JF Ptak Science Books  Quick Post

Capt. Paul-Nicholas Lucas-Girardville of the Military Aviation Park, Vincennes, an interesting inventor and early aviator  (and author of a  Étude sur la navigation aérienne in 1899)  came up with this idea for a “gyroscopic” aeroplane, or flying machine. Initially I thought that there was no gyroscopic action and that the idea was being used for static stability, as a different body for the aircraft. But as it turns out there was some sort of gyroscope being employed here, though I do not understand how it functioned–I have to say though that it seems like an interesting experiment, especially given how early this came in the history of airplanes.  In any event, I bumped into this evocative photo in the pages of the June 22, 1911 issue of Scientific American Supplement and thought to share them.  

[Source for the two images, above and below: Scientific American Supplement, July 22, 1911   For the full text of the article in a raw-ish OCR format, see: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/abstracts-from-current-periodicals-1911-07-22/]