frankchampion

American aviator Frank Champion (1884-1917) "By the time Champion performed before the Emperor of Japan in early 1917 he had added the loop to his aerobatic routine. He was performing the maneuver over Koghi, Japan, in July when a wing spar on his Bleriot failed sending the Oklahoma flier plummeting 4,000-feet to his death. The entire population of the city turned out for his funeral and accompanied his ashes in a colorful procession through the streets of the town. The Emperor honored the flier's memory by placing the 50-hp Gnome rotary engine of his mangled monoplane on exhibit in the Imperial Palace in Tokyo." www.earlyaviators.com/echampio.htm

see also

Thank you Art Siegel. We will add more details to these photographs of American aviator Frank Champion.

I searched out in the US magazine Aerial Age Weekly which gives an article and a picture of Frank Champion flying in Japan in the issue of Vol.6 No.1 (September 17, 1917) p. 12 hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015080124087?urlappend=%3Bseq=14 Obviously the machine he flew was a Morane-Saulnier monoplane as evidenced in the picture and in the picture of the LC. The fatal flight and death of Frank Champion was also recorded in Aerial Age Weekly Vol.6 No.9 (12 November 1917) p. 374 hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015080124087?urlappend=%3Bseq=194 He fell from a height of 4000 ft. due to a broken wing on 1 November 1917 during a flight at Kochi (Japan). Obviously I am completely disappointed by the links to the exact pages - they do not work, at least when I controlled it myself.

Frank Champion, see

Thanks Art Siegel for making the connection between these two images. We will add more details.