and discussed business. All were out for business, the Pioneer Instrument Company even sending along a "Flying Showcase."

Public interest exceeded the most optimistic hopes. Long before 10 o'clock, when the doors were opened, there were lines waiting to get in. The giant Sikorsky, moored off the Detroit Yacht Club because it was too big to get into Convention Hall, was constantly surrounded. Most amazing of all, men and women seemed to understand and a few got out their checkbooks.