John Carver Edwards, a retired UGA archivist, has released a new book entitled Orville’s Aviators: Outstanding Alumni of the Wright Flying School, 1910-1916.
The book profiles six pilots who graduated from the Wright Brothers’ School of Aviation in Ohio: Arthur L. Welsh, a Russian immigrant who rose to become Orville Wright’s chief instructor; Howard Warfield Gill, heir to an international tea dynasty; Archibald Freeman, whose flour-bag bombing of Boston Harbor won him attention as an early exponent of the supremacy of air power; Grover Cleveland Bergdoll, whose promise as a pilot quickly soured; George A. Gray, whose marriage resulted in an extraordinary husband-and-wife exhibition team; and Howard Max Rinehart, aerial mercenary, international racing competitor, Wright test pilot, South American explorer and co-owner of one of America’s premiere charter
services.