![]() ![]() ![]() The testing was in the dunes along the shore of Lake Michigan near the town of Miller Beach, Indiana, just east of what became the city of Gary. In 1896, Chanute, Herring, and Avery tested a design based on the work of German aviation pioneer Otto Lilienthal, and of hang gliders of their own design. This was the most systematic global survey of fixed-wing heavier-than-air aviation research published up to that time.Īt the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, Chanute collaborated with Albert Zahm to organize a highly successful International Conference on Aerial Navigation.Ĭhanute was too old to fly, so he partnered with younger experimenters, including Augustus M. He published his findings in a series of articles in The Railroad and Engineering Journal from 1891 to 1893, which were then re-published in the influential book Progress in Flying Machines in 1894. Applying his engineering background, Chanute collected all available data from flight experimenters around the world and combined it with the knowledge gathered as a civil engineer in the past. When he retired from his railroad career in 1883, he devoted some leisure time to furthering the new science of aviation. Ĭhanute became interested in aviation after watching a balloon ascend in Peoria, Illinois, in 1856. let us hope that the advent of a successful flying machine, now only dimly foreseen and nevertheless thought to be possible, will bring nothing but good into the world that it shall abridge distance, make all parts of the globe accessible, bring men into closer relation with each other, advance civilization, and hasten the promised era in which there shall be nothing but peace and good-will among all men. As a method to monitor the longevity of railroad ties and other wooden structures, he introduced the railroad date nail in the United States.Ĭhanute retired from the Erie Railway in 1883 to become an independent engineering consultant. Establishing the first commercial plants, he convinced railroad men that it was commercially feasible to make money by spending money on treating ties to extend their service time and reduce replacement costs. He designed many other bridges during his railroad career, including the Illinois River rail bridge at Chillicothe, Illinois, the Genesee River Gorge rail bridge near Portageville, New York (now in Letchworth State Park), the Sibley Railroad Bridge across the Missouri River at Sibley, Missouri, the Fort Madison Toll Bridge at Fort Madison, Iowa, and the Kinzua Bridge in Pennsylvania.Ĭhanute established a procedure for pressure-treating wooden railroad ties with an antiseptic that increased the wood's lifespan in the tracks. In 1869, this bridge established Kansas City, Missouri as the dominant city in the region, as the first bridge to cross the Missouri River there. He designed and built the Hannibal Bridge with Joseph Tomlinson and George S. During his career he designed and constructed the two biggest stockyards in the United States, Chicago Stock Yards (1865) and Kansas City Stockyards (1871). ![]() He was widely considered brilliant and innovative in the engineering profession. Career Railroad civil engineer Ĭhanute stands in the middle of the Hannibal Bridge in 1869.Ĭhanute began his training as a civil engineer in 1848. In 1857, he married Anne Riddell James, with whom he had a son and three daughters. He added the "e" to his last name in his adult life. Octave attended private schools in New York. Octave and Joseph emigrated to the United States of America in 1838, when Joseph was named Vice President of Jefferson College in Louisiana. Octave Chanut was born in Paris to Elise and Joseph Chanut, professor at the Collège de France. At his death, he was hailed as the father of aviation and the initial concepts of the heavier-than-air flying machine. He advised and publicized many aviation enthusiasts, including the Wright brothers. Octave Chanute (Febru– November 23, 1910) was a French-American civil engineer and aviation pioneer. Civil engineer, railway engineer and bridge designer, aviation pioneer ![]()
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