The Guardians of the Museums of Santos=Dumont and Museum of Aeronautics - OCA Ibirapuera

 

Luiz Pagano, Tizuka Yamasaki e Ricardo Magalhães - Where is the Santos=Dumont Museum?

Why does the world believe that the Wright brothers invented the airplane with so much scientific documentation giving the precedence to Santos=Dumont?

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The answer to this question is simple – we Brazilians are not capable to producing mythology about ourselves. Therefore, the second question to ask yourself is 'where is Our Jack London?

The movement called 'the Bandeiras of São Paulo' began their search for gold and precious gems 250 years before the North Americans, generating the first major gold rush in the world, we had another enormous adventure in that sense, in Serra Pelada and nobody/or very little was reported. However, in 1903, the brilliant Jack London enchanted the world with North American audacity and daring in the book The Call of the Wild, reporting myths of an adventure with the same purposes, which does not even compare to Brazilian ones.

Ever since the term mouseion, the temple of the inspiring muses, was used for the first time in Alexandria in the 2nd century BC, a space designed to excite the minds of young people with encyclopedic knowledge, in order to consume and generate science, the whole world has known the importance of such an institution, to encourage the culture of a people, except for us here in Brazil.

In 1506, the Vatican Museums opened their doors praising popes and Christianity and here in Brazil, the sad history of museology appears with the National Museum, our first, on June 6, 1818, which exactly 200 years after its foundation, demonstrates our ineptitude in dealing with such institutions, when a mega-proportion fire destroyed part of our legacy in 2018.

Legacy and Mythification

This photo that appears at the beginning of this article, with me Professor Ricardo and film director Tizuka Yamasaki carries a very important symbology, that of 'near execution'. 

As I said, in this photo we see myself, Luiz Pagano, who writes this blog, my friend Tizuka Yamazaki, director of the classic film from the 80s, Gaijin, who since that time has wanted to make a film about Santos=Dumont and never succeeded, and Professor Ricardo Magalhães, disguised as Santos=Dumont, who strugles tirelessly for the preservation and dissemination of the Father of Aviation.

The three of us form a group of “potential Jack London” with the power to mythologize Santos=Dumont, but there seems to be a strange mystical, anti-Brazilian force that prevents us from moving forward.

When I was 16, I met one of the most special women in my life, Dona Ada Rogato (pictured, I sit in front of the Cesna 140 she used to circumnavigate the Americas). In 1983, I wanted to work, do something interesting and I volunteered to clean planes at the old Aeronautics Museum, in Oca do Ibirapuera.

In this other photo, by coincidence, the other most important woman in my life, my wife (the one in the middle) at the last party that took place at the Museum of Aeronautics, at the Flash Power Energy Drik in the late 1990s.

If there is a man who loves and fights for Santos=Dumont, that man is my big brother, Professor Ricardo Magalhães, who, along with me, Marcos Villares, great-grandnephew of the aviator and a select group of friends, does not think twice about to dedicate time and money to the effort to keep the memory of Santos=Dumont alive and intact.

In the middle 1930s, the Museum of Ipiranga was experiencing difficulties, three years after the death of Santos=Dumont, Arnaldo Villares, Jorge Dumont Villares and his brother-in-law Ricardo Severo, donated a good sum to the museum for the creation of the Santos Dumont Room, with thousands of items that belonged to the aviator.

The collection consisted of a set of 1,670 pieces of various types, such as three-dimensional, iconographic and textual documents that belonged to the inventor or were produced in his honor. The following year, under the management of Affonso de d'Escragnole Taunay, the "Sala Santos Dumont" was created. The museum's renovation works were also carried out and financed by the Dumont family.

Photo of my visit to the former IV COMAR on October 19, 2016, with objects that belonged to Santos=Dumont

The making of the exhibition furniture was custom-made at the Lyceum of Arts and Crafts of São Paulo (my great-grandmother, Giulia Maiello, says that my grandfather, Nicola Maiello, came from the Province of Caserta, in Florence, to sculpt furniture for this undertaking).

Anyway, the inauguration took place on October 23, 1936 and since then it has been very difficult to maintain the room and the aviator's memory.

At that time there was also the idea of creating a space to honor Santos Dumont in the new Ibirapuera Park, which was being conceived. Political instability in Brazil during the Vargas era postponed the project by 20 years, and it was only inaugurated on October 16, 1960, (at that time the Santos=Dumont foundation already existed, created in the 1950s) on the floors of the Pavilhão Lucas Nogueira Garcez, better known such as Oca, designed by Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer in Ibirapuera Park.

