Kelly Field, San Antonio, USA
(Paul Aldin Smith Kelly Field Album / San Diego Air & Space Museum)
The United States had entered the Great War the previous year, and this aviator is training the photographer to pilot a two-person biplane at Kelly Field. Biplanes, with two pairs of horizontal wings (one above the other), had by this point in aviation development found favor as the dominant craft. Two pairs of wings rather than one increased both the agility and the fortitude of the plane.
Before it was a center for aeronautics, Kelly Field had been a cotton field. Following the US entry into the war, it became an Air Training Service Camp.
‘It is assured that one of the attractions that winter tourists will find in San Antonio during the coming season will be that of flying men over and around the city. Already myriads of airplanes are often seen performing the various kinds of feats above Kelly Field. One day recently a great flock of buzzards was noticed to apparently join in the manoeuvres that were being conducted by the flying machine men. These birds went through evolutions that were being performed by the air-planes and their remarkable actions were viewed with interest by visitors.’
Rockingham Post-Dispatch, March 7, 1918
