Were back with the second of three Three Mosquitoes stories we’re presenting this month. This week it’s “Roof of Treachery” from the March 1930 issue of Sky Riders. The city of Remiens could not be taken. It is continuously ranged and shelled and whole battalions of crops are sent in to take it, but they all die in the undertaking. Pilots are sent over during these skirmishes, but they never return. The Brass turn to The Three Mosquitoes to try to find the secret behind Remiens’ invulnerability just hours before a great push is set to take the town. Can they discover it’s deadly secret in time?

Fate had thrust upon Kirby, valiant leader of the famous Three Mosquitoes, a staggering responsibility. One lone Yank among thousands of the enemy, he had been placed suddenly in a position where the whole show depended on him. He alone held the secret of Remiens in his grasp. And yet, here he was with his plane disabled and only twenty minutes to spare!

• Download “Roof of Treachery” (March 1930, Sky Riders)

If you enjoyed this tale of our intrepid trio, check out some of the other stories of The Three Mosquitoes we have posted by clicking the Three Mosquitoes tag or check out one of the four volumes we’ve published on our books page! And come back next Friday or another exciting tale.

Before he became renown for such classics as The Left Hand of God and Lilies of The Field, Barrett honed his craft across the pages of the pulp magazines—and nowhere more so than in War Birds and it’s companion magazine War Aces where he contributed smashing novels and novelettes, True tales of the Aces of the Great War, encyclopedic articles on the great war planes as well as other factual features. Here at Age of Aces Books he’s best known for his nine Iron Ace stories which ran in Sky Birds in the mid ’30s!

This week we have another of his “Sky Talks” from the pages of Air Trails. In “Twins and Trouble,” our flight instructor Brad tells us of the time he had to instruct a Señor Enrique Gopez’ two sons. Gopez senior had gained some notoriety of late for successfully quelling the revolution in his country. Instructing Señor Gopez’ two kids in the fine art of flying wouldn’t have been such a tough job until Brad’s told the two boys are twins, and to Brad twins meant trouble—double trouble!

From the pages of the February 1930 number of Air Trails, it’s William E. Barrett’s “Twins and Trouble!”

Another “sky talk” yarn, proving that trouble never comes in small doses—particularly in the air.

• Download “Twins and Trouble” (February 1930, Air Trails)

To get the ball rolling, let’s meet the man—or the man in 1930! Here’s a great article of introduction to Mr. Barrett from the St. Louis Globe Democrat, from October 26th, 1930. (portions of this seem to have been reused in Barrett’s biographical feature in the November 1930 issue of Swift Story Magazine (or vise-versa).

William E. Barrett COMPOSES and MARKETS an Average of 50,000 WORDS of FICTION a Month

by Hamilton Thornton • St. Louis Globe Democrat, St. Louis, MO • Sunday, 26 October 1930

He resigned a promising position to write for magazines and periodicals specializing in “thrillers,” has a contract with the creator of his boyhood hero for one novel a month, besides which he turns out several short stories, sometimes at the rate of 1000 words an hour.

ALMOST a year ago William E. Barrett left a promising position as southwestern advertising manager for the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company to write yarns for the pulp paper magazines. To almost anyone—that is, anyone with but a perverted idea of the business—the change might have seemed the most foolhardy thing a young chap could do. It wasn’t And this is why:

Author Barrett writes and sells on the average of 50,000 words a month. He has a contract with one publishing house to furnish a 35,000-word novel every month for a year, and for each novel he receives – approximately $900. With all his contributions to the different paper-backed purveyors of blood and thunder, he nets over $1000 a month. The which is considerably more than twice what his former salary was.

Now consider that Author Barrett is just turned thirty, has an apparently Inexhaustible fund of Action adventure in his system and can pour it out with terrific speed over the roller of his typewriter. Then try to figure just how idiotic he was to give up that nice, secure position with the manufacturing house. In the words of any George Ade, he was as foolish as the oft similed fox.

Receives Practically No Rejection Slips

“Pulp paper writing is a whale of a business and plenty of fun,” grins the youthful Barrett, pushing back from the type machine in his office. The office is on the second floor of the Stroh Building. 4541 Delmar Boulevard.

“Sometimes one finds persons who sneer at the paper-backed periodicals, he continued. “Perhaps that’s because they do not have the shadings of character, the finesse of description. But, believe me, they havo plenty of action, movement and drama—all stripped down to bone. Also, to my mind it’s the best and surest paying proposition for a writer.

