For us of the West, the wonder of flying is over and one with. We have accepted it as a fact, seen with our own eyes, that man can fly.  And we ask ourselves, like true children of the new century, "Why shouldn't we fly?" it all seems such a matter of course that man, who has mastered the earth and the treasure-bearing places under the earth, the sea and the deeps thereof, should also be master of the air. I think that the unconcerned manner of the aviators has something to do with our feeling that flying is no longer a modern miracle, but just a new and convenient way of getting from place to place. They do not look like miracle workers, these men; the modest affable little Frenchman, Louis Paulhan; the keen-eyed taciturn Curtiss; a typical American businessman, that; the boyish Willard and Hamilton who appears no less a boy, though a quieter type; these masters of the air do not impress you as wonder workers but rather as men who have learned to use a new tool. Yet they all hold records; some of them new-made in Los Angeles. Paulhan has to his credit the official altitude of 4, 165 feet and a cross country flight of forty five miles, both world records and both newly won. Curtiss is the speed king and showed us what he could do by covering the course of 1.61 miles in two minutes and twelve seconds. Hamilton proved his iron nerve when he made the long distance glide record, dropping 250 feet, with a broken engine and landing safely and easily.  That was his Los Angeles feat and was done because he either had to glide or break his neck as the crank shaft of his motor broke while he was trying for altitude and it was a case of glide gracefully or drop to death.  Since then he bettered his record in San Diego by cutting his engine at 500 feet. Charlie Willard demonstrated that he had absolute control of his bi-plane by taking flight from a square in front of the grand stand, a square which measured only 20 feet, but into which he dropped again after circling the course; a record for skill which is unsurpassed. …The engine of the Farman biplane used by Paulhan is one of the beauties of mechanical art. It is a 50 horse power seven cylinder Gnome. The cylinders are set like the spokes of a wheel and the whole engine revolves with the propeller, thus acting as its own flywheel and giving perfect steadiness to its motion. The Curtiss makes use of an eight cylinder engine of the same power but it is not the rotary type. The lighter weight of the Curtiss machine  may account for its swifter flight. There is little doubt that Paulhan's splendid engine is responsible for his successful long distance and altitude flights.  One of the interesting events of the LA meet was the 'bomb throwing' from an aeroplane. Lieutenant Paul Beck USA ascended with Paulham and endeavored to drop imitation bombs into a square of about twelve feet. None of them quite reached their mark.