Remember the Peter Powell TM stunt kite?
Apparently the Toy of the Year in 1976 is back http://www.peterpowellkites.co.uk
and better than ever! I had one – a blue plastic kite with a long tail that
would inflate in the wind. We used to take it up to the playing field to fly.
On a good day, with a steady breeze, it was extremely exciting to put the kite
through its paces, spiralling one way and then back the other while being
pulled across the grass by the surprisingly strong kite with its aluminium
struts. It was thrilling to develop a feel for the kite and the wind, to make
the kite perform at its limits and to test your strength against the tug of the
kite that seemed desperate to get away and fly on its own. On a bad day, I
would spend most of my time untangling the two flying lines, running
frantically backwards to no avail time and time again, dealing with the
frustration of the parent or brother who had to throw the kite back into the
air after each crash and then, when I gave up, spending ages getting the air
out of the tail so that I could roll it up.
Before the Peter Powell kite
arrived, we children had made various attempts at making a kite out of sticks,
paper and a piece of string – most were very disappointing and ended up stuck
in trees. The best things about the Peter Powell kite were the dual control
lines and its robust construction. Mine crashed into the ground on numerous
occasions but it was easy to repair and would be back in the air quite quickly
(as long as your ‘thrower’ hadn't got bored and gone home for a cup of tea!).
Here is a link to a YouTube video of someone flying stunt
kites in stacks of 3-6. They look wonderful flying together like this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJXv5Lt06_s
Trying to describe the thrill of kite flying reminded me of
the descriptions of the thrill of flying in our two aviation titles – The
Boys’ Book of Aeroplanes and Sky Roads of the World. Amy Johnson
and Hubbard and Turner are far better at describing what it is like to fly than
I am at describing kite-flying. Of course, when these authors were flying they
were doing so when manned flight was at the exciting visceral stage, where they
stared death in the face on numerous occasions and when the skills needed to
fly a plane made of balsa wood, paper and wire were being learned through trial
and error by everyone.
The Boys’ Book of Aeroplanes was written only nine years after
the Wright brothers made their first successful motor-driven flight. Here
Hubbard and Turner describe the thrill of flying in an aeroplane for the first
time:
The machine is held back, the
motor started by swinging the propeller, and the wild clamour of the motor
arises, obliterating all other sounds. The pilot seated by him raises his arm,
the machine is released and rushes over the ground, and before the passenger
has time to realise it, the machine is in the air, climbing steadily. Glancing
right and left he sees the country spreading out like a map, and then looking
down he sees the ground, far below, shrinking between his feet. The wind blows
hard in his face, but it is not unpleasant, and he soon gets used to it, and
also hardly notices the unending roar of the motor behind him. Movements of the
pilot's hand and foot on lever and cross-bar footrest send the machine turning,
tilting over towards the side to which the turn is made. There is no sensation
of giddiness, certainly none of fear; he feels as secure as in an armchair in
his own home. Far below, now, he can see the roofs of the aeroplane sheds, and
the little black dots, which are in reality men, moving very slowly over the
ground. Another turn, and the machine is passing over a belt of trees, and for
the first time he feels an indescribable thrill - a thrill of inexplicable
pleasure. To fly over the tops of trees is to experience a mystical exultation;
flying over grass is nothing, over houses nothing, over water a mere incident,
but over trees is a mysterious delight - a riddle that a Sphinx might propound
but no Oedipus ever satisfactorily answer.