“Tell you what I mean. Suppose you write a story for Harper’s Magazine, send it off and it fails to make the grade. Well, there are possibly one or two other magazines that would even look at your story. The field Is limited. A story written for the Saturday Evening Post I don’t believe would be taken for any other magazine. And a reject from Collier’s would not be suitable for Liberty. But there are any number of magazine in the pulp paper class—distinguished from the slick paper mags—that offer virtually the same market. Some time ago I sold a story that had been sent off thirty-two times.”

Barrett writes regularly for five magazines and has appeared in about twenty-five during the last two years. He sells at a minimum of 2 cents a word and gets sometimes as high as 4 and 5 cents. His average sale price runs 2½ cents. There are some monthly and semi-monthly periodicals in which he has appeared without missing an issue for a year. Sometimes he has two or three stories in the same issue. Then he uses several different noms de plume. His stories appear under the names of W.K. Brownestone and Bill Alexander, as well as under his own proper name.

This prolific young writer can do 1000 words an hour. And when he gets done it’s in finished shape for the publishers. He has completed a 35,000-word novel in four days, but usually takes a week or a little longer for that type of story. His short stories he con do in a few days. In addition to his monthly novel he writes three or four short stories a month. And more important, he sells them.

“here are practically no rejection slips now,” he says, “for which, thank the Lord. There was a time when I was not so fortunate. But it seems I’ve got over the shoals.”

William Barrett is one New York lad who left Gotham for the West when many another youthful outlander was ambitiously heading for Manhattan. His life has been varied enough even if it hasn’t been as full of color as the adventurous, rough and ready careers of his own action heroes. But being himself a scribbler, the least concession would be to let him give an account of his biography in his own style.

“I vented my first squawk at life In the City of New York on November 16, 1900,” Barrett began. “I managed to survive the hazards of Manhattan until I was 16, then followed the family star to Colorado. I had prepared at Manhattan College Prep, a Christian Brothers school, for an engineering career, but this proved a misdeal, and I took a whirl at reporting for a Denver dally.

Mathematics Thorn in His Engineering Ambition

“After about nine months of my cubbing and picture chasing. the city editor of the Rocky Mountain News shook a fatherly head over my newspaper aspirations. And I went to work as general factotem in the office of the Denver Gas and Electric Company, taking an engineering correspondence course and studying at night. You see, ambition was bubbling in my young breast. But ambition was not equaled by my ability at the drafting board. Mathematics was the great thorn in my engineering dream. So after several years I wormed my way into the advertising department of the Westinghouse Company out in Denver.

“My publicity job took me all over the West—mining camps, oil towns, every place where spectacular installations were being made. Later I became publicity manager. And in 1926, the company brought me to St Louis as southwestern advertising manager, handling a territory that included fourteen states.

“But some base deceiver told me about the big pay and easy hours in flctloneering and I tried my hand. By the time I found out the horrible truth I was too badly bitten by the bug ever to escape. I learned to fly and became a pilot with the idea of writing air stories that would be authentic.

“I was still in Denver when I published my first bit. Yep, a poem in the All-Story Magazine. Then I wrote a story, sent it off and it was accepted. My first one! And it was the worst thing that could have happened. I thought I had the knack of writing by both horns and was In the way of annexing an ace of a racket. However, it was more than a year before I could market another yarn. I got $30 for my first story. My usual income from a short story now—about 5000 words—is $100.

“That first tale was sold eight years ago. Well, I kept pegging away at the work in my spare time until a year and a half before I left my place at Westinghouse I was receiving more from my scrivening sideline than I was from my regular salary. And I was on the road five months of the year, too. So I had to cut loose. I’ve been on my own since last February.

“My total published stuff, if anyone cares, is 263 short stories, 10 complete novels, 18 novelettes of about 12,000 words each and countless articles.

“My wife mode her first short story sale a month or so ago, and there was a kick for both of us in that, She has helped me with so many of mine that it was a real thrill to see her push across a yarn of her own. I’ve got a boy 3 years old and a girl 4—to round out the personal narrative. And I’m still in love—

“Sorry there isn’t more plot or drama or excitement in this—but if there were, this being, a sordid age, I’d probably stick a name like Pete Jones on myself and sell the darn thing.”

There you have a pretty fair picture of Author Barrett. Except, possibly, for his personal appearance. He is very young looking, with a trace of gray in his hair to make his thirty years seem authentic. He is keen of eye, medium in height and of rather a slight build, despite the fact that his characters are usually of the 6-foot, bulbous-muscled, he-man type.

