Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 182, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 July 1920 — ARABS SKILLED IN AVIATION [ARTICLE]

ARABS SKILLED IN AVIATION

Their Mechanicians Said to Have Been Pioneers In the Art In the "Second Century. The Arie Arabe has some interesting sidelights op the early history of kHatton, so far as it concerns the Arab race. According to this paper, it was at the end of the second century, and the beginning of the third, that the Arab race began to be influenced by the Greeks and Indians. It was in Bagdad that the mathematical and mechanical arts first began to make their appearance. With the coming of these different studies the horizon of the Arabs became enlarged, ft was about this period that the grand Caliph Haroun al-Raschid sent his famous clock to Charlemagne, emperor of the Franks. Amongst the various ' crafts from which the Arabs drew their culture was, strange as it may seem today, that of aviation. At the head of this sectton was the celebrated Arab mechanician Abbas Ben Farnas, the first known pioneer of the art which Bleriot, Farman and Guynemer have since made famous, unless one should Include in such the young Icarus of Greek legend. ' . , \ •