Carl Friedrich Meerwein

Carl Friedrich Meerwein (2 August 1737 in Leiselheim – 6 December 1810 in Emmendingen) was a German civil engineer and aviation pioneer.

He built flying devices with moving wings. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica he succeeded in flying with one of these devices, an ornithopter in 1781, at Giessen, Germany. Further attempts were less successful. There is a legend that he only survived one of his flights in 1784 because he hit exactly upon a dung pile.[1]

"Meerwein, the architect of the Prince of Baden, built an orthopteric machine, and protested against the tendency of the aerostats which had just been invented." (Verne, Robur)

Meerwein died as a result of a fall from a horse.

Notes
  1. Untucht, Peter (2003) Freiburg und die Regio DuMont-Reiseverlag, Cologne, Germany, page 164, ISBN 3-7701-6047-9, in German

Sources
This article is based in part on material from the German Wikipedia.

Further reading
  • "Airplane:History of Flight" (2007) Encyclopædia Britannica Retrieved May 17, 2007, from Encyclopædia Britannica
  • Hart, Clive (1972)The dream of flight: aeronautics from classical times to the Renaissance Faber and Faber, London, ISBN 0-571-09886-X
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