Felix du Temple de la Croix
1823-1890
Felix du Temple, as he is more commonly known, was a French naval officer. However, before and after leaving the navy he longed to fly. Accredited with the first powered flight and the first retractable landing gear, he more than accoplished his goal and helped to push the exploration of the Earth to higher heights.
(original
design of 1857)
(Monoplane design of 1874)
Felix du Temple put a lot of time and thought into the first designs
of his aircraft. The original design (pictured on the left),
although never built was estamated to weigh around a ton. Fortunately,
with the help of his brother, Louis, the duo designed and built a working
model (pictured on the right), made of aluminum, weighing in at only 106
pounds without the operator. Because the original power source was
a steam engine and to heavy for the new aircraft the brothers built a specially
designed "hot air" steam engine. In addition to having the first
internal engine, it also included the first retractable landing gear, a
tractor propeller, and a boat-shaped hull all under a wing span of only
40 feet. Although the flight was only a small distance and a short
time, it was enough to go down in the histroy books when it coasted to
a stop after a soft landing without injury to the craft or the pilot.
After the flight was completed and seen as successful, the aircraft became
know as the Monoplane because it could only carry one person, the pilot,
due to the design.
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Designed by Amanda Pillow