Photo of my visit to the former IV COMAR on October 19, 2016, with objects that belonged to Santos=Dumont

Maintained by the Secretary of Culture of the State of São Paulo, the Museum of Aeronautics also had the support of the Ministry of Aeronautics and private companies.

The museum had its doors closed to the public in 1996 and started to host only a few private events, such as the two-year Flash Power Energy Drink party promoted by Paulinho Machline, Udo Holler and Arnaldo Waligora, which took place on March 30, 1999, the company my wife worked for at the time.

Internal map of the Museu da Aeronautica / Oca - The P47 Thunderbolt was at the TAM Museum (today they are in the Company's collection), the replica of the 14 Bis and Demoiselle, also at the TAM Museum, the IPT Glider and the Ypiranga at the Revoar Project

The museum was definitively closed in the year 2000, allegedly due to the mega exhibition "Brasil+500 - Mostra do Reescobrimento", which also included the Bienal Foundation building and the Manoel da Nóbrega Pavilion and brought together works from the pre-Cabraline period to the 20th century. The OCA at Ibirapuera began to be used on a large scale for exhibitions by "maecenas" Edemar Cid Ferreira, from the "controversial" Banco Santos.

Internal map of the Museu da Aeronautica / Oca - The Gloster Meteor MK-8,  Jahú was duly recovered and is safe in the TAM Museum collection, the PT- 19 and Muniz are in Project Revoar

With the revocation of the concession for the space occupied by the Aeronautics Museum in the park, the Santos Dumont Foundation and the City of São Paulo transferred the entire collection to a reserved area in CEMUCAM Park, in Cotia, which was renamed Parque Santos Dumont.

Interior map of Museu da Aeronautica / Oca - P-47 Thunderbolt, Curtiss-Wright Corporation, “Brasil”, a 90 HP Cessna 140-A that belonged to Dona Ada Rogato, North-American T-6 Esquadrilha da Fumaça and a Waco Aircraft Company C.S.O.

In 2002 a new museum opened in Guarulhos, and part of the collection was taken there, as seen in this year's ASAS magazine.

Transcription of the Article

The commander of BASP cel. Lima de Andrade, and the mayor of Guarulhos, Eloi Pietà, inaugurate the new museum.

Inauguration of the Guarulhos Aeronautical Museum

In one of the most popular events, the newest Brazilian aviation museum, the Aeronautical Museum of Guarulhos, was inaugurated on the morning of December 5, 2002, the result of an agreement between the São Paulo Air Base (BASP), the Santos-Dumont Foundation and the Municipality of Guarulhos (see ASAS n°10). The new museum is located in BASP itself and, in this first phase of implementation, has a hangar where a Fairchild PT-19, a Muniz M-7 biplane and the North American T-6D Texan piloted by Col. Braga na Esquadrilha da Fumaça) and a large air-conditioned exhibition hall with a snack bar and magazine shop. In this hall, in excellent exhibition conditions, protected in glass showcases, there are several pieces of great historical importance referring to Alberto Santos-Dumont, such as the nacelle of 14-Bis, the basket of the balloon Brazil (also used in the dingivels N° 1.2 and 3). parts of his clothing and used by him on the flights, original documents and other items In addition, suspended, an original Demoiselle is on display.

With the inauguration of the museum, the population of Greater São Paulo (metropolitan area) once again has a genuine historical space dedicated to aviation, something that it had been deprived of since the regrettable closure of the museum in Ibirapuera Park.

The new museum is completely open to the public, open from Wednesday to Sunday from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm, with access through Gate G-3 of the São Paulo Air Force Base (BASP). The path is along Avenida Hélio Smidt, which goes to São Paulo International Airport (Cumbica), where signs inform the exit to BASP and the museum.

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Another great preserver of aircrafts is Commander Cesar Pulschen, from Projeto Revoar.

He who has already flown for Varig, Vasp, Gol, ABSA and currently operates in executive aviation. A fan of vintage aircraft, Pulschen has a PT-19 from 1942, a PA11 from 1949, a Cessna 170 from 1954 and a N3N biplane from 1940. "My pleasure is restoring and maintaining the planes in their original form. All they are in flight condition. I travel a lot to go to meetings with old planes", says the captain, who has had a house with a hangar in the Eldorado Valley since 2000.

After that, most of the collection that was at the São Paulo Air Base in 2007, in terrible conditions, as well as the part that was in CEMUCAM, library and smaller materials, which belonged to the Santos Dumont Foundation, with Brigadier Major José Vicente Cabral Checchia headed the Santos-Dumont Foundation at the time.