He specializes in oil field stories, air stories, Westerns, air war yarns and general adventure tales. And he has tabooed sex, love and confession stories, largely because he says he hasn’t much of a faculty for them.

There’s rather a curious story attached to Barrett’s writing for the Gilbert Patten Corporation, publishers. This is the concern which gets out the Swift Story Magazine and which has awarded Barrett the contract for his novel a month.

Now the juvenile Will Barrett was as keen a devotee of boy fiction as anyone could find. And the favorite of all the rest for him was the series of Frank Merriwell, the peerless hero of a million adventures. Barrett frankly admits that as a kid he tried his level best to do everything just like the redoubtable Merriwell. He went in for athletics and got four letters at high school, because that was the way Merriwell would have done.

“I used to feel like kicking myself sometimes.” smiled Barrett, “when I got into a fit of boyish introspection and felt I resembled a butcher’s boy a lot more than the great Frank. Well, sir, I’ve saved every book of the Merriwell series, and every other thing, I believe, that Burt L. Standish ever wrote. Some day I shall give them to my boy to read, because I think they’re classics of their kind.

“Some months ago I received a letter from Gilbert Patten. He told me about several new magazines he was going to publish, and said he had read a number of my stories in other publications and wanted some. That was a thrill, for you know Gilbert Patten, publisher, is the former Burt L. Standish, who for two decades poured out the tremendous annals of Frank and later Dick Merriwell.”

So today Barrett is writing stories for the creator of his boyhood’s greatest hero. A sort of passing on the literary torch. Only in this case the torch is fired with an inky ribbon and the imagination of a first-class producer of the clean but lurid dime novel fiction.

Thus far Barrett writes about locales that he knows, places that he has seen. He is an airplane pilot and has a first-hand knowledge of the oil fields and the West. There may, however, come a day when he goes dry on his present topics, when he writes himself out. And with a canny foresight he is preparing against such a contingency.

Not a week goes by, and rarely a day for that matter, when he isn’t studying some new subject. He quotes an old bromide to the effect that if a man concentrates on one study fifteen minutes a day for a year, he will become a fair master of that subject. This is what Barrett is doing.

“Now.” he explains, “I’m reading everything I can get my hands on about India. I believe there will come a blow-off down there before many years. Then the fiction buyers are going to want stories about India. And if I’m saturated with the customs, the religion, the character of the country, I believe I shall be able to turn out acceptable stuff.”

Barrett maintains regular office hours, writing from 9 until 5 o’clock dally. The office, by the way, is filled with books, paper and a stack of hundreds of paper-backed magazines. In each of these magazines is some story he has written. He will soon have out a book of a semitechnical nature on his study of airplanes, particularly of the old war-time machines.

Usually he works just during his office hours. But if a story “gets hot,” he will sit there at his typewriter until midnight or later, hammering away as fast as his fingers will fly. And his wife’s dinner or bridge party or show has to do without him. Mrs Barrett has become rather accustomed to this, however, and understands. He has written steadily for as long as eighteen hours at a stretch.

Does he read? Voluminously, but not fiction. He quit reading fiction when he became a professional producer.

“My business now,” he says, with his frequent grin, “is to write yarns, not read ‘em. After all. there’s more money In that.”

Editor’s Note: The cartoon accompanying Mr. Barrett’s photo in the article was rendered by VicVac, the illustrator of Barret’s Famous Firsts and Is That a Fact features in War Birds and War Aces.

Gene Burke tried to keep a low profile, lest he be discovered and imprissoned for a murder he did not commit. He must be careful not to arouse suspicion—but there must be no confirmed victories. Rather incur the stigma of lost nerve than risk disaster. Unfortunately, ever since he had come up from Issoudun, intent on remaining but an obscure pilot of the Royal Flying Corps, that Fate had shaped a strange destiny for him. Three swift victories had been his, longed-for but feared because of the inevitable increase of local fame. Then he had gotten a straggler from Richthofen’s Circus, which he dared not hold back from attacking, and finally came the fifth scrap that had made him an ace. It was Fate, a grinning, mocking Fate that gave him these victories, only to lead him closer to a dishonored end . . .

A haunting fear crept into Burke’s eyes as he saw his thirteenth Boche go twisting down in flames. For it was a mocking Fate that gave him these victories—victories that he dared not claim!

