Mr Glover's mystery lifter

摘要

In yorkshire IN the late 1960s staff at the Brough Division of Hawker Siddeley Aviation discovered a curious entry in an old account book of Robert Blackburn, founder of the Blackburn Aircraft Company. Dated June 30,1912, it charged Mr G.P. Glover of Leeds £455 for the design and construction of the "Glover direct lifting machine". An early Blackburn employee, Harry Goodyear, recalled the device and said it had as much chance of lifting itself off the ground as he had of lifting himself by rotating his arms. But it was an order, and £455 was welcome income for a struggling aeroplane manufacturer, so Glover's contraption was made and erected at the company's factory in Balm Road, Leeds. Built entirely from steel tubing, it was to have an engine driving a pair of rotating paddles, but Goodyear believed it was not completed.