Professor Ricardo Magalhães, Secretary of the Board of Trustees of the Santos Dumont Foundation, was responsible for transferring everything to Santos, with his own resources, which received several relics that were added to the collection of the Museu de Aeronáutica de Santos, the so-called 'Museu Aéreo da Baixada Santista ', curated by Ricardo himself, managed at the time by Lieutenant Colonel Jorge Tebicheranede, from 2007 to 2008.

Changes in aeronautics, which transformed the Santos Air Base into the Air Base Nucleus, with a consequent reduction in personnel, caused the museum to be deactivated and the collection taken back near the Ipiranga museum, the initial destination of the 1930s, in the 4th COMAR, under the administration of Lieutenant-Brigadier Marcelo Kanitz Damasceno.

There, a report by the Santos=Dumont Foundation was made with pieces from the collection, accompanied by Ricardo Magalhães, who, with the help of a team from USP, carried out the transfer.

Created on March 27, 1942, the Fourth Regional Air Command (IV COMAR), headquartered in São Paulo (SP), ended its activities in August 2017 becoming COMGAP, and with that the collection was taken to the Yatch Club of Saints.

With the arrival of the pandemic in 2020, under the administration of Brigadier Major Paulo Roberto Pertusi, part was transferred back to the São Paulo Air Base (this blog did not have access to where the other part was taken).

Some of the items from the former Aeronautics Museum, such as the Jahu seaplane, used by Commander João Ribeiro de Barros to cross the South Atlantic, guaranteed restoration promoted by the Foundation to be exhibited at the then TAM Museum, in São Carlos (city in the estate of São Paulo).

Luiz Pagano and Movie director Tizuka Yamasaki 

The great dream of Commander Rolim Adolfo Amaro, founder and president of TAM Linhas Aéreas, and of his brother João Francisco Amaro, the TAM Museum, inaugurated experimentally on November 11, 2006, in the district of Água Vermelha, in São Carlos, Attached to São Carlos Airport and LATAM MRO, it operated for 10 years, growing from 32 aircraft to 100 of them. Continuing the endless back-and-forth of museum closures, this one was also deactivated in January 2016 with the transfer of the TAM Museum collection to new facilities, May 12, 2018, to be built in the place where the Memorial is located Aeroespacial Brasileiro, in the city of São José dos Campos.

Today the collection is at the headquarters of Embraer and the Department of Aerospace Science and Technology (DCTA), attached to São José dos Campos Airport. The agreement was reached in the presence of the president of the Tam Museum, João Amaro, the mayor of São José dos Campos, Colonel Ozires Silva and other museum and city authorities.

Irreparable losses

It is evident that in each of these displacements, regardless of the endeavor of Ricardo, mine and the effort of our friends, much is lost. As everything is done with own resources and sometimes, without the consent and prior knowledge issued by the Brazilian Air force, the difficulty multiplies.

I hope with all my heart that one day we can have the security and pleasure of having a worthy museology system, as well as the exaltation of our myths in a way comparable to those of the north-Americans, so that we can finally tell our history with more respect, increasing the love and dedication of the Brazilian people to science and culture.

References

AERO Magazine, Inner Editora

BUENO, Eduardo - Presentismo e Presentificação do Passado: a Narrativa Jornalística da Historia na Coleção Terra Brasilis – 2010; 

FAB, Força Aérea Brasileira | CPDOC». cpdoc.fgv.br.- Fundação Santos Dummont». www.santosdumont.org.br; 

Folha de S.Paulo - Descobrimento: Brasil 500 Anos vai expor carta de Caminha - 03/06/1999». www1.folha.uol.com.br;

GALANTE, Alexandre (15 de maio de 2018). «Museu Asas de um Sonho será instalado em São José dos Campos (SP)». Poder Aéreo - Forças Aéreas, Indústria Aeronáutica e de Defesa;

MEMORIAL  0122A - Lucas Nogueira Garcez ZH 2014;

MUNDO Educação.  - Como surgiu o avião? - Mundo Educação»;

Revista Turismo - Parque do Ibirapuera. www.revistaturismo.com.br:

Santos Dumont and Apple at 114 Champs-Élysées, home to the world's greatest innovations

  

Santos=Dumont's office in his apartment on the Champs-Élysées rendered from photos of the time, superimposed on current ones

It was at number 114 on the Champs-Élysées that Santos=Dumont invented the greatest number of aerial machines - innovation continues at this address with the Apple store (a full plate for those who credit him as a creative egregore).

Much can be said when analyzing the photos of Santos=Dumont's apartment at the time.