Another half-circle and the
machine heads back towards the sheds, and then the pilot, momentarily turning
his face, shouts two words which the passenger fails to hear, but assumes, and
rightly, to be "Hold tight!" The nose of the machine suddenly dips
sharply downwards, and immediately the noise of the motor ceases, for the pilot
has switched off for a glide. The passenger grips the upright spar on his right
very tightly, thrusting his legs very firmly against the foot-rest. He misses
the noise of the motor now it has stopped, though previously he had been hardly
conscious of it. He hears the wind singing against the planes and wires, and
sees between his feet the ground rushing up to meet him. High up, the ground,
by a simple optical delusion, seems to move very slowly, but increases its
apparent motion the nearer one is to it. Faster and faster flows the ground,
and then, obeying a slight movement of the lever, just as the passenger
imagines a collision with the earth is inevitable, the machine gradually
straightens out; there is an almost imperceptible shock at the moment the
wheels touch; the machine runs along the ground, losing speed rapidly, and
finally stops; and the passenger, his mind still in a whirl with his novel
experiences, finds himself at the door of the shed. There is no noise, no
rushing wind, only a few spectators standing in front of the machine asking him
casual questions which he cannot, for the life of him, answer. He wants to sit
still and think, but he is hustled out of his seat, and becomes, to his growing
disgust, a mere crawling pedestrian once more.
Fantastic. This description is followed by an even more
dramatic description of what it is like to make your first solo flight. Amy
Johnson too, a few years later in Sky Roads of The World, is eloquent
about the excitement and sheer joy of flying:
As dawn breaks you are treated to such
a vision of beauty that you find it difficult to concentrate on the prosaic
tasks of fuelling your plane and preparing for the take-off. Brilliant stars in
black velvet sky have gently faded away, gracefully giving first place to the
rising splendour of the sun. Knowing full well our poor eyes could not stand
the sudden sight of an African sun in all its glory, it first sends out faint
warning rays of pearly grey, shading to lemon, then pale rose and dim gold,
growing ever deeper and more intense till suddenly, as though losing patience,
it bursts with dazzling radiance on the uncaring world.
Breathing the dry, tonic air, you jump
aboard your plane, longing to be away in the light blue sky, already feeling
the fascination of the desert.
First you will be flying over the oasis
belt. Tiny groups of mud huts shining whitely in the glowing sun nestle amongst
clumps of towering green palms. Some of the ground between is stony and rocky,
much of it covered with a fine film of sand. South of the oasis of Tarhit, to
my mind most beautiful of them all, stretch three hundred miles of golden sand
dunes, wave after enormous wave, as though some god had stretched his arm over
a restless sea, petrifying its restlessness into waves of stone.
Amy was the first to see many parts of the world from the
air. What a privilege to be the first to appreciate our beautiful planet in a
completely new way.
Escaping gravity was the desperate dream of so many people
for centuries. It took so long for them to work out the science of flying but
that didn’t stop them trying. It was only when the Wright brothers grasped the
scientific method – proper experimentation (and without killing yourself in the
process) – that the answer finally revealed itself. The Wright brothers’
experiments in flight is covered in some detail in The Boys’ Book of Aeroplanes.
What is so delightful about the two descriptions above is that they demonstrate
that those centuries of effort proved to be worth it – flying was a wonderful
experience, particularly for those flying in an open cockpit, ‘close to the
wind’.
Our final extract extolling the thrill of flying is a poem
called High Flight, written by Pilot Officer John Magee
RCAF (1922-1941) who died aged only 19 during World War II.
Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunwards I’ve climbed and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-spilt clouds – and done a thousand things
You have not dreamed of – wheeled and soared and
swung
High in the sunlit silence, hovering there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air,
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace,
Where never lark, or even eagle flew;
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
Kite-flying is as close as many of us can, or wish to, come
to the experience of physically controlling an air-borne object. It does
require patience and a certain amount of determination. One day someone will
create a kite that you can get into the air on your own, without needing a
bored parent or sibling to launch it for you. Also, a kite whose control lines
didn’t get tangled would be a great innovation. Sadly, kite-flying has been out
of fashion for some time and many children prefer the artificial thrill of
simulated flying on their tablet or computer. Perhaps adults who remember the
Peter Powell stunt kite can take a lead, get out into the fresh air and show
their children or grandchildren what they are missing.
