Airplanes Pt. 1 (Pre-1900s)

Albrecht Berblinger's Glider

Amazingly this glider was flown and built by Albrecht Berblinger (I love this guy's name) in 1811. He spent all of his money developing it with a large disapproval from others, but none-the-less continued to build it. Unfortunately he ended up crashing it in front of the public due unfavorable wind conditions and a low starting height. After this, he was socially outcast and called a lier, he later died without having made a successful flight. A replica was made in 1986 and proved that it could indeed glide.

John Stringfellow's Monoplane 1848

This plane is sometimes considered the first true powered flight, it used a steam engine to power two propellers and sent the plane flying for about 100 ft on the second attempt. It did not carry a human on board however. Stringfellow eventually designed a large aircraft and planned to man it himself, but old age took charge.

Sir George Cayley's glider 1849 (this picture is from 1973 though haha)

This guy was great, he conducted the first truly scientific experiments on aircraft which was an important step towards developing stable flight. He successfully tested the above glider with a 10 year old boy on board and a bunch of people pulling it down a hill.

Otto Lilienthal's glider

Between the years 1891 and 1896, Otto Lilienthal piloted around 2000 successful flights, an impressive amount. He even had flights as long as 1150 ft. As you can see, it doesnt look like the safest way to glide and it became his demise. He was gliding one time in 1896, crashed hard and broke his back and died in the hospital the next day after muttering his famous last words, "Sacrifices must be made". ---Side note, Lilienthal is one of my favorite persons in history, you should learn more about him if you have the time.

Chanute-Herring 1896 Biplane Glide

This was considered the most successful pre-wright glider with hundreds of controlled flights of up to 360 ft and 14 seconds long.

If you guys like this, I will continue on throughout aviation history with more parts!