Dining Room in the Sky circa 2020 - Apple store

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Santos=Dumont's life could have been better documented, were it not for the episode in which Santos sets fire to several documents, in the backyard of his house in Benérville, in August 1914, when gendarmerrie agents suspected that he might be a spy of war (learn more)

Luiz Pagano at Avenida Champs Elysées, 114, on the corner of Rue Washington, Santos Dumont's address in Paris

You that are reading this article may have already noticed that much of the information we see in biographies seems to be repeated from book to book, with a lot of data about some events and, on the other hand, huge gaps, of up to decades, with lost events.

I myself wrote an article about Santos+Dumont's apartment in 2012 (learn more)

Description of the environments at the time when Santos=Dumont lived in the apartment, we can see the "roundabout" oval room, the office next to the facades of Rue Washington and Champs Élysees and, in the background, the staff and guest room, kitchen and bathrooms.

One can compensate for some of these losses simply by analyzing the various photographs, especially those taken in his apartment on Rue Washington.

In the photos of the time, we see basically four environments:

1 - Rotunda or Oval Room: This is a central and prominent space in the apartment. The oval shape provides a sense of fluidity and elegance to the environment. Possibly the oval hall was used to receive guests and hold meetings. With its unique shape, it sings with sophisticated furniture carefully to suit the room's aesthetic and purpose;

2- The Office of Santos=Dumont, photo overlooking the shelf, detail for the large amount of paper on the table, among them journalistic articles, flight photos, envelope cutting templates and models of nacelles for his airships, etc.

Santos=Dumont's office front photo - S=D evaluates a metal piece, details to be observed: wallpaper with an owl motif, the radica table, lamp and art nouveau frame

S=D analyzing a project in the office next to a model, moments before going to engineering.

2 - Office: In the office, Santos=Dumont dedicated most of his time to reflection and planning. The bookcase suggests that this was a space where he studied and did research. It may have contained books on aviation, science and technology, reflecting Santos=Dumont's intellectual and creative interests;

3 - Engineering: The engineering room was a place of action and experimentation. It was where he began to turn his ideas and projects into reality.

Santos=Dumont's third room would be the equivalent of engineering. Place where he designs the technical part of his aircraft, maintains ropes, cables and fuel, spare parts, as well as builds and makes his models.

Gym equipment, including the rowing machine and weights, suggest that he also valued physical health.

The presence of an engine and battery above the fireplace indicates Dumont's continued focus on innovation and technology;

4 - Dining Room in the Heights: This unique space is where Dumont enjoyed his meals, the billiard table adds a touch of entertainment and relaxation to the room;

4 - Dining Room in the Heights, circa 1904

These four environments combined offered Santos=Dumont a versatile environment that reflected his multifaceted interests, his creativity and his quest for innovation both in aviation and in other aspects of his life.

Santos=Dumont's office in his apartment on the Champs-Élysées

On the wall of one of the rooms, there is a picture behind a table, for example, with stars nailed to the frame that showed one of the pyramids of Egypt and a people riding camels.

Santos=Dumont & o enigma da pirâmide de Gizé, no Egito

Who would those be?

To try to solve this charade, I analyze another photo of Santos=Dumont in Egypt, from a trip we know almost nothing about. In it seem to be Santos=Dumont, someone who looks a lot like Henri Deutsch de la Meurthe, Mr Henrique Dumont (except that the dates don't match as he died in 1891) or even the tutor/protector Garcia.

On page 230 of the biography Santos=Dumont e a conquista do ar (Santos=Dumont and the conquest of the air) by Aluizio Napoleão (1941) appears one of the few references to him in North Africa “Santos Dumont was beginning to get tired of life, Paris betrayed him. 

In vain he crossed the Mediterranean, traveled through North Africa and had his portrait in Tunis, dressed as a sheikh, by Albert, Rue Diazira "photographe de Son Altesse, le Bey". In vain he played in car racing, in engine handling. Interviews with journalists were becoming rare. He was undoubtedly "a character en vedette. But he was not "the" character en vedette.

19th century photograph: Egypt circa 1880 - Pyramid of Cheops, Giza, Egypt, 1890 photo by Lekegian studio.

As for the photo of the pyramid in the background, behind Dumont, there was no one known from S=D there, it is a photograph from the 19th century: Egypt around 1880 - Pyramid of Cheops, Giza, Egypt, photo from 1890 by the Lekegian studio.

Whose picture is on the desk?

In 1917, the New York Journal's European correspondent sent a note about Santos=Dumont's engagement to Miss Edna Powers. Edna was an American who lived in Paris with her parents. The text is in the Aerospace Museum of Rio de Janerio.

Aida d'Acosta, Edna Powers or another woman? - According to the newspaper República, it was Edna Power - but in the close-up photo you can read the dedication in English "To Santos = Dumont", something illegible, and the signature, which can be either Edna or Lurline (depending on how you analyze it the graphology of the "E" or "L").

