The aircraft boys of Lakeport

Title: The aircraft boys of Lakeport

or, Rivals of the clouds

Author: Edward Stratemeyer

Illustrator: H. Richard Boehm

Release date: December 23, 2025 [eBook #77538]

Language: English

Original publication: Boston: Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co., 1912

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77538

Credits: Aaron Adrignola, Terry Jeffress, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)

Price $1.50

THE AUTOMOBILE BOYS OF LAKEPORT

Or, A Run for Fun and Fame

By EDWARD STRATEMEYER

Fifth Volume of “The Lakeport Series”

Illustrated 12mo Cloth

The author tells us in a manner that will please both young and old how the dauntless lads of Lakeport got their big touring car, how they went on a long trip through the mountains, and how they won a great race. Early in the story a mystery of a most peculiar nature is introduced, and this increases as the tale proceeds. There are likewise a thrilling ride down a steep mountain road, and the details of saving the costly automobile when the garage in which it was stored took fire. Some mean fellows were jealous because they did not own the car and once they decamped with it, carrying it on a flat-boat to an island in a lake. Mr. Stratemeyer, whose books are the most widely read of those by any living American writer for boys, loves motoring himself and understands his subject thoroughly.

EDWARD STRATEMEYER’S BOOKS

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[iii]

LAKEPORT SERIES

The Aircraft Boys of Lakeport

OR

Rivals of the Clouds

By EDWARD STRATEMEYER

Author of “The Gun Club Boys of Lakeport,” “Dave Porter on Cave Island,” “Old Glory Series,” “Pan-American Series,” etc.

ILLUSTRATED BY H. RICHARD BOEHM

BOSTON

LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.

[iv]

Published, August, 1912

Copyright, 1912, by Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co.

All Rights Reserved

The Aircraft Boys of Lakeport

Norwood Press Berwick and Smith Co. Norwood, Mass. U. S. A.

[v]

PREFACE

This story is complete in itself, but forms the sixth volume in a line issued under the general title of “Lakeport Series.”

In the first volume of this series, which was called “The Gun Club Boys of Lakeport,” I told how several lads organized their club and went forth in the winter time for some sport in the woods.

With the coming of summer the thoughts of these boys, and many of their friends, turned to baseball, and in the second volume, entitled “The Baseball Boys of Lakeport,” I gave the particulars of several contests on the diamond. Then came “The Boat Club Boys of Lakeport,” showing how the youths became the proud possessors of some first-class shells and other water craft, and how they rowed in several races and won them.

With the end of the summer came thoughts of other sports, and in “The Football Boys of Lakeport” were given the particulars of some hard-fought rivalries on the gridiron.

[vi]

During all these days many of the boys had longed for a touring car in which to make a trip through the country surrounding their homes. At last came the opportunity to use a fine car, and in “The Automobile Boys of Lakeport” I have given the details of a trip that was full of mystery as well as excitement. Once the boys had to save the car from burning up, and another time some of their enemies ran away with the machine.

In the present volume some of the boys take up the art of aviation. A few learn how to manage biplanes and other flying machines; and the particulars are given of a thrilling flight through a thunderstorm, a grand long-distance race, and how one of the lads disappeared in a most unexpected fashion.

During the present summer I have been much interested in the efforts to conquer the air, and have witnessed the flights of many of our leading birdmen, and have examined with great interest the various machines used. As yet aviation seems to be in its infancy; but since man has at last learned how to fly, the working out of the details of the science seems to be only a question of time.

Edward Stratemeyer.

August 1, 1912.

[vii]

ILLUSTRATIONS

[1]

CHAPTER I THE MAN IN THE BIPLANE

“Speed her up, Joe; we can’t afford to waste any time on this auto trip!”

“We’re making thirty-five miles an hour now, Fred,” returned Joe Westmore, who was at the wheel of the big six-cylinder touring car that contained five of the liveliest lads of Lakeport.

“Oh, shove her up to forty!” cried Harry Westmore, Joe’s younger brother. “The road is clear and as straight as a string.”

“What a pity that you’ve got to give up this fine car after this week!” sighed Link Darrow, as he sank back on the soft cushions of the tonneau.

“Never mind, we’ve had some dandy times in it this summer,” returned Fred Rush.

