Whilst flicking through some feeds today, I came across this story and realised that we have loads of stuff about planes but not alot about the Pioneers of early flight. After all, this whole board would not exsist without them. 

 

Good idea Diesel, I'll see if I can dig some more out when I have time

Here's some very early stuff to watch. The sheer inventiveness of these machines is quite astonishing, bearing in mind that they didn't have the advantage of CAD or wind tunnels to test their designs.




Where as, this little lot made me smile.

Sir Alan Cobham recounts the first flight to Australia and back:



Cobham was also the pioneer of inflight refueling

When talking about aviation Pioneers we should also consider those that came before the Wright brothers, here is a good website on probably the most controvertial of these Gustave Whitehead who claimed to have made powered flight as early as 1898:

Gustav_Whitehead