• Download “No More Victories” (September 1930, Sky Birds)

And be sure to check out Keyhoe’s Mad Marines—The Devildog Squadron—in five new Weird World War Adventures in The Devildog Squadron: The Mystery Meteor!

Humpy and Tex were out on liberty, When they couldn’t get that they preferred death, but the reaper has a funny way of choosing its victims.

• Download “Liberty—or Death” (October 1930, War Aces)

Flying Aces didn’t always have a story behind their covers in the early years. Only one of the three Blakeslee covers had a bit of a write-up on it—the August issue—which he have previously posted here. It’s just great to see all three covers together!

June 1930

July 1930

August 1930

He would fight as never before, and death to the Allied plane that crossed his guns! Yet the sight of those British cockades made a bell ring in his clouded mind, and his hands fumbled on the trips. He could not shoot!

From the October 1930 Sky Birds, it’s William E. Barrett’s “Crossed Controls!”

• Download “Crossed Controls” (October 1930, Sky Birds)

If you enjoyed this story, check out William E. Barrett’s other features and stories on this site or pick up a copy of his Iron Ace stories which collects all nine of his tales of Hugh McQuillen, The Iron Ace, also from the pages of Sky Birds.

Flying Into View
introducing MAJOR T.A.B. DITTON, R.A.F.

“. . . HE WENT DOWN end over end and crashed behind the German lines, leaving the three other Albatrosses to finish me off, now that I’d used up my last few bullets on him,” continued “Tabs” Ditton, as he ordered more coffee.

“There was nothing that I could do,” he went on, “but do my best to out-stunt ’em and get back to my drome with a whole crate. I sure did stunt that Dolphin, but just a bit too much. With the snarling hun ships swarming all over me I kicked the rudder over and threw her into a vertical bank with the power full on. There was a sudden lurch, a snapping, splintering cra-a-a-a-a-ack, and the two left wings just folded up and over the center section! The bus went into a sickening spin at once, and after a few turns the broken wings came off and went turning and twisting down off to one side. I shed ’em at four thousand feet and I sure covered that in short order.

“All the way down I cut the engine in and out and wrestled with the controls, hoping to get what there was left of the bus out of the spin. I’d unhooked my safety belt so that I would have a chance at least of getting clear when she hit, if I was still interested in getting clear.

“Well, we spun down to about two hundred feet and then the bus came out of the spin for a few seconds. Then when we got down to about a hundred she came out again and slid down on one wing. The men on the ground that saw me said I was thrown clear when she hit, and landed about fifty feet off to one side. I went out for a while and came to in a hospital all snarled up in bandages. I was out in about two weeks and back in the air even if my left eye wasn’t so good,” concluded “Tabs.”

Major T.A.B. Ditton, as he is officially known, was with the R.F.C., which later became the R.A.F., from 1916 until the end of the war. He is officially credited with thirteen German planes, about the same number unofficially, and that besides balloons. He also has several decorations for his skill and bravery in the air.

“Tabs,” as he was known to the men of his outfit, learned to fly on Maurice-Farmans, or “short horns.” He says that they had so many guy wires that the only way they could be tested to see if they were rigged right was to put a canary in the pilot’s seat. If the canary could fly out through the snarl of wires and struts the ship wasn’t rigged right. From those he went on Avros, S.E.5s, Sop. Camels and D.H.5s. He also had flights in bombing crates to make his training complete. Camels were his special hobby, even if they were tricky boats to push around upstairs.

One time one of the “higher ups” decided that the pilots at his drome had not had enough stunting to keep them in trim, so he was ordered up for a few wingovers. Before he went up he had another officer move the planes out of one of the permanent hangars and open the doors on both sides.

After a few rolls and loops he dove his little Sop. Pup down in a screaming dive straight through the hangar and out the other side. He said he landed with his chest all puffed out and was at once put under arrest for reckless flying. The officer who had requested the stunting practice, however, managed to get him off. But needless to say that sort of stunts was barred in the future.

AFTER LUNCH was over “Tabs” and I caught a train for his home in Greenwich Village, where he turns out the stories you men are clamoring for. Here, with his feet parked on a footstool made from the prop of that same Dolphin whose wings he shed, he showed me snapshots of overseas days and told me some of his narrow escapes. This one he says was a joke on himself.