“Couldn’t be beat,” put in big Bart Mason, who had been lolling back with his eyes closed. “Say, [2] a car like this rides as easy as a Pullman, doesn’t it?”

“Better, I think,” answered Harry. “Anyway, I think you can see the scenery better from an auto than you can from a railroad car.”

“Well, we needn’t complain,” observed Joe, as he increased the speed a little. “It was awfully kind of Mr. Corsen to let us use the car at all. Now he’s coming back I don’t blame him for wanting it.”

“Say, but we certainly did have some adventures on the road,” observed Harry, as Joe reached a turn of the highway and slowed down. “Remember how we were caught in that storm on the mountain?”

“Yes, and how we were caught by the constable of Coville,” added Fred, with a grin.

“The color-blind constable!” put in Joe, and then the boys began to laugh at the recollection of the countryman who had taken a green car for a red one.

“Oh, say!” burst out Bart, rousing up suddenly. “Did I tell you fellows the news?”

“What news?” demanded the four others quickly.

“Early this morning a flying machine passed over our house!”

[3]

“A flying machine!”

“Over your house?”

“Why didn’t you mention it before, Bart?”

“What kind of a flying machine was it?”

“Why—I—er—I didn’t see it—I only heard it,” stammered the big youth. “I was going to speak of it as soon as I met you, but, somehow, it slipped my mind.”

“It slipped his mind!” declared Link, sarcastically. “Well, if I saw an airship—or even heard one—I’d not forget it so quickly.”

“What did it sound like?” demanded Joe, slowing down to listen to what his big chum might have to say.

“Why, it sounded like a—er—a—well, like this auto when you’ve got the muffler cut out,” drawled big Bart. “Only, of course, it was up in the air, not on the ground. I was in bed, and I thought at first it was a cyclone or something like that, and so did dad. I jumped up and ran to the window and looked out. But it was only half-past four and rather dark and all I could see was a cloud in the distance. But it made some noise, I can tell you that!”

“I wonder if that’s the same noise Paul Shale said he heard a couple of nights ago?” mused Harry. “He heard it just about midnight and said [4] it sounded like a train of cars in the air. He looked out, but it was too dark to see anything.”

“Must have been the same flying machine,” answered Bart.

“I’d like to see it,” cried Fred.

“So would I,” added Link. “Wonder what it looks like, and why doesn’t the fellow who is running it fly in the daytime?”

“Maybe he is a bit bashful,” suggested Joe, with a smile. “Or maybe he hasn’t got his license to run.”

“Or he wants to wait until he can get a new pair of pink socks,” burst out Harry. “No, if he runs only at night, he must have some real reason for it. If he didn’t have some reason, he’d run in the daytime—anybody would.”

“All of which doesn’t settle the question of which road we are to take!” sang out Joe. “The forks are just ahead. Which shall it be, Cresco way, or towards Blockville?”

“Let’s go Cresco way,” came simultaneously from Fred and Harry.

“Whoop! I know why they want to go there!” cried Link, with a broad wink.

“Why?” demanded the pair, boldly.

“Because Joel Runnell lives there, and because Cora Runnell is so pretty, and——”

[5]

“Cut it out!”

“Throw him out of the car!”

“Well, we might go Cresco way,” came from Joe. “But I was thinking——”

“Here comes another auto!” interrupted Bart. “My! what a racket it’s making!”

Joe had by this time reached the forks of the road, and had brought the big touring car to a stop, not being sure of which road they wanted to take. At the cry from Bart he turned around to look back. Then he uttered an exclamation.

“Look! look!” He pointed upwards. “It isn’t an auto—it’s the flying machine!”

All gazed in the direction indicated, and there, high up in the air, they saw a flying machine moving along swiftly. The explosions of the motor could be heard plainly, and these had made Bart imagine an automobile was coming.

“It’s a biplane!” exclaimed Harry, as the machine came closer.

“One man is running her,” added Fred.

“Look out, he’s coming this way!” yelled Link, as the flying machine made a sudden dip in their direction.

“He’s making a circle,” added Joe, a few seconds later, as the biplane veered to the westward and then came around on a big curve. “Say, but [6] this is a sight worth seeing!” he added, earnestly.

