From BLÉriot to Apollo 11

Abstract

‘THE event, which stirs the imagination by its far‐reaching possibilities and marks the dawn of a new age for man, took place in the early hours of yesterday morning. Thus have the sceptics been put to scorn’. Those words were not written a few days ago, although they would be easily equitable to the event which took place at 0256 hrs. G.M.T. on July 21, 1969, when Mr Neil Armstrong became the first person from earth to put a foot on another planet, but sixty years ago. In fact the quotation was from the Daily Mail of July 26, 1909, and the occasion was the first crossing of the Channel by M Louis Blériot in a machine of his own design, an event which was perhaps the first notable place‐to‐place journey to be carried out in defiance of gravity.

Citation

(1969), "From BLÉriot to Apollo 11", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 41 No. 8, pp. 5-5. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb034539