Or it could also be Aida d'Acosta, the first woman to fly a blimp through the French skies (in the world)

But according to S=D, he was already married to his aircraft family.

Edna or Lurline

Who else should have had the photo on Santos=Dumont's desk was the American millionaire Lurline Spreckels, according to biographer Cosme Degenar.

Santos=dumont and Lurline Spreckels

Dumont was engaged to her until her mother forbade the engagement, believing Dumont to be a dowries hunter.

Other photos that belonged to Santos=Dumont with Lurline Spreckels

On December 21, the Republic newspaper, from Saint Louis, in the United States, informs that “the king of the air is going to marry a beautiful Yankee”. it was not Lurline Spreckels, but another American, Edna Power. The article says that Santos=Dumont's fiancée belonged to the American colony in Paris and “lost her heart” for him when she heard him recount the adventures of his escapes. “And he, in his loneliness away from his Brazilian home, lost his heart to her because she was brilliant, understanding and ingratiating.”

On December 21, the Saint Louis newspaper Republic reported that Santos=Dumont was going to marry Edna Power.

Coincidence or not, Santos=Dumont writes two days later, on December 23, 1901, a letter to his Brazilian friend Pedro Guimarães in which he mentions being in a dilemma – loving and selfish, financially speaking. He does not mention Edna Powers by her name, but refers to "darling".

 A short distance away, on a black plinth more than a meter long, was a white marble bust of Victor Hugo, the aeronaut is known to have had great admiration for the poet of the Chansons des rues et des bois. In fact, the two had many affinities: they were dreamers, visionaries and possessed of a fertile and powerful imagination.

In October 1901, the Brazilian colony in France, presented S=D with a replica of the statue of Jean-Antoine Injalbert (1845–1933), "La Renommée" (the fame), replicated by the talented artist Thiebaud, leaning against the mirror.

In this photo we see the large windows with balconies overlooking the Champs-Élysées, one of which has a well-known photo in which S=D explains the operation of the balloon with guide rope to his brother-in-law, Mr. Carlos de andrade Villares, married to Gabriela.

The Various Environments of the Noble Address

On the corner of Champs-Élysées and Rue Washington lived Santos=Dumont, who made the feat of parking the Dirigeable #9 to have a coffee, Luiz Pagano had dinner with fans of this blog at Le Mood in 2014 and is currently the Apple Store in Paris

The noble address on the corner of Champs-Élysées and Rue Washington, has already had several opportunities to be visited, whether by the 2010 ballad 'Le Mood'.

These are the various tenants of the famous property, Le Mood from 1913, the Apple store and in the days of Dumont

But nothing makes more sense than Santos=Dumont's great expression of genius in giving way to the also innovative Apple store.

For those who believe in creative egregore, perhaps this is the most iconic place in the world! - It was on this table that in 1910 Santos Dumont created his wonderful inventions of air navigation, taking great steps to bring flight to humanity, opening up perspectives of integration and entertainment never seen before. In 2018, Steve Jobs' Apple brings the coolest and most fun innovations the world has ever seen to the same place. There's no denying that big innovations seem to haunt the iconic apartment 114 Champs-Élysées

Elegance that comes in generations - the Apple Watch is inspired by Cartier Santos

Perhaps the choice of Santos=Dumont's apartment in Paris to be the location of the Apple store was not coincidental, Johnny Ive, Apple's head of design, said that when details of the Apple Watch development process were emerging, Marc Newson, who had recently joined Ive's team at Apple, was greatly inspired by the vintage Cartier Santos wristwatch. 

Apple Watch inspired by Cartier Santos

Like the Apple Watch, the IkePod also adopted Cartier's classic square dial Santos, Ive also revealed that the Apple Watch was positioned as a premium smartwatch that would compete with a Rolex, Cartier or Omega.

The Apple Watch uses extremely premium materials, similar to Rolex watches, but has been positioned at a lower price point than these high-end luxury items.

Ive, like Santos=Dumont is a car enthusiast, owned a Bentley Mulsanne and an Aston Martin DB4.

Watches

João Villares, great-nephew of Santos Dumont, holds a watch that belonged to his relative Alberto Santos=Dumont. An interesting curiosity is that João keeps on the dial 16:45, the time when the aviator took off on November 12, 1906, at Campo de Bagatelle, in Paris - picture Rubens Cavallari

Room 4 - Engineering

Santos=Dumont's fourth room would be the equivalent of engineering. Place where he designs the technical part of his aircraft, maintains ropes, cables and fuel, spare parts, as well as builds and makes his models.