“I’d not miss it for ten dollars!” affirmed his brother.

All the lads had leaped to their feet and touring in the car was for the time being forgotten. They saw the big biplane, with its snowy canvas stretches, cover a big circle and then cut an equally large figure eight. Only one man was aboard, an elderly individual, with gray hair and a gray beard.

“Say, that’s great!” murmured Harry, enthusiastically.

“Would you like to run one?” queried Fred.

“Indeed I would, Fred! Look at him skim along like a bird!”

“He’s giving us a private exhibition,” observed Link.

“Wonder who he is and where he is from?” said Bart. “I haven’t heard of any aviators around Lakeport.”

“Oh, they can sail miles in those machines,” answered Joe. “He may be from some large city—out on a trial trip, to see how the biplane acts. Maybe he is tuning up for some race.”

“I wish he’d come down—I’d like to get a near view of the machine,” cried Fred. “Say, this sort of thing beats a balloon all hollow, doesn’t it?”

[7]

“Yes, indeed, even a dirigible,” replied Link.

The biplane had swept off, over some open fields and a patch of woodland. Now it came curving back, the explosions of the motor becoming louder and louder. They could see the gray-haired old aviator bending over to one side, as if watching some of the machinery. Then the motor stopped for a few seconds, to start up again with a louder banging than ever.

“The engine is missing,” cried Fred. “Must be something the matter with his spark.”

“Look! look!” yelled Harry.

He had no need to utter the words, for all in the touring car were straining their eyes to the utmost. They saw the biplane tilt and veer and make a dash towards the ground. Then the old aviator changed the angle of his elevation rudder, and up shot the flying machine towards the clouds.

“Wow! what a narrow escape!”

“I thought he was coming down sure!”

“So did I! Say, flying isn’t so easy after all, is it?”

“If he had come down he would have been killed, sure!”

By this time the five lads were worked up to the top notch of excitement. Who was this daring aviator, and why was he performing in such a [8] fashion in this lonely section of the country? There were some farmed fields at hand, but the nearest farmhouse was all but out of sight.

“Maybe he is trying to perfect a new kind of a plane, or new kind of a motor, and doesn’t want any outsider to know about it,” suggested Joe.

“Here he comes back!” cried Fred. “And look how queerly the machine is acting!”

Once more the biplane was approaching, this time at a height of about a hundred and fifty feet. It was swaying from side to side, and the boys could plainly see that something had gone wrong. The aged aviator was bending to one side, working over the engine control. The machine made a dip and a dart, and for one brief second the boys thought the affair was coming down on their heads. Link ducked down in the tonneau of the car and big Bart sprawled on top of him. The biplane swept within fifty feet of them and the din from the motor was terrific.

“That engine is running wild, that’s what’s the matter!” yelled Joe, when the danger was past.

“Say, let us get out of here!” stammered Bart, as he got to his feet again, followed by Link. “It’s not safe.”

[9]

None of the others replied, for all were again watching the erratic movements of the big biplane. First it would turn to one side of the road and then the other, and then it made another circle and a dip. After that it appeared to shoot straight for the clouds.

“Either something is wrong or that aviator is crazy!” declared Joe. “I don’t know much about flying machines, but I know they shouldn’t act that way.”

The motor was still exploding loudly, occasionally missing fire. The biplane made another circle, and this time the boys saw the aviator full in the face. He looked pale and alarmed. He seemed to shout out something, but what it was they could not hear because of the noise from the engine and the propellers. The latter were flashing around in the sunlight like twin buzz-saws.

“That fellow will end up by wrecking that machine and killing himself,” was Joe’s comment.

With a final swoop the biplane left the vicinity of the road, heading in the direction of what was known locally as Owl Lake, a small sheet of water deep in the Cresco woods. As it shot away something fell from the machine, an oblong metallic box. It came crashing down in a tree, bounced off [10] from a limb, dropped to some brushwood, and disappeared from view.

“Did you see that?” cried Harry.

“Yes,” answered his brother.

“What was it?” questioned Fred.

“It was a box of some sort, a black box,” answered Link. “It fell in yonder bushes.”

“Let’s go see what it is!” cried Bart, and leaped from the automobile. The others were equally eager to learn what it was that had come down from out of the clouds, and all hastened forward to the spot where the object had landed.

