Transport: Round Trip

To win a £20,000 wager Phileas Fogg, cucumbrous hero of Novelist Jules Verne’s best seller, circled the globe in 80 days. This fictive feat remained a record until 1889, when the late Publisher Joseph Pulitzer, casting about for a circulation-getter, ordered 22-year-old Nellie Ely to “knock about five days off this fellow Phileas Fogg’s record.” Globe-girdler Bly, bloomered and veiled, sailed from Hoboken, N. J. on a bow-spritted ocean greyhound, completed her stint in 72¼ days.

Since Nellie Ely’s day, the record has changed hands as often as wrestling titles.

First to round the world by commercial airline was the New York World-Telegram’s, Herbert Roslyn (“Bud”) Ekins (1936; 181 days).

Ekins’ record stood unchallenged till last month, when a wealthy widow named Clara Adams, famed in airline circles as an inveterate first-nighter, saw her chance. When Pan American’s Dixie Clipper soared away from Port Washington, L. I. on its first transatlantic passenger flight, Mrs. Adams took her seat. In Marseille her plans nearly went agley. Fellow-tripper Julius Rappaport of Allentown, Pa., confessed that he too hankered to make a record. With chivalry worthy of Phileas Fogg, he finally withdrew, leaving Widow Adams unrivaled in the field. July 3rd found Widow Adams in Jodhpur, India, joshing its photophobic maharajah into posing with her for a snapshot. But her biggest thrill came in the California Clipper nearing Honolulu, when she broadcasted over a Honolulu-San Francisco radio hookup. She did not strike rough weather until she encountered an electrical storm over Nebraska.

Sixteen days, 19 hours, 4 minutes after leaving New York, Widow Adams was back again. She had flown all the way. Total mileage: 25,000. Cost: $2,500. Chortled she: “That’s ten cents a mile. Can you travel cheaper than that?”