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- ╚January 2, 1928Man of the YearCharles Lindbergh
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- Height: 6 ft. 2 inches.
- Age: 25.
- Eyes: Blue.
- Cheeks: Pink.
- Hair: Sandy.
- Feet: Large. When he arrived at the Embassy in France no shoes
- big enough were handy.
- Habits: Smokes not; drinks not. Does not gamble. Eats a
- thorough-going breakfast / Prefers light luncheon and dinner when
- permitted. Avoids rich dishes. Likes sweets.
- Calligraphy: From examination of his handwriting Dr. Camille
- Streletski, Secretary of French Graphological Society concluded:
- Superiority, intellectualism, cerebration, idealism, even
- mysticism.
- Characteristics: Modesty, taciturnity, diffidence (women make
- him blush), singleness of purpose, courage, occasional curtness,
- phlegm. Elinor Glyn avers he lacks "It."
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- Last week rumor rose that for next summer a direct flight
- to China was proposed for the first of flyers. An accomplished
- and reliable Chinese gentleman, also an aviator, sponsored the
- rumor. Skeptics pointed out that such a spectacular bid for
- Chinese good will was among the more remote problems if
- immediate statecraft. Hard-headed U.S. men, soft-hearted U.S.
- women grumblingly asked when the dangerous far-flung flight of
- Col. Lindbergh would cease.
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- To date he has flown to France; Belgium; England; Mexico;
- Canada in the interests (his) of aviation progress and the
- interests (governmental) of international good will. In his own
- writings last week he pointed out the risks of flying over the
- lonely Central American mountains. Remarked dissenters: "How
- much more lonely are the wastes of the Pacific; jungles below
- the Equator; tropic waterways of the East over which he must fly
- if his portfolio of Ambassador of Good Will is permanent."
- Grumblers wondered of interest accruing to the national welfare
- by his flights is worth the calamitous crash of principal which
- would accompany his death. Col. Lindbergh is the most cherished
- citizen since Theodore Roosevelt. Thought they: "He is worth
- keeping." One way to keep him is to keep him on the ground.
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- Others argued savagely that Lindbergh must fly for his life
- in the public eye; heroes age swiftly when seated at office
- desks; argued that by his very nature he must fly.
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- Unconscious of these wrangles over the national coffee
- cups, Col. Lindbergh tended to business. He climbed into The
- Spirit of St. Louis at Mexico City; nosed upward; set off for
- Guatemala, British Honduras, Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua,
- Costa Rica, Panama.
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- In Detroit a school teacher put by her pointer and her
- students' papers. Mrs. Evangeline Lodge Lindbergh dressed
- herself warmly and was swept southward by the propeller
- windstorm of a sturdy tri-motored Ford monoplane. One night she
- spent in St. Louis. The next day as her famed offspring in
- Mexico City was piloting on his first flight President Plutarco
- Elias Calles, the monoplane sprung to Tulsa, Okla. The third
- sunset found her in Brownsville, Texas. Next day up from the
- crowded field at Mexico City rose Col. Lindbergh in THe Spirit
- of St., Louis. Swallowed in the clouds he missed the monoplane
- which he had flown to meet. Shouts from the field of "Vivi
- Senora Leenbaire" as Mrs. Lindbergh stepped out of the Ford
- plane. She met her wandering boy an hour later at the American
- Embassy.
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- En route Mrs. Lindbergh was loquacious. Previously laconic
- regarding the achievements of her amazing child she expressed
- herself to the press thus:
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- "He has always been my boy. I have always loved him. been
- proud of him and thought he was the world's greatest."
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