He was setting a Camel down when her wheels caught on a stump. The tail rose up in a high arc and came down with a terrific crun-n-n-n-nch where the plane’s nose should be. “Tabs,” hanging head down from his safety belt, took account of all his bones and found that at least he was all there and not hurt. He was trying to unhook his belt, which was held tightly because of his weight pulling on it, when an “Ack-emma” came running up to see if he was killed, or only banged up. After being assured that “Tabs” was O.K., the Ack-emma reached up under the fuselage and unhooked the safety belt for the suspended pilot. Now for the tragic part of the story! Ditton had forgotten by this time to hold onto the sides of the fuselage, so that when the safety belt snap was released he dropped about two feet and landed on his head. Just his tough luck, after cracking up a ship without getting a mark.

Another almost fatal flight was in a Camel that had been rigged up for instruction work. The main gas tank had been removed and another pilot cockpit and set of controls had been put in where the gas tank had been located. So many young pilots were killed soloing in Camels that it had been thought best to rig up dual controls in a few ships to enable the instructors to ride along with students and help ’em.

Well, this particular bus had just been converted, and Ditton was to give her a buzz or two over the field for a tryout. He told the “Ack-emma” to take the safety belt out of the front seat so that it would not get in the way of the stick.

“Tabs” took the bus up a good ways and proceeded to do his stuff with her. A few minutes later he decided to loop her. The loop went O.K. till he tried to level off at the end of the loop. Try as he might he couldn’t get the stick back to neutral to save his neck, so up went the nose into another loop. He cut the motor and of course she stalled. He did his best but the stick refused to go forward an inch. Right and left O.K. But front? Not an inch!

He finally decided to stall and spin and side slip all the way down to the field. When he landed there was quite an audience waiting for an explanation, including several C.O.s. The first thing Ditton did was to look into the front pit, and there, sure enough, was the safety belt looped over the stick. When the plane had gone into the first loop the belt had hung, down, of course, and swung over the end of the stick. When the stick was shoved forward at the end of the loop of course it tightened the belt about the stick in the front pit, and there it was locked for good. That Ack-emma is still running!

Major Ditton is a yery popular author here at the Sky Birds drome. You can read more of his split second air thrills at any time—because he draws all of his yarns from actual personal experience.

Bibliography

title	magazine	date	vol	no
1929
The Desert Hawk	Sky Birds	Sep/Oct	3	1
Aerobatics	Aviation Stories	Oct	1	3
1930
Death Deviation	Flying Aces	Jan	4	4
The Flying Idol	Sky Birds	Jan	3	4
Eagle of the North	Flying Aces	Feb	5	1
Three Points Ahead	Flying Aces	Mar	5	2
Air Wolves	Flying Aces	Apr	5	3
Death Rides High	Flying Aces	May	5	4
Desert Vultures	Sky Birds	May	4	4
Boom Buzzards	Flying Aces	Aug	6	3
1932
Stars in the Sky	War Aces	Apr	9	25
Artillery Guys	Battle Stories	Jul	10	57
1935
Annihilation or a Firing Squad	Dime Adventure	Jun	1	1
Diamonds in the Sky	Bill Barnes	Sep	4	2
Sable Rider	Thrilling Adventures	Nov	15	3
Black Saber	Thrilling Adventures	Dec	16	1
1936
Wings of the Dragon	Top-Notch	Jan	98	1

 
Here are a trio of his stories that ran in the 1930 in the pages of Flying Aces and Sky Birds.

Death Derivation

Murder in the skies. The slain pilot lay slumped in his cockpit—the blue mark of a pistol shot on his forehead. A mysterious killing in the air that will keep you guessing.

• Download “Death Derivation” (January 1930, Flying Aces)

The Flying Idol

Yank flying courage clashes with the treacherous cunning of a swarm of godless yellow devils. A tale of thrills and daring adventure in heathen skies!

• Download “The Flying Idol” (January 1930, Sky Birds)

Death Rides High

Powell was fighting mad. It wasn’t the crashed altimeter that got him—it was the startling discovery he made after that.

• Download “Death Rides High” (May 1930, Flying Aces)

When a beautiful woman drops out of the swirling mists of fog looking for directions at the Oakland airport, she accidentally leaves behind a purse whose contents may or may not be linked to at least one murder and who knows what else—and it sends Dave Flint on a mission to find the girl and return the bag—even if it means his life! From the pages of the February 1930 issue of Flyers, it’s Erle Stanley Gardner’s “Above the Fog!”

There may be no adventure left on the ground these days, but above the fog. . . .

