AIR TAXIS.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18362, 21 April 1925, Page 13

AIR TAXIS.

A COMMERCIAL VENTURE IN AMERICA. \ Colonel H. E. Hartney, former commander of the First Pursuit Squadron of the A.E.F., with a distinguished record aa a fighting pilot, announces, in the "New York Times" the formation of a Yellow Air Gab Company, to operate nine 'planes in Chicago, and three 'planes in each of four other large cities. The 'plane to be used is painted the colour of the well-known Yelftw taxicab. With a 90-horse power, 1 ©-cylinder, air-cooled Anzani motor it eaa carry a pilot and four passengers in a comfortably enclosed cabin, and can cruise at 80 miles an hour with a mileage of 16 to the gallon of gas.. Is this, asks the "Scientific American,", s dream or a sound business proposition? The commercial aeroplane has long ago passed the stage of prohibitive luxury, and such a 'plane is undoubtedly economical. The prospect of offering a business man in Detroit a two-and-a-half - hour ride to Dayton at any time he may choose, instead of a train journey consuming the whole day, or a tiresome sleeper ride, is fascinating. What are the factors against the success of the gallant colonel's scheme! Rapid depreciation of 'plane and motor; an insurance rate of at least 20 per cent, per annum; unreliability of serrice la foggy or stormy weather; loss of time at either end of the journey in getting to and from the aerodrome, which cannot be in the heart of tho city like a railway station; unfamiliaritjr and only partel confidence on the part of the public. At any rate, the experiment, which Is soundly backed, will be well worth watching.

Mr Henry Hill, one of the grand ®W men of the stationery trade, and ess of the few Survivors of the quill pea industry, has been lecturing at Stationers' Hall on that old type of pea. In his view, although first of all the «t®et pen made a great inroad, and then came the fonntain pen, while the typewriter, of coarse, mast not be left out of consideration, the quill will never become actually a thing of the past. For nso in legal documents, for example, th*j quill still possesses unchallenged sapremacy. Mr Hill, by the way, ha# elaimed the "Old Lady of Threadneedle Street'\as a customer of his from th* time firm was founded in the year 1843.