Sources and Bibliographies

- GRAHAL, Étude historique et documentaire, 2015.

- Pascal Payen-Appenzeller et Brice Payen, Champs-Élysées: Dictionnaire historique, architectural et culturel, Paris, Ledico éditions, 2013.

The plenary session of the Old Paris Commission met on June 24, 2016 at the Hôtel de Ville under the chairmanship of Mr. Bernard Gaudillère, Councilor of Paris.

The resolutions taken by the Commission were published in BMO No. 58 of July 22, 2016.

Santos Dumont and his wearable aircrafts

 When observing birds, Santos=Dumont developed systems of controls that involve his entire body, in which, instinctively, he can, in coordinated and reflexive acts, dominate the dynamics of flight – in that sense, we may say that “Santos=Dumont created wearable aircrafts”, paraphrasing Professor Miguel Nicolelis' grandmother Lygia - his handlings were body centric, all controls were mere extensions of Santos=Dumont's body.

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In other articles on this blog I described how Santos=Dumont was not only the father of aviation but also the father of biomimetics and the Wiki philosophy, in this article I tell how he may well have been the father of ergonomics, since it is the scientific study of the relationship between man and machine, aiming at safety and efficiency, as well as bionics, as it is the technique of applying knowledge of biology in the solution of engineering and design problems.

Santos=Dumont, sewed a wooden "T" device in his jacket from which thin rings connected to the control cables that acted on the "ailerons". Tilting his shoulder to the right, he could command the left aileron, and vice versa, reacting both surfaces, in a coordinated manner, according to the inclination of the aviator's body.

As different bird species adapted over millions of years through evolution to specific environments, prey, predators and other needs, they developed specializations in their wings and tails in order to acquire different forms of flight.

By observing the flight of birds, one of the most complex forms of locomotion in the animal kingdom, Santos=Dumont created intuitive ways to make the necessary movements, including taking off and landing, tasks that involve many complex movements.

Controls attached to the 14-Bis jacket

Santos=Dumont, still not knowing a good part of how to control a heavier-than-air aircraft, made his first flight with the 14-Bis on September 7,  around 5 pm: It reached a height of about 2 m and realized that it should place ailerons in the outer cells of the wing, to control the rotational movements.

The only problem is that all his limbs were occupied with other controls, it was then that he decided to put a piece of wood sewn to the back of his jacket and started to control the screw movement by tilting his body to the left or to the right, as we see in Santos Dumont Book - Helio Paes de Barros – 1973 Ed. Federal University of Pernambuco.

“...Therefore, SANTOS DUMONT had solved the problem of flight in a heavier-than-air device: the "14-Bis... As he had both hands occupied in the various controls of the plane, Santos=Dumont, sewed a wooden "T" device in his jacket from which thin rings connected to the control cables that acted on the "ailerons". Tilting his shoulder to the right, he could command the left aileron, and vice versa, reacting both surfaces, in a coordinated manner, according to the inclination of the aviator's body.

Santos=Dumont had the objective of flying like Icarus, individually, and he evolved the wicker basket in order to fulfill this dream – he did it several times to perfection, mainly with the Balladeuse N.9.

Nowadays it is not uncommon to see such adaptations as expensive American military helmets. One example is the helmet or head-mounted display (HMD) developed by Rockwell Collins Enhanced Vision Systems, a joint venture between Rockwell Collins and Elbit Systems, which costs $400,000, a price that is significantly higher than that of a Ferrari.

* Article published on the G1 News Portal on November 04, 2006 - The man who dressed himself as an airplane, giving wings to the mind

October has arrived and with it the chance to once again celebrate two of the most important achievements in the history of Brazilian science.

In fact, I would say more.

If we could choose a single month that represented the daring and creativity of Brazilian national science, it wouldn't be for anyone. October won by rout!

All because this month we celebrate two of the most famous feats of Alberto Santos-Dumont, the greatest of all our scientists. The one that amazed the French people live, with the precision of his daily flights through the skies of Paris, and fascinated the whole world with the realization of humanity's collective dream of flying.

On the afternoon of dubious weather and treacherous winds on October 19, 1901, Santos-Dumont took off from the Saint-Cloud countryside towards the most imposing symbol of French modernism at the time: the Eiffel Tower. After circling it with elegant and precise maneuvers, Santos-Dumont returned to the take-off point to the delirious applause of the crowd that took to the streets of Paris.

The first great aeronaut demonstrated to anyone who wanted to see that the mixture of daring, tenacity and passion makes us fly.

Literally.

And that is precisely what Santos-Dumont did.

He promised he would fly and he did.

Like no one had ever done.

