; Edmond Audemars
 
EDMOND AUDEMARS
1882-1970
 

 
 
Edmond Audemars in his Demoiselle
 
 
Edmond Audemars in his Demoiselle - 1910
Photo courtesy of Jean-Claude Cailliez, 11-5-04
 

 
 
 
 
AIRSHOW, Houston, Texas 1911
Sitting, l-r: Joseph Seymour, John Frisbie, Rene Simon ('flying fool'),
Edmund Audemars, Rene Barrier, Roland Garros, Peter Young (manager),
and Charles Hamilton (standing)
From AIRSHOW, Houston, Texas 1911
By permission of Story Sloane, 10-12-09
 

 
 

The Daily Journal and Tribune,
Knoxville, Tennessee: September 8, 1912,
Transcribed by Bob Davis - 6-11-04
     
"International Aviation Meet will be Featured by World's Championship Race. $10,000 Silver Service has been Won by an American, Once Curtiss and the Other Time Weymann
This Week's Program"
"Chicago, Sept. 7. - America's third international aviation meet, which opens Monday, will establish a new mark for America in the number of aviators of international fame entered. chief of these are the pilots of the foreign and American racers who compete in the Gordon Bennett world's championship aeroplane race, the first event of the meet.
      The meeting embraces daily monoplane and biplane handicap races, a scratch biplane and monoplane race which is designed to give further demonstration of the skill of the Gordon Bennett drivers, and a 40-kilometer race for all types, handicapped. Other contests are bomb and mail throwing, accuracy landing contests from heights of 1,000 feet without a motor and similar events in which the skill of the operator is tested.
      This is the fourth time aeroplanes have been matched for the world's championship, as typified by the $10,000 silver trophy given by James Gordon Bennett in 1908 to be contended for annually by licensed pilots of the Federation Aeronautique Internationale.
      Twice before a single American entrant has driven his aeroplane ahead of his competitors and brought the silver trophy to America. Glenn H. Curtiss was the first winner, at Rheims, France, Aug. 28, 1909. His biplane finished the 12.4 mile race in 15 minutes, 50 seconds, or five seconds ahead of the looked-for winner, Louis Bleriot's monoplane. There were five starters, but only four of the flyers were able to cover the distance, which then was considered an almost impossible journey for an aeroplane.
      In New York on the Belmont park aerodrome, the second contest was held. The course had been lengthened to 100 kilometers (62.14 miles) and Claude Graham-White, England's best known airman, won in 71 minutes, 4 seconds, in the first 100-horsepower Bleriot monoplane built. Alfred LeBlanc, of France, led in the race in a similar machine, up to the last lap of the field, when he ran out of gasoline and in landing, crashed into a telephone pole and smashed his aeroplane.
      Graham-White's victory took the trophy for England, where it was contested for in 1911 on the Isle of Sheppy at Eastchurch, July 1. Charles Terres Weymann, sole American entrant, again went up in a 100 horsepower Nieuport monoplane and captured the trophy. His time for the 100 kilometers was 81 minutes, 30 seconds, a speed of over eighty miles an hour, then a world's speed record. Leblanc again after the world championship, had to content himself with second, being two minutes slower than Weymann.
      Speed alone determines the winner, there being no restriction on the construction of the aeroplane. Because of the high speeds obtained, few aviators have cared to enter, and in the three events held previously, a total of thirteen entrants only appear on the lists.
      This year the race has been lengthened to 200 kilometers (124 miles), and the course was laid out as an ellipse of 4.14 miles, requiring thirty laps to complete the races. In the French elimination trials, Jules Vedrinesmade a speed of 100 miles an ahour, which established expectance as to what speed would be made by the choice machines of the six nations competing - America, England, France, Holland, Belgium and Switzerland.
      France designated Jules Vedrines and Maurice Prevost, pilots of Deperdussin monoplanes, and Andre Frey, who drives an Hanriot monoplane, as its representatives. England had named Claude Graham-White, Gustave Hamel and George Dyott, but it was certain until the last minute just who would make the actual flights.
      Belgium's representative, Charles Morok, died of typhoid fever a few days before the race, and Jan Wynmalen, who was to represent Holland, was so disappointed in the showing of his Oerts monoplane, he withdrew. Edmond Audemars, Switzerland's representative, was not certain of entering, and as for America, the choice of pilot will not be definitely settled till the day before the race. An American defender prepared to carry a 100 horsepower motor, the largest aero motor ever designed.
      The hydroaeroplane, or airboat, aviation contests are the first ever held outside military competetions held in France for selection of government machines. The contests must continue five days during which races and contests are evolved to demonstrate how the multi-use machine may be guided on the water, be raised into the air and flown as a flying craft.
      In addition efficiency prizes have been offered, the contest being the numbers of passengers carried, the length of time one, two, and three extra persons may remain aloft, and other similar competitions."
Bob Davis
 

 
 
James Radley
 
 
Monjau - Audemars - Radley - Moissant - Aubrun - Simon
Edmond Audemars - John Moissant
Emile Aubrun - René Simon
Library of Congress, 7-13-08
 

 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
via email from Jean-Claude Cailliez, 11-5-04
     The Swiss pilot Edmond Audemars participated in the New-York Belmont park meeting & competitions in October 1910, flying a Santos-Dumont "Demoiselle."
     Then, with the Moisant "Aviation Circus", he flew over some US cities from Christmas, 1910 to early (March?) 1911, also including some flights over Mexico and Cuba.
     At the beginning of 1912, he was again on a circus tour in Argentina. He was the close friend of Roland Garros and stopped to flying when Garros died (1918).
     He was a very good stunt pilot who earned a lot of prizes including the Paris-Berlin (1912) and Berlin-Paris (1913) races.
     He was later associated with the Jaegger-Lecoultre company all the rest of his life, (watches, chronos, flight instruments, jewelry).
Cordially
Jean-Claude Cailliez
Historien de l'aviation
75 avenue de Mategnin
CH-1217 Meyrin, Suisse
tél/fax +41 22-782.30.39
prof +41 22-327.43.65
 

 
 
BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
via email from Dave Lam, 11-14-04
     Edmond Audemars participated in the 1910 Bournemouth Air Meet. Though Swiss, he earned French license # 100 on 10 June 1910.
 

 
 
ONLINE RESOURCES
     If you search for "Edmond Audemars", using the Google search engine, (11-8-04), you will find about 54 links. Many of them are in French, but usually a machine translation is available directly from Google.
 

 
 
The Moisant International Aviators
     This page on Carroll Gray's website offers a very comprehensive revue of the Moisant International Aviators. You will find a mention of EdmondAudemars as one of the members of the team. If time permits, you will probably want to read the whole story which includes mention of many of the pioneer aviators of the era. You can access the page by clicking on the title above.
 

 
 
Cycling - Amateur Motor-Paced World Champions
     This page on Tony Hinchliffe's Sports Facts website lists EdmondAudemars as the winner of a 100 km bicycle race in 1903. You can access the page by clicking on the title above.
 

 
 
 
 
Edmond Audemars died in 1970.
via email from Pete Jones, 10-16-08
 

 
 
Editor's Note:
If you have any more information on this pioneer aviator
please contact me.
E-mail to Ralph Cooper
 

 
 
BackBack Home