General Monthly Meeting and Presidential Address
Antipodean Aeronautica
Mr David A. Craddock
Date: Wednesday, 3rd April, 2002
Time: 6:15 for 6:30 pm
Venue: City Tattersalls Club, 198 Pitt Street, Sydney
December 17, 2003 will mark precisely one hundred years since the first powered, controlled, sustained, heavier-than-air, human flight. A few months ago, on September 11, 2001, air travel was suddenly stopped throughout the USA. Although only a temporary grounding, the effects have been far reaching. Aviation has figured very prominently in so many aspects of life during the past century and is an appropriate subject for review. This address is concerned with some of the aeronautical ventures in Australia during the nineteenth century. The events discussed include both the elation due to success and the all too often desolation of failure, with particular emphasis on Australia and its position in relation to Europe.
As the subject matter for this address has been extracted from research notes for an article proposed for 2003, the period covered will extend only to the end of 1903. For almost this entire period, aviation was really for the birds; for much of the populace, it was a joke. Several of the events I will describe exemplify the public's perception of human flight in the 1800s and beyond.
The Society's President, David Andrew Craddock began his career with Hawker De Havilland, in 1968, as a Cadet Engineer, studying Aeronautical Engineering part time at the University of New South Wales. Experience was gained in most aspects of aircraft manufacture and design. During this time he learnt to fly, gaining a Private Pilot's Licence in 1971. After graduation [BSc(Eng)], David assumed engineering responsibility for several projects, in particular for Douglas, Boeing, Lockheed and British Aerospace Airbus manufacturing activities performed by Hawker De Havilland.
In 1982 David was seconded to British Aerospace, Hatfield, U.K. for a period of twelve months, designing repairs and modifications to the BAe 146 wing and fuselage. Upon return to Australia he became involved with the detail design of the wing for the Wamira {the Basic Pilot Training Aircraft). His responsibilities also encompassed supervision of the wing and undercarriage mock-up, and culminated in 1985 as Test Engineer for the Wamira Wing and Undercarriage.
At the end of 1985, David returned to manufacturing project work, on Airbus wing ribs, until securing employment with the Department of Defence in 1987. The change in employer resulted in a career modification from engineering to quality assurance. A qualification in quality assurance (Certified Quality Practitioner, AOQ, 1994) and a Graduate Certificate in Management (University of Western Sydney, Nepean, 1997) were obtained. Having survived the evolutionary changes in quality assurance, David is now Regional Manager for the Directorate of Quality Assurance (Air), responsible for staff in NSW and Queensland. The Directorate monitors the quality performance of firms that maintain aircraft for the RAAF.
Apart from writing a training package for the Department, David's interests include Australian aviation history, about which he has written and published half a dozen books. He has been involved in the design of solar-powered motorcars and replicas of Lawrence Hargrave's kites and Australia's first glider.
David has been associated with several organizations, including the Aviation Historical Society of Australia, the Lawrence Hargrave Foundation, Bathurst Soaring Club, American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics, Association of Professional Engineers Australia, and the Sport Aircraft Association of Australia. He has retained membership in the Royal Society of New South Wales, the Royal Australian Historical Society, the Royal Aeronautical Society, Vintage Glider Association and Hornsby Shire Historical Society.
Report on the Presidential Address
by Dr E.C. Potter
The President, David Craddock, delivered his Presidential Address to members and numerous guests gathered at City Tattersalls Club, Sydney, for the Society's 135th Annual General Meeting on Wednesday 3 April 2002. The title of his Address (heading this summary) tersely reflects not only the prowess our President has attained in aviation history, but also the role of Australians here in the worldwide, 19th century, quest to be first human to fly. Profusely illustrated, the Presidential Address captured with clarity and fitting quaintness early aerial exploits down under.
As is often the case with inventive technology, it helps to define the competition rules before an agreed winner emerges. As the President illustrated: the fact that Robert Paltock wrote in 1751 "The Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins" subtitled "Shipwrecked at the South Pole" (with winged human species flying around), cuts no ice in the competitive stakes. Also, the wax wings that melted when (the late) Icarus flew too close to the sun while escaping Cretan captivity does not give his shaded father, Daedalus, (who survived) inventive priority. Further, the Montgolfier brothers built a fine hot-air balloon in 1782 and on 21 November 1783 showed Marie Antoinette (among others) that it could carry aloft physicist de Rozier and a French army major. But who should receive the accolade for this first human flight, the earthbound builders or the airborne heros?
The air and the heavens were slow to beckon when Australia was colonized. Dawes, an astronomer of his day, briefly looked upward until 1790, and Governor Thomas Brisbane, founder of a forerunner of our Society, boasted two astronomers in 1821. But it is Thomas Downes near-illegible gravestone at St. Stephens, Newtown, that marks a pioneering but tragic attempt at balloon flight in Sydney in late 1856.
It appears a Pierre Maigre advertised a hot-air balloon ascent, and 15000 people paid to view the spectacle from Sydney's Domain. A contemporary illustration shows a fire on the ground heating air in a balloon attached to a high horizontal tether slung between two tall poles. When the balloon failed to rise as planned, Maigre panicked and lost his hat, but Thomas Downes was hit by the toppling poles and lost his life.
A better effort took place on 18 July 1859 with a coal-gas filled balloon (contents supplied by the publicity-conscious gas company). With Wardell and Green aboard, the balloon rose to clear the Sydney GPO at dusk and untidily landed in a paddock at Haymarket near Campbell Street. Wardell jumped out, and felt faint from a rent leaking coal gas. An onlooker nearby was careless with his lucifer, causing casualties among an unruly crowd trampling their way clear. A public collection was initiated, from which Green, who partly funded the event, handsomely benefited.
In similar vein had been an 1843 airship designed by Francis Forbes, son of a famous judge. Allegedly the English purloined the idea, and Dr. William Bland went over to investigate, designing in 1851 his own "Atmotic" ship slung from a hydrogen-filled balloon and displaying the plans at London and Paris Exhibitions. Nothing came of these unsavoury goings-on, and it was William Dean who made the first fully-successful Australian balloon ascent in Melbourne in 1858.
Sydney's own Lawrence Hargrave, must be classed as an unlucky near miss for the accolade that the Wright brothers gained on 17 December 1903 when they separately made the first powered, controlled, heavier-than-air human flights over sand dunes in South Carolina. Even in 1884 Hargrave had designed a flapping wing machine that awaited his intended development of a suitable steam engine. In December 1894 Hargrave got his required 34 km/h wind and it lifted him and his chain of box kites from Stanwell, south of Sydney. However, he deduced wrongly that birds could soar in a purely horizontal wind, being unaware that an upward component of wind direction was the cause of the birds' ability. Hargrave had the hardware for heavier-than-air flight by 1899, all except a light-enough power source.
During questions it emerged that many of Hargrave's models and equipment are still stored unseen in Sydney, but the remainder were lost in Germany. The Society's Hon. Treasurer, Bob Creelman, had introduced the President at some length at the outset and also thanked him afterwards for a fascinating Address that would produce further rewards for the reader when published with the illustrations to browse over.