In just over 30 minutes, there he was. Momentarily back on the ground, a hostile environment for this birdman, he listened to the crowd demanding that he be awarded the first grand prize in aviation: the Deutsch de La Meurthe Prize.

But it was not easy to make history. It never is.

Due to a controversy regarding the precise moment of the race's conclusion, Santos-Dumont and the Parisians had to wait until the beginning of November to celebrate the official decision of the Air Club of France.

And how Paris celebrated! As promised, Santos-Dumont divided the 100,000 francs (plus interest) earned from the prize, half among his mechanics and the rest among 3,950 poor people in Paris.

Five years later, on October 23, 1906, Santos-Dumont once again amazed Parisians by flying 60 meters aboard his legendary 14bis plane.

When I was a boy, and the 23rd of October arrived, the greatest neuroscientist I've ever met, my dear grandmother Lygia, always said to me:

“Today we celebrate the day when man dressed up as an airplane.”

Lygia said this because she knew that, since his first airships, Santos-Dumont had created a complex and efficient system of ropes, pulleys and levers that allowed him to feel and control, as no one had done before, all the main components of each one. of your aircraft. There were so many control instruments that many who inspected these aircraft thought it was impossible for a single man to handle them.

One hundred Octobers later, neuroscience may be able to explain this phenomenon.

Today we know that through a process called neural plasticity (or neuronal, for good measure), multiple areas of the brain that contain complete representations of our body continually change these representations (or maps) throughout our lives. Such alterations occur due to changes that can be commonplace (changes in weight) or more dramatic and rare (amputation of a limb) in the spatial configuration of the body. Most of the time, however, these brain maps change due to constant practice of specialized motor tasks, or as a result of changing habits of tactile exploration of the environment. For example, throughout their lives, pianists and violinists develop brain representations of their fingers that are much larger and more elaborate than most of the population.

Recent results suggest that these brain representations of the body also undergo changes correlated with the type of tool used on a daily basis. For example, due to constant practice, professional tennis players are likely to incorporate their rackets as simple extensions of the brain representations of their arms and hands.

In other words, creation becomes part of the creator.

According to this theory, the more efficient the incorporation of the tool by the brain, the better the dexterity and precision with which the operator would use it.

Thus, it is plausible to postulate that, throughout his aviator career, with the practice of constant flights, Santos-Dumont's brain probably developed the ability to incorporate all the components of his aircraft; stabilizers, wings, tires, as if they were nothing more than part of your own body.

From left to right Professor Ricardo Magalhaães, the great-grandnephew of S=D, Professor Miguel Nicolelis. creator of the exoskeleton that allows Juliano Pinto (sitting) to walk after spinal cord injury and Luiz Pagano, writer of this blog. Both professor Nicolelis and patient Juliano sign the handkerchief that belonged to Santos=Dumont - this handkerchief, whichsymbolizes the milestones of Brazilian technological achievements, it already has the signature of Marcos Pontes, the 1st Brazilian astronaut who took it into space aboard the ISS, along with an S=D hat, and the illustration of the 'ALADO HEART OF SANTOS=DUMONT' ' by Romero Brito, an artist who well represents Brazil abroad.

In this way, through brain plasticity, when climbing on his pegasi made of Japanese silk and piano strings, the slender fellow countryman suddenly became a pioneering giant.

Humanity aeronaut.

Brazilian scientist.

Airplane body.

Brain with wings.

Dona Lygia, who would have thought, was once again right.

Unmissable readings for this more than historic October:

"O que eu vi, o que nós veremos." Alberto Santos-Dumont (French. Ce que j’ai vu, ce que nous verrons) Published by Hedra, São Paulo, 2002.

"Santos-Dumont and the invention of flight". Henrique Lins de Barros. Jorge Zahar Editor, Rio de Janeiro, 2003.

"Wings of Madness". Paul Hoffman. Editora Objetiva, Rio de Janeiro, 2004.

 

Miguel Nicolelis, for the G1.

Santos Dumont according to Nature invented the plane, not the Wright's brothers – Final Part & Conclusion

After the previous article, in which we see that Santos=Dumont made his flights accompanied by the scientific community, tested and questioned to exhaustion, while the Wrights, supposedly flew away from the public eye. As we saw in the other article that several pioneers relied on weak testimonies in beautiful stories, which seem more like legend than science, such as of the Shivkar Bapuji Talpade and Wright’s, who seem to have been chosen the first to fly as a mere matter of 'American national agenda', we will see in this last and conclusive article the definitive 'birth certificate of the flight', reported by none other than the journal Nature - since always, the most respected magazine in the scientific world.

leia esta matéria em Português

Read and follow what happened in 1906, when Santos=Dumont was in the spotlight of the human-flight vanguard, in its most diverse forms, while no one had ever heard of the Wright Brothers.

