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The Romance of modern scientific and mechanical Achievements

Dawn of Aerial Navigation 247 From the very earliest days man, in his ambition, has sought the conquest of the air by emulating the bird. But the earliest efforts were weird, fan- tastic, and utterly devoid of any practical value. The majority of the experimenters sought to achieve their end by attaching artificial wings to their bodies, and to copy the bird’s movements by the movement of their arms and legs. Needless to say, they accom- plished nothing beyond broken bones and bruises, and in some cases a terrible death. It was a German genius, Otto Lilienthal, who paved the way for the realisation of the flying machine such as we know it to-day. He built a machine com- prising wings and a rudder, which might be described as a huge kite, with which he indulged in sailing flights. He approached the problem from the severely scientific point of view, discovering new facts and data for himself. With this contrivance by starting from an artificial hill nearly 100 feet in height he was able to sail over distances up to 1,000 feet. Flushed with the success thus achieved, he endeavoured to propel himself through the air, for which purpose he installed a 2| horse-power motor, the idea being to move through the air in any direction. Unfortunately, his researches were brought to an abrupt conclusion. While testing a new steering contrivance which he had designed, he fell from a height of 45 feet and broke his spine, from which accident he died on August 10th, 1896. Contemporaneously with these experiments in Ger- many, an English marine engineer, Mr. Percy S. Pilcher, was attacking the self-same problem and along almost identical lines. He contrived a gliding