harrym, excellent stuff, Sir! The setting again so well described, especially the contrasts (wild west film set town yet with luxurious interiors for a Brit).
The Cornell sounds a very variable beast given its hybrid construction and equipment dependent on its origin, the plywood one side metal on the other wings on one sounds almost as bizarre as the DC2/DC3 wings fitted to one of Mr Douglas's products in Nationalist China, but there again they both flew!
So lots more please, and don't worry about thread drift, indeed embrace it! The many 'by the way' moments are the very essence of our thread. It's more a ramble than a race, so lots of time and lots of interesting byways to choose. Let digression be our watchword!