On this day

1452 — Johann Gut-tenberg published the world’s first book, a Bible.1888 — “Jack the Ripper” murdered two women, Liz Stride and Kate Eddowes.1934 — The St Louis Cardinals clinched the pennant as Dizzy Dean won his 30th game of the year.1953 — WICS TV-20 began broadcasting. 1962 — James Mer-edith registered for classes at the Universi-ty of Mississippi, its first black student.

It’s hard to imagine what people must have felt seeing a machine that was obviously heavi-er than air soar through the sky and land softly on the ground in front of them. In 1910, it was likely the first time any-one between Chicago and Springfield had experi-enced such a sight.

On Sept. 29 of that year, thousands of people in Chicago, in the com-munities of Kankakee and Gilpin and Mount Pulaski, along the entire length of the route to Springfield and at the state fairgrounds, saw for the first time the incom-prehensible phenomenon of human flight. It was the unbelievable proved true.

On that day, Walter R. “Birdman” Brookins made history by flying from Chicago to Spring-field, beating an Illinois Central special train in a race, and setting a record for the longest continu-ous flight.

“A ghost would have

been easier to accept as ‘real’ than a machine up in the air, flown by a real pilot, whose hand you could shake after he landed, whose au-tograph after watching him fly might inspire you to learn to fly,” says Job Conger, director of AeroKnow Museum and author of “Springfield Aviation,” a book about the history of flight in Springfield.

“Most people seeing an airplane for the first time in 1910, saw it at a distance and often in flight. It brought proof of a staggering, incompre-hensible new dimension for human habitation,” he says.

For the 22-year-old Brookins, it sounded like another day at the office.

“It was an awful trip,” he said after landing, “but I would do it again. It was one long battle with the wind all the way; it never let up. Of-ten the machine jumped up and down to such an extent at times, I had a

hard time to keep it bal-anced. Outside of that I never had any trouble.”

He told The New York Times it was trying on both his body and ner-vous system.

“I was under great strain, though my biplane worked fine. At one time, I was nearly paralyzed in the arms, and had to use my knees to assist me.”

Operation of the plane was a physical endeavor with everything controlled manually. Keeping it straight and level was a workout, and Brookins was in the air more than seven hours.

From the ground, of course, flabbergasted spectators saw only the graceful arc of an “aero-plane” while it grew from a speck in the distance to a floating airship.

“It was a beautiful and aweful sight to witness the process of a common earth-being breaking the law of gravitation and riding high in the heav-ens in a heavier-than-air machine, and the thou-sands of spectators with heads thrown back gazed with bewildered wonder,” the Illinois State Register reported. “The swiftly re-volving propellers, which were furnishing the mo-

mentum for the machine, keeping it afloat, were plainly visible. The broad white body and tail-like rudder assumed normal proportions, and the figure of the aviator was recognized by all.”

After its initial sighting and the loud shouts of welcome from the vast crowd, some of whom had been waiting for hours, had died down, an intense stillness came over the scene while they took in the sight.

“It was the calm pre-ceding the storm and lasted while the biplane swooped earthward, circling above the race

Riding high in the heavens, Brookins sets world record

FLASHBACK SPRINGFIELD — Sept. 30, 1910

Monday, September 30, 2013 THE STATE JOURNAL-REGISTER PXX

course, and then the crowd went wild.”

Conger notes that at that time, not many “right-headed” people believed that flying ma-chines would ever offer anything of practical value to society.

But then, before the Wright brothers proved doubters wrong just seven years earlier, many thought man was not meant to fly. And besides, on this day, the $10,000 in prize money Brookins claimed for beating the train seemed mighty practical.

— Rich SaalDownload this page at

www.sj-r.com/flashback.

Walter R. “Birdman” Brookins, at controls of the plane, confessed that his arms were nearly paralyzed at one point during the seven-hour flight from Chicago and that he used his knees to help steer. Wilbur Wright, center right, greeted Brook-ins at the fairgrounds. SANGAMON VALLEY COLLECTION AT LINCOLN LIBRARY