The Inspiring Career of Robert T. Jones, AIAA Honorary Fellow

摘要

Robert Thomas "Bob" Jones, 89, who began his career as a handyman for a flying circus and later developed a wing design that revolutionized air travel and enabled planes to break the sound barrier, died 11 August 1999 at his home. The cause of death was not disclosed. What sort of man was this, whose extensive career yielded so many significant contributions? First, consider how he got into the aeronautics field. A fascination with aviation in the 1920s was commonplace among those of us who were schoolboys. In Macon, Missouri, where he lived, young Bob read Aero Digest, treasured its cover pictures of the airplanes of the day, and pored over its technical articles on performance estimation, stability and control, and stress analysis.