EAGLE ANTICS

ABOVE: We met the intrepid French aviator Eugène Gilbert last issue, when he was mistaken for a gigantic bird of ill-omen and shot at by a terrified farmer in the Auvergne in 1912. A year earlier, Corporal Gilbert had in fact enjoyed a run-in of his own with an all-too-real bird. Competing in the 1911 Paris to Madrid air race, he flew his Bleriot XI across the Pyrenees and was attacked by an angry mother eagle defending her nest and young. To ward off the large bird, Gilbert fired warning shots from his pistol rather than kill it. Gilbert went on to become a flying ace in World War I and died in 1918. La Domenica del Corriere, 4 July 1911.