[11]

CHAPTER II SOMETHING ABOUT THE BOYS

“I think it came down over there!”

“No, it struck that tree and bounced off in this direction.”

“What do you think it was, Joe?”

“I haven’t the least idea, Fred. I don’t see what such an aviator could be carrying in a box.”

“Maybe it was a tool box,” suggested Link as he strode on beside his friends.

“A tool box would be fastened so it couldn’t drop, I think,” replied Harry. “Well, we’ll soon know. I only hope it wasn’t smashed to pieces by the fall.”

“Maybe he’ll come back for it,” suggested Joe, as he looked up in the direction of the biplane.

“Doesn’t look so now,” replied his brother, as the flying machine was all but lost to sight in the direction of Owl Lake.

“That aviator may not know that he dropped anything—being so busy looking after the machine,” [12] was Fred’s comment. And then all made their way into the bushes where they thought the strange object had dropped.

To the readers of the former volumes in this “Lakeport Series” the go-ahead lads already introduced will need no special introduction. For the benefit of others allow me to state that all belonged in the town of Lakeport, a bustling little place, located at one end of Pine Lake. In this town the father of Joe and Harry Westmore was the leading grain merchant, and Fred Rush’s parent kept a hardware store. Link Darrow was the son of the leading carpenter, while Bart Mason’s father was interested in various lines of business.

In my first volume, called “The Gun Club Boys of Lakeport,” I told how Joe, Harry, and Fred organized their club, and how they went forth for some winter sport in the woods. They took with them old Joel Runnell, a well-known hunter, and journeyed to Pine Island, near the head of the lake. Here the lads had a good time generally and incidentally managed to get the better of a miserly real-estate dealer who was trying to defraud the Westmore family out of some valuable real estate.

With the coming of summer the thoughts of the lads turned to baseball. From his father Link got [13] permission to use the upper part of the carpenter shop for a meeting place, and there the boys organized their ball club, as related in detail in “The Baseball Boys of Lakeport.” On this nine, Joe was the pitcher, while Fred was the catcher. Harry covered first base and Link second, with big Bart on third. A lively lad named Matt Roscoe was shortstop, and Walter Bannister was left fielder and Frank Pemberton right fielder. Among the substitutes was Teddy Dugan, a bright Irish lad, witty and loyal to the last degree. The lads played some great games, and also had much trouble with their rivals, Si Voup and his crony, Ike Boardman. Si was rich and a bully, and he and Ike did some things that came near getting them into trouble with the authorities.

Not a great many miles from Lakeport was the town of Brookside, and there some of the boys, led by George Dixon, had organized a boat club. At once the others caught the “fever.”

“If Brookside can have a boat club, so can we,” declared Harry.

“Sure thing,” returned Paul Shale, whose uncle owned a fine sailboat, and who often allowed Paul to use the craft. Then came a chance to buy some shells and other rowing things at a bargain, and how the boys got the outfit, and how they rowed [14] some great races, has already been related in “The Boat Club Boys of Lakeport.”

Football is a favorite sport everywhere, and at certain times of the year the lads of Lakeport found it impossible to keep off the gridiron. They joined a football league, as related in “The Football Boys of Lakeport,” being coached by an experienced man named Carl Bellman. They had an uphill fight for the pennant, and once again their old enemy, Si Voup, did all in his power to make them lose.

Following the football season had come a winter of hard work in school for nearly all the boys, livened up only by an outing around the holidays, when some of them had gone camping and hunting. Then had come spring, and the lads had wondered what they would do during the summer. Some wanted to play ball while others wanted to row.

Living on the outskirts of the town was a rich gentleman named Munroe Corsen. He had a daughter Violet, whom Harry had once saved from the savage attack of a bull. Later, Violet was abducted by some evil men, who held her hoping thereby to make Mr. Corsen do what they wanted. The boys got on the trail of the abductors and saved the girl and restored her to her parents. For this Mr. and Mrs. Corsen were deeply grateful, and [15] the gentleman insisted upon aiding the lads in many ways. He had a fine six-cylinder automobile, and when he and his family left Lakeport for a tour of Europe he asked Joe Westmore how he would like to have the use of the car for the time being.