Throughout
history, since the very first human put pigment to a cave wall, and quite
likely even before that, there has been in every human population the need to
reach up beyond the hill top and tree canopies, to the very sky itself. This idea of flight has remained with us
through literal eons, while other ideas have come and gone, most long forgot
never to be remembered, and a few written down in historical manuscripts and
documents. Why is that flight, thought like
so many other ideas to be no less then unachievable magic, lingered and grew to
mature into the modern industry we see today? What kept the dream alive for so
many centuries? In this paper we will
discuss a few of the important milestones in the development of flight long
before mankind defeated gravity.
No other idea through history seems
as ubiquitous as flight. It spanned
continents, appearing all over the world in a time when populations were
separated by insurmountable oceans and continents. And in almost all cases flight was connected to the supernatural, lying solely in the realm of gods and
deities. Evidence of flight connected to
religious beliefs can be found throughout history. European mythology is well known for its
stories of Daedalus and Icarus who flew with wings made of wax (Davidson, 2008)
to escape the tower of Minos. Farther
north, in the Nordic regions, Valkeries, winged women warriors on flying horses were believed to fly over battle fields (Caviness, A., 2012) and choose who would survive the fight and
who would fall. Further west, much further, in South America, the Incans had
their own myths, including one of a boy riding a condor to find a love interest
(Bierhorst, J. 1976).
As we can see, religions and
mythologies around the world carried with them the idea of flight. Though not a singular event, religious myths
from around the world are where we find the first seeds of mankind’s fascination
with flight. It is paradoxical that religion,
so rooted in the supernatural, would be the carrier for an idea that would take
concrete and substantial scientific and technological understanding to bring to
reality. The fact that so many religions, spread so far apart, each held an idea of flight ensured that even if a
singular culture failed and let their unique vision of flight die, others
would carry on and deliver the idea of flight to a future prepared to pursue it
in earnest.
For centuries manned flight remained
in the realm of the myths and legends, dragons and magic. It wasn’t until the the great thinkers of the
Renaissance that the idea of pursuing flight with the rigors of the scientific
method took hold. Most notably the
artist, philosopher and scientist Leonardo DeVinci applied his engineering mind
to the problem and developed several models for flying machines. Among these are the helical aerial screw, a
manned ornithopter, and a pyramidal shaped parachute (Brennan, A., 2016), all
of which he designed 400 years before mankind would ever leave the ground using powered wings. The detail of his drawings and the notes of
his experiments marked a great leap forward toward manned flight. Prior to Da Vinci flight was not looked at as
a serious possibility and so little real work was put into achieving it. Each of his devices showed an understanding
of the physical principles needed to achieve flight. In his parachute design one can see he was
thinking of air resistance, what we call drag.
The ornithopter is the beginning of drawing upon nature to solve
engineering problems. He studied the
ratio of a bird’s weight to its wing area and thus invented the idea of wing
loading, an idea of utmost importance in aircraft manufacturing today. Through the application of scientific study,
he even realized that it was not the flapping of a wing that provides lift, but
rather the flow of air moving near the wing, that allowed cranes to
fly. It was Da Vinci that turned a once
magical idea into a real physical problem with a solution that could be understood
by mortal men. In essence he created the
science of flight.
Despite the remarkable discoveries
of Da Vinci, it wasn’t until three hundred years later that the Mongolfier
brothers lifted two men in a balloon filled with hot air. Perhaps the most intriguing piece of this is
that one has to recognize the confluence of events that made it possible at
all. The Mongolfier family were expert
paper makers, paper being light weight and relatively tough made the balloon
possible. Even then it was the smoke and
embers rising from a fireplace that sparked their interest. And then in a mad
rush, they created the successful balloon in less than a year from when the
fireplace first provided the idea. On November 21st 1783, a balloon
lifted Jen-Francois Pilatre’ and Francois Laurent into the air, marking the
first true manned flight (Tretkoff, E., 2006). On that flight, the idea that
had been carried through the ages in so many forms, an idea that had started in
myth, became a reality. The Mongolfier
brothers fused the cumulative imagination of mankind into a singular event, and leaving no
room for doubt declared that the sky could be tamed.
Throughout known history, mankind’s fascination
with flight was carried like a torch being passed from culture to culture,
generation to generation. Along the way
it caused fires in some who saw it not as a supernatural explanation for things
observed in nature, but as a challenge to be overcome. The remarkableness of this is evident when
one compares it to so many other ideas that were lost in the ages or dropped
from all pursuit. We rarely see serious
inquiry into spell making or dragon summoning.
We no longer attribute the phases of the moon to great beasts eating
it. It was flight that stayed with us, first being carried in religions all over the world, then being transformed from
magic to science, and finally becoming a reality. Thanks to superstitious tribes from years
long forgot, we have flown the circumference of the globe without touching the
ground, sent men to the moon, and probes beyond the edge of the solar
system. Flight it seems is the one
unifying force that spans the globe. Is it any wonder that we describe time as an arrow in flight?
Bierhorst,
J., (1976). Black Rainbow. New York:
Farrar, Straus, and Giroux
Brennan,
A., (February 2016). Leanardo Da Vinci’s 10 most extraordinary inventions.
Retrieved from https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/leonardo-da-vinci-10-inventions-most-extraordinary
Caviness,
A., & CAVINESS, A. (2012). Valkyries. In Gods, goddesses, and mythology.
Tarrytown, NY: Marshall Cavendish Reference. Retrieved from
https://search.credoreference.com/content/topic/valkyries_norse_mythology
Davidson,
J., (Januaury 14, 2008). Daedalus and Icarus. The Gaurdian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/jan/14/greekmyths.greekmythsfeatures4
Tretkoff,
E., (2006). November 1783: Intrepid physicist is first to fly. APS NEWS, Volume 15, (Issue 10).
Retrieved from https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200611/history.cfm
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