The First “Manned” Flying Machine - Issue Date

08 November 1906

THE FIRST “MANNED" FLYING MACHINE. 

OCTOBER 23 of the present year will be remembered as a red-letter day in the history of flying machines, for it was on that day that the first flying machine, constructed on the “heavier than air” principle, successfully raised itself and its driver from the ground several feet, and transported itself by means of its own power over a distance of eighty yards.

In this his first successful flight with this machine, M. Santos Dumont is to be sincerely congratulated, for he has accomplished a performance which many workers in different parts of the world have been striving after for many years past and failed.  M. Santos Dumont's machine is built on the aëroplane principle, and mounted on two wheels. It is fitted with an eight-cylinder, 60 h.p. motor weighing about 170 lb., and drives an aluminium fan, which makes 1000 to 1500 revolutions a minute. The motor is the work of the Adams Manufacturing Company, England.  With its driver the machine weighs about 750 lb. 

The aëroplane is shaped like a large T placed horizontally. The short arms of the T are slightly inclined upwards, and are each composed of three compartments, like three box-kites tied together side by side. At the base of the T is a large compartment, also like a box-kite, and by manipulating about a horizontal axis the upper and lower surfaces act as a powerful rudder. This rudder arrangement is at the front end of the aëroplane, and the operator stands on a platform midway between, and nearly on a level with, the lower surfaces of the two main inclined arms. The driven fan is situated at the rear of the machine, just behind the operator, at the junction of the two main inclined arms. 

Now that success has rewarded this daring investigator, it is of interest to take a cursory glance at the steps which ultimately led the way to success. 

One naturally, in the first instance, calls to mind the very interesting experiments carried out in 1893 by Herr Otto Lilienthal near Berlin (NATURE, vol. xlix., p. 157), because Santos Dumont's aëroplane is, generally speaking, somewhat after the style of the gliding machines used by him. Lilienthal's experiments were confined to trying to learn soaring, and he employed slightly curved wings having a surface of about 15 square metres. With this inclined planes, and eventually vertical and horizontal rudders, he started from the top of a hill, and after a few steps forward jumped into the air and glided sometimes 250 metres. Lilienthal depended for the success of his apparatus on himself, trusting to his instinct to be able to keep his balance by making the necessary compensating adjustments by moving his own centre of gravity. In later experiments he employed some mechanical aid to assist him in sustaining himself longer in the air. This consisted of a small machine driven by compressed carbonic acid gas, and operating a series of feather-like sails which were capable of flapping. He found that occasional flapping of these wings helped him to cover longer distances. 

In 1895 he adopted a new principle, and instead of using one large framework, employed two smaller ones, placed parallel one above the other; this method he found distinctly advantageous (NATURE, Vol. lii., p. 300). 

About this time Lilienthal's soaring experiments began to be taken up both in this country and in America. Mr. Percy 'S. Pilecher in England gained considerable experience both in the making and in the handling of these aëroplanes (NATURE, vol. Ivi., p. 344). Unfortunately, as in the case of Herr Lilienthal, an accident during his experiments re sulted in his death. Pilcher, however, was quite aware of the importance of using some motive power, and some time before his death proposed to employ, and actually began to make, a small and light engine, indicating about 4 h.p., to drive a fan, this being considered by him as more than sufficient for flights of moderate length. With this advance it was hoped that much greater distances could be covered, and a nearer approximation to a flying machine attained. 

There is little doubt that if Pilcher had been spared he would soon have constructed and made use of the latest and lightest form of motor, and probably been led to use the double-decked form of aeroplane adopted by Santos Dumont. 

By embodying the best ideas of his predecessors and using his own ingenuity to make the aëroplane a practical flying machine, Santos Dumont has advanced the science of aëronautics a very considerable step. The petrol motor has no doubt helped greatly in facilitating this progress, since high-powered engines of comparatively very light weight can be constructed.

In this pioneer work of navigating the air the work of Hiram Maxim and S. P. Langley must not be forgotten. Maxim made numerous attempts to drive his flying machine at such a speed that it would be lifted off the rails on which it ran, but on fully accomplished. Further, it was not known whether it would capsize or not if it was set free. Langley, on the other hand, was undoubtedly the first to demonstrate that a machine heavier than air could be made to travel in the air driven by its own all "unmanned," but nevertheless much valuable in- formation was accumulated. 

This the last achievement of Santos Dumont will no doubt give a fresh impetus to the problem of flight, and those who have the money and time have now before them a successful aëroplane that can serve as a starting point.