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Sunday 2 November 2014

Aviation Pioneers - Sunday Stamps

As I am staying with my daughter in Michigan I thought I should use some American stamps this week that I received some time ago on postcards. The postcards were boring city scenes but both cards had stamps commemorating aviation pioneers.

USA - Aviation Pioneers
Samuel Pierpont Langley (1834 - 1906) could have been more famous than the Wright brothers - if only...

Langley was an astronomer, physicist, and inventor of the bolometer for measuring electromagnetic radiation. He built a series of gasoline and steam powered model aerodrome planes in the 1890s/early 20th century, the most successful in 1896. In 1903 he built a full size human carrying airplane, the Aerodrome A. Unfortunately his design was flawed and test flights ended disastrously.

Alfred V Verville (1898/1970) was born in a small town in Michigan's Upper Peninsular. An aviation pioneer and aircraft designer he contributed to the development of civil and military aviation.

The Verville stamp is somewhat damaged as a result of its postcard being trimmed to enable it to be inserted in an album.

To see what others have selected this week fly across to the links at Viridian's Sunday-Stamps-194.

4 comments:

viridian said...

Thank you for sharing these two stamps!

Postcardy said...

I never heard of those pioneers before. I hate to think of any postcards being trimmed, even if they are boring.

Lisa B said...

Interesting stamps, and good to remember these early aviators.

Joy said...

Not heard of either of these two pioneers. I did like the sentiment of the cancel of getting your post in the morning by getting a post box. I wonder why they did not trim the bottom of the card.