View source for Crossing the English Channel

=Crossing the English Channel=

by [[User:Sqjohnson|Samuel Johnson]]<br>

{{Infobox 
|title = Portrait of Louis Bleriot
|header1 = Louis Bleriot
|bodystyle = width:25em
|image = [[File:220px-Louis_Bleriot-1.jpg|x450px|alt=Article Image]]

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=Abstract=
My milestone tells the history of the first Crossing of the English Channel in an airplane by Louis Bleriot.  I have been interested in airplanes my who life and have had a book called the Glorious Flight about this topic since I was a kid.  I have taken many history classes before and enjoyed using the research skills I have learned from them on this project. this event in time. The biggest take away from this milestone was the danger that the early pilots faced and have a new respect for them based on the risk they took to advance aviation.  

=Introduction= 

This milestones purpose is to tell the history of the first Crossing of the English Channel in an airplane by Louis Bleriot.  The Crossing of the English Channel was the most important pre World War I aviation event outside of the Wright Brothers first flight at Kitty hawk.  Bleriot's flight across the English Channel showed what the future of aviation had to offer by crossing  a natural barrier. In order to tell the history of Bleriot's flight I decided to attempt a Ken Burns style documentary. After starting off with only the knowledge that Bleriot crossed the channel I branched out my research to include Hubert Latham's, Bleriot's main competitor, attempt at crossing the channel. After reading about them in various history of aviation books I created the documentary.   
=Background or Origin of Article=
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==The Daily Mail Prize==
In 1909, after early achievements the new field of aviation entered its next phase.  The beginning of this next phase was kicked off by the crossing of the English channel, for the first time.  The crossing occurred between Calais, France, and Dover on the English side.  The crossing of the channel was formalized by a contest sponsored by the Daily Mail, a newspaper, with the goal of increasing readership.  This was initiated by the owner of the Daily Mail, Lord Northcliffe, who believed newspapers should create news, not just report it.  Lord Northcliffe put a prize of 1,000 pounds to the first person to successfully cross the English Channel by air.  Lord Northcliffe also believed in the future of aviation.
 
	The creation of the prize for crossing the English Channel caught the imagination of the public.  Other newspapers in Europe and in the US had to send their reporters to cover it.  Thousands of people travelled to the French and English sides of the channel when it was reported that attempts would be made to cross.  These tens of thousands of people were hoping to experience history being made.  Lord Northcliffe’s goal was achieved and he created a huge amount of public interest in the aviation milestone of crossing the English Channel.  
 
==The Competitors==
Three men attempted or planned to attempt the English Channel Crossing.  They were:  Hubert Latham, the Comte de Lambert, and Louis Bleriot.  The Comte de Lambert had actually been taught to fly by Wilbur Wright.  And, he had a Wright biplane.  Unfortunately, he crashed his biplane while practicing near the French side of the channel, and was out of the competition.
 
===Hubert Latham===
Hubert Latham was a wealthy French Playboy.  He once described his profession as “man of the world”.  He had many accomplishments under his belt.  He had raced automobiles.  He had raced speed boats.  He had crossed the English Channel in a balloon with a cousin, who was the pilot.  His latest interest became airplanes.  He learned to fly at the aircraft works of the French Antonette firm who also made the engines of the boats he raced.  He quickly became on of the most skilled pilots also a flying instructor.  He quickly began setting a variety of records with the Antonette airplane.  He set an altitude record.  Then, he set a record for distance.  He showed off how stable the Antonette airplane was during the distance record by taking his hands off the wheel and lighting and smoking a cigarette in his trademark ivory holder.  If he crashed that was the first thing he would do after the crash, light up a cigarette and smoke it in his ivory holder.  He was known to carry his cigarette and holder in a silver case with him everywhere he went, particularly on his adventures.
 
===Louis Bleriot===

	Louis Bleriot was a self-made man.  He had gone to college at Ecole Centrale, a polytechnic school in Paris, where he earned a degree in engineering.  His first job was at an electrical engineering company.  He developed the first successful head lamp for automobiles.  Then he formed his own company to manufacture headlamps and sell them to automobile manufacturers.  His company was very successful and he became a wealthy many. This meant he could pursue his interests in aviation with the profits from his headlamp business.  He had long had an interest in aviation.  He began his aeroplane experiments by designing and building a flapping wing plane, which was a failure.  He was a self taught pilot, learning as he created new aeroplane designs, constructed them, and attempted to fly them. In fact, he was noted for his crashes.  But, he stuck to it, and by 1909, he had what he called his Bleriot XI, his eleventh iteration of his airplane experiments.  
 
==The Planes==
 
===The Bleriot XI===
Bleriot’s experiments had evolved towards monoplanes, which meant the plane had one wing.  Many other early experimenters, including the Wright Brothers were focused on biplanes, planes with two wings.  Bleriot’s eleventh airplane the Bleriot XI was the culmination of his work and had what now looks like a modern layout.  It was a monoplane with the engine up front at the nose, a single set of wings, and a rudder and elevator at the tail.  This was different than the Wright biplane that had an elevator out in the front, rudders at the rear, and pusher props behind the wing.  Unlike the Wright biplane where the pilot sat on the front of the wing, in Bleriot’s plane the pilot sat in a fuselage between the wings.  The plane relied on a 3 cylinder air cooled Anzani Engine motorcycle in order to power it along with a more efficient propeller.  It also used advanced landing suspension that could bend and pivot in order to allow it land in fields better.
 
