¶ The air mail stamps existing today bear witness to the importance of this accomplishment. Dozens of them picture the great Zeppelins from their early beginnings to their present state of perfection. Tableaus depicting them over the polar regions, and topping the crags of mountain ranges, and even in the process of construction form a visual history of the balloon. ¶ And now the Wright brothers come to the fore! After years of patient experimenting, these humble bicycle builders from Dayton, Ohio, launched a ’plane powered with a gasoline engine upon a startled world. On the bleak sands of Kitty Hawk, Orville and Wilbur Wright had seen their efforts crowned with success. Aviation had taken its biggest step forward. ¶ The Wright ’plane’s successful performance, which is shown on a two-cent U. S. stamp of 1928, gave new impetus to this branch of aeronautics. ¶ And Santos-Dumont, apparently forsaking the lighter-than-air vessels that had occupied his earlier years, followed the trail blazed by these two Americans. In 1906 he perfected a biplane glider which rose from water and flew. This flight which was staged in Paris, the scene of most of the Brazilian’s experiments, was the first official European ascension of a heavier-than-air craft. ¶ Flying, by this time, had become a more practical affair. With the elemental principles understood and conquered, minor improvements were developed as a result of ever-widening experience. In the summer of 1909, Bleriot crossed the English Channel in a frail monoplane and received an ovation almost as great as that accorded Lindbergh for his daring feat. ¶ But before Lindbergh could take a ’plane from New York to Paris in one triumphant jump, years had to pass, years of war that spread havoc and desolation throughout the world. But from the embers of that conflagration one thing, at least, emerged with greater glory. While guns and ammunition were dumped in the sea, and warships scrapped, the airplane rose in the eyes of the world to a new height of importance. ¶ For the war had wrought a great change in this device—no longer were ’planes but the playthings of a few, but servants that could serve a world! ¶ Today we can see on the air mail stamps of Spain, of Brazil, and the African Congo, portraits of the early craft—and by turning a few leaves of the album, can view the wartime “devils of the air”—the D. H. 4’s, the Curtiss “Jennies,” and the deadly Fokkers. ¶ Soon after the great conflict had ended, the hundreds of daring airmen who found themselves footloose, began to gamble their lives against a new element. Where formerly they had defied machine-gun bullets, they now pitted their skill against the hazards of sea and jungle.