Storks In Flight Gave Glider Pioneer Ideas
How a study of the planing, gliding flight of storks, in a small town near the the shores of the Baltic Sea last century, inspired a pioneer of aviation who was “flying” years before the Wright brothers’ efforts in America, is family history to a Christchurch woman, Mrs Proctor Morris, of Windermee road, Papanui.
The pioneer, Otto Lilienthal, was the elder brother of Mrs Morris’s mother. “I remember my mother telling me how they (Otto and his brother Gustav) would marvel at the flight of the storks,” Mrs Morris said yesterday, before going with other members of her family as guests of Qantas to a preview of the “Da Vinci to Sputnik” exhibition in which is displayed a model of a glider made by their uncle.
The Lilienthal family then lived in Anklam, which is now in Eastern Germany. Sometimes the boys would take their little sister Marie with them on their excursions.
"Mother often talked to us about bow they used to lie out in the long grass, sometimes for hours, to watch how the storks could glide upwards from the chimneys where they nested, without any flapping of their wings.” If birds could ride on air currents, men could too, Otto reasoned. He was educated as an engineer and by 1889 had written a book, the translated title of which was “Birdflight as the Basis of Aviation.’’
Removed Mystery “Aeronautics.” Part 1, in the Science Museum of London, has this to say: “Otto Lilienthal (1848-96) was undoubtedly the greatest pioneer of gliding flight and one of the principal contributors to the knowledge and confidence which subsequently made mechanical flight possible... he demonstrated that natural flight was not a mystery, but could be recouped to a purely mechanical or dynamical proposition.
"He was the first to supply reliable data concerning the shape of wings...he considered the possibility of applying mechanical power to his flying machines, and he made calculations for that purpose. . . .”
First Jumps Otto experimented with gliders, and in 1891 made his first jumps from an 18ft mill hill. Other models followed. A monoplane that could be folded up appeared in 1893, and in the same year flights of up to 200 yards were made near Berlin from a height of 30ft. In 1894 an ornithopter, with “primary feathers,” driven by a one-cylinder motor of two horsepower, was built.
An artificial hill was built at Gross Lichterfelde, near Berlin by the Lilienthals for the flights. In 1895 flights were made from this hill in a biplane glider.
“I saw the hill when I was in Berlin two years ago,” Mrs Morris said. “It has been made into a monument for him, with a reflecting lake in front of it.” Not far from the site live other branches of the family, whom she met.
Lilienthal's career ended in 1896, when he received fatal injuries in a glider crash. “I remember mother telling us a heavy gale caused one of the wings to crack,” said Mrs Morris.
Study By Wrights However, the aviator’s work lived on. Wilbur Wright who visited Germany to study Lilienthal’s work, took one of the pioneer’s planes back to America with him, and continued the experiments.
Long before this, however, Marie Lilienthal had left Berlin. “My mother was about 18 when she left Germany. She was for a time governess to the daughters of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and taught them music and art. In 1880 she met her brother, Gustav, who had become an. architect in London, and travelled with him to Australia, where he became one of the architects of the new Houses of Parliament in Melbourne.”
On the same boat was a young Devonshire farmer, who wanted to settle in the new world. Before the end of the trip he and Marie were engaged.
Wed In Christchurch They settled at Darling Downs until there was a parching drought in the area. Then Mrs Morris’s father moved on to New Zealand.
“Mother followed later, and they were married in Christchurch. The second generation are still farming their original holding of land in South Canterbury.” Mrs Morris, her sister, Mrs Caroline Dale (Maungati), and their two brothers, Messrs Wil. Squire (Fairview) and G. Squire (Cannington, Cave), were also guests of Qantas last evening, at a reception, before attending the exhibition. -Press, 8/7/1964.
Otto Lilienthal's last words, as he lay dying with a broken back, were "Sacrifices must be made."
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