After the English Channel crossing Bleriot and his plane were world famous.  There was lots of demand for Bleriot XI’s around the world and his company set about producing them.  Many were produced in his own factory.  Others were produced under license by other firms. Over 800 Bleriot XI’s were produced worldwide over the next five years, making it the first mass produced airplane.  The Bleriot XI design continued to evolve.  The first major change early on in producing Bleriot XI’s was fitting the more powerful 7-cylinder rotary Gnome engine.  In the Gnome engine the engine cylinders actually spun around with the propellor unlike the 3-cylinder Anzani used in the original.  Later variants of the XI included two-seat versions that could carry a passenger.  The Bleriot company would later produce the SPAD fighter flown by the Allies in WWI.  The Bleriot aircraft company was still a thriving airplane manufacturer at the time of Louis’ death in 1936.
 
===The Antoinette IV===

Hubert Latham did not design his own plane.  He was a pilot, and piloted the Antoinette IV, a plane designed a man named Leon Levavasseur, at the Antoinette company.  The Antoinette was also a monoplane, with the rudder and elevator back at the rear of the plane.  The engine and propellor were up front, and the pilot sat sort of in and sort of on top of the fuselage behind the wings.  So, the Antoinette was also in the more modern configuration of an airplane.  The Antoinette had a V-8 water cooled engine manufactured by their firm, originally for racing boats.  The radiators for the water were attached along the sides of the fuselage up by the nose of the airplane.  The propellor on the Antoinette was much cruder than the Bleriot, and resembled very simple rowing paddles.  The Antoinette was a considerably larger airplane than the Bleriot. 
 
The Antoinette airplane did not become famous like the Bleriot since it did not achieve the first flight over the channel.  The Antoinette airplane continued to be developed over the next several years.  They switched the control back from ailerons to wing-warping. And, they installed a larger V-16 engine and a more modern carved wood propellor.  But, the overall design stayed very similar to the one that Latham attempted the Channel crossing with.  There was very little demand for the Antoinette airplanes, since most people were buying Bleriot’s.  By 1912, just three years after the English Channel crossing the Antoinette firm was bankrupt and out of business.  

==The Race==
 
Hubert Latham attempted to cross the English Channel from Calais France to Dover England after arriving on July 19th 1909.  Because of an engine failure he was forced to attempt to land in the Channel.  Each time he flew he had a French destroyer following him in order to rescue him if he crashed into the water.  After they arrived at his floating plane wreck, they found him dry sitting on top of the wreck smoking a cigarette. Latham’s Antoinette was destroyed from the crash and a new one had to be sent up via train. 
 
On July 21st Bleriot arrived in Calais with his Bleriot XI ready to attempt crossing the English Channel.  Because of the severe wind at the time bleriot and latham were grounded for a couple days. However, on July 25th Bleriot and his mechanic are awake very early and catch good weather for crossing the channel and set off around 4:40 am.  The noise of Bleriot taking off woke up Latham and his team who rushed to prepare the Antoinette. However, they were too late as the wind had become unfavorable when they were ready to take off.  
 
When Bleriot took off he did not have any navigational devices with him such as a compass, map, or clock. This lead to him losing his orientation and arriving down the coast from his landing point in dover.  However, he was able to correct his course and arrive in dover completing the Daily Mail Prize and successfully crossing the English Channel. After arriving Bleriot offered to split the prize money with Latham if he could make it across. This gesture was never tested as Latham failed to cross the channel again resulting in another rescue of him and his wreckage.  Latham was never able to attempt completing the Daily Mail prize as the Antoinette company did not want to lose another plane. 
 
=Deliverable=
==Crossing the English Channel==
This video tells the story of Louis Bleriot competing against Hubert Latham to win the Daily Mail prize after crossing the English Channel and culminates with Bleriot's success. The use of pictures and voice over to form a video was chosen because I wanted to have the experience of trying to create a documentary like the Ken Burns documentaries that I love watching.


<mediaplayer>File:Crossing_the_English_Channe_low_res.mp4</mediaplayer> 


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=References=

Brett, R. D. (1988). History of British aviation: 1908-1914. Surbiton, Surrey, England: Air Research Publications.

"The Wright Story/Showing the World/Louis Bleriot Cross the English Channel." Bleriot's Cross Channel Flight. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 June 2017. <http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/Wright_Story/Showing_the_World/Crossing_the_Channel/Bleriots_Flight.htm>.
 
Grant, R. G. Flight: 100 Years of Aviation. London: Dorling Kindersley, 2010. Print.
 

Images
 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b6/Latham1large.jpg/300px-Latham1large.jpg
 
http://www.thefirstairraces.net/pilots/images/latham1345.jpg
 
http://www.thefirstairraces.net/pilots/images/latham2345.jpg
 
http://www.janinetissot.fdaf.org/images/LATHAM%20Hubert3.jpg
 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9a/Antoinette4.jpg/300px-Antoinette4.jpg
 
http://www.wright-brothers.org/Information_Desk/Just_the_Facts/Airplanes/Wright_Airplane_images/1904_Flyer_II/1904_Flyer_Flight_16Nov.jpg
 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/First_flight2.jpg
 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9c/Louis_Bleriot.jpg/220px-Louis_Bleriot.jpg
 
http://www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/images/bleriot_007_500.jpg
 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8c/Bleriot_XI_Thulin_A_1910_a.jpg
 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/03/Bleriot.jpg
 
https://doverhistorian.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/th-louis-blc3a9riot-july-1909-plane-courtesy-of-dover-library.jpg
 
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/25/Louis_Blériot_Dover_1909.jpg/1280px-Louis_Blériot_Dover_1909.jpg

https://flyawaysimulation.com/images/downloadshots/1334-bleriotxihellenicairservicezip-1-anzani-24hp.jpg
 
https://www.thegoodlifefrance.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/calais.png

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[[Category:History]]