• Download “Above the Fog” (February 1930, Flyers)

AS A bonus, here’s a brief article about Erle Stanley Gardner that appeared in the pages of the newspaper magazine This Week, the week prior to the supplement serializing his latest novel Fugitive Gold!

An Adventure Every Day
That’s the life of Erle Stanley Garner, whose new serial,
“Fugitive Gold,” begins next week

A STRANGE apparition of squat, chain-like things slowly crawls across a cacti-dotted section of our Southwestern desert and finally takes shape—a string of automobiles and trailers.

A depression riddled clan seeking new life and some small fortune in a change of scene? A new health-movement idea? Or perhaps a gold-seeking expedition hunting a lost mine? No, none of these—though the last is warm. It is merely the home and office of one of America’s most popular authors, whose latest serial, “Fugitive Gold.” begins next week in these pages.

The fiction train on location.

At a glance, it is evident that Erle Stanley Gardner is not the drawing-room, cocktail-drinking type, but a virile, nature-loving man who lives the same sort of vigorous and adventurous life as the heroes of his stories. He is medium height and stocky and wears a wide sombrero and the look of one who has spent much time in the outdoors.

Mr. Gardner’s early life was spent on the Pacific coast. He was admitted to the California Bar when he was twenty-one and found his first clients among those who made their livings from underworld activities. With prohibition, organised crime increased and so did his work and its accompanying dangers.

Once Mr. Gardner, lest he should talk too much, was kidnapped by gangsters and held prisoner in a hideout house, the gangsters expecting a pitched battle with the police. The events of those hours remained indelibly seared upon his memory.

The skill which Mr. Gardner exhibited in the trial of jury cases, however, gradually led to his dropping of criminal cases, and he became widely known as a trial attorney specializing in cases tried before juries. Some ten years ago he wrote his first magazine stories and in 1933 his first book, “The Case of the Velvet Claws.” He has given up the law, of course, and today devotes all his time to writing.

Lunch time on the road.

Erle Gardner has traveled all over the world, but he loves and belongs to the Southwest of which be writes so colorfully and fascinatingly—and so convincingly. Convincingly, because he relies only partly upon imagination for plots, preferring to supplement his stories from first-hand contact. It is not surprising, therefore, that he has found himself in more positions of personal danger than the average man would in two lifetimes.

Upon one occasion, seeking a lost gold mine (much the same as the lost mine that plays so important a part in “Fugitive Gold”) he was challenged by two horsemen, one of whom “cut down” on him with a six-shooter. Gardner finally outdistanced them in his car, felt chagrined when safe, and returned, rifle in hand, “to see what it was all about.” The horsemen stared at him, both fingering their guns; he stared at them. At last a wordless truce was declared and they went their own ways. Such a type of man is Erle Stanley Gardner, the author.

An author? But how does he live in this house on wheels? How does he get any work done? The interviewer stands a little abashed as Mr. Gardner gently explains: “There are three trailers, all self-contained living units. There are double beds; closets; water tanks; stoves; windows; awnings; screens; ice-boxes and radios.

“As to getting work done, I use dictating machines for first drafts of stories and I can dictate fast enough to keep all three of my secretaries busy transcribing. These secretaries, incidentally, have been with me since I began writing eleven years ago and travel everywhere with Mrs. Gardner and me. Two years ago we went to China and left the secretaries behind, but I won’t do that again. There were lots of times I was punching the portable when there were priceless experiences to be had.”

Mr. Gardner is at home in the Southwest.

This, then, is how the man lives whose latest and best novel begins next week in these pages. A novel of the modern bad men of the Southwest. The story of a lost gold mine. A story of adventure, of crime and love. A story packed with thrills and fast-moving action, with breathless suspense and a romance as tender and as strong as the rugged land in which it takes place. Watch for “Fugitive Gold” by Erie Stanley Gardner—in our next issue.

• Download “An Adventure Every Day” (May 19, 1935, This Week)

Thirty-four pilots gone—one by one they screamed to their death, and not a Hun in the sky! And each one that was found had bitten off the end of his tongue . . . . What was the terrible force operating on the Doomed Sguadron?

From the pages of Eagles of the Air, it’s “The Doomed Squadron” by E.W. Chess!

• Download “The Doomed Squadron” (February 1930, Eagles of the Air)

If you haven’t check it out, Pulpflakes posted an excellent post about the life of “Elliot Chess—Fighter pilot, Author” last year.