Like a blue cockchafer crawling onto a floating chip of wood, Naval Lieutenant Alfred J. William's Schneider Cup mono-seaplane Mercury floated on the Severn River off Annapolis last week, her nose in a barge. Lieutenant Williams, swiftest U. S. straightaway flyer since he won the 1923 Pulitzer speed trophy at St. Louis by flying 266.6 m. p. h., built the Mercury from his own specifications. The Navy could not afford the building costs. So friends supplied him the needed $175,000. The navy gave him factory facilities.
The Mercury's wing spread is only...
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