THE HISTORY AND SCIENCE OF
AVIATION
CHAPTER I
THE FIRST FLYING MACHINES
THE conquest of the air was not won by a happy accident of invention. Long before man learned to fly the science of aviation had to be created by investigation and experiment. At first with very crude attempts, a great many flying machines had to be built, and many lives sacrificed in flying them. The exact nature of the invisible air currents and the action of wings and planes, were to be learned before the delicate mechanism of the modern aëroplane was possible. Probably no other great invention has required such long and patient preparation.
In many ways the aëroplane is therefore a greater achievement than the steam engine or the steamboat. When Watt turned from watching his tea kettle to build his engine, he applied mechanical principles which had long been in actual use, and there were many experienced mechanics to help him. Robert Fulton, again, when he set up his engine, found the science of boat-building highly developed. The aviator had no such advantage. He must first of all build a craft which would keep afloat in the most unstable of mediums. A motive power had to be applied to suit these conditions, and the two must be so attuned that they would work perfectly together when the least slip would mean instant disaster. As we learn to realize these difficulties we will appreciate more than ever how marvellous a creation is the modern aëroplane.
PLATE XII.
A Good Example of Tilted Planes.
Man has thought much about flying from the earliest times. The open air has always seemed the natural highway, and flying machines were invented hundreds of years before anyone dreamed of steamengines or steamboats. The ancient Greeks long ago spun wonderful tales of the mythical Daedalus and Icarus and their flight to the sun and back again. The first practical aviator seems to have been a Greek named Achytas, and we are told he invented a dove of wood propelled by heated air. There is another ancient record of a brass fly which made a short flight, so that we may be sure that even the ancients had their own ideas about heavier-than-air machines.
As far as we may judge from these quaint old records the early aviators attempted to fly with wings which they flapped about them in imitation of birds. About the year 67 A. D., during the reign of the Emperor Nero, an aviator named “Simon the Magician” made a public flight before a Roman crowd. According to the record, “He rose into the air through the assistance of demons. But St. Peter having offered a prayer, the action of the demons ceased and the magician was crushed in a fall and perished instantly.” The end of the account, which sounds very probable indeed, is the first aëronautical smash-up on record.