| CODY, Samuel Franklin , American- born British aviator, born in Texas. He came to England in 1890 and acquired British nationality. He experimented with man-lifting kites & participated in the planning and construction of the first British dirigible.He was the first person to fly in Britain and built an early aeroplane & flew for 27 mins in Oct.1908. He was killed in a flying accident at Aldershot. | |
Not to be confused with & was no relation of CODY, William Frederick (1846-1917) , known as Buffalo Bill, born in Iowa. Army scout and pony express rider, he earned his nickname after killing 5000 buffalo in 18 months for a contract to supply the workers on the Kansas Pacific Railway with meat. From 1883 toured with his Wild West Show. |
Among all the pioneers of early aviation, probably the most
remarkable was the flamboyant Samuel Franklin Cody.Up until only a few years ago, it was thought that Samuel Cody was born in Birdville, Texas. However, he was not. Birth records were found that proved he was born in 1861 in Davenport, Iowa. He lived the
typical prairie life of a cowboy, catching and training wild
horses in true bronco-buster style. He was also a highly
skilled buffalo hunter, and became an expert with the rifle and
lasso. During 1883-4 he was gold prospecting around the
junction of the KIondyke and Yukon Rivers,a location which thirteen years later grew into
Dawson City, centre of the Alaskan Gold Rush, the biggest
gold rush of all time. Cody, however, made no strike, and
after a few years spent touring America with a Wild West
show, where he was billed as 'Captain Cody, King of the
Cowboys', he eventually settled in England in 1890. He soon became a showman, forming his own company of
entertainers, giving demonstrations of his exceptional skills in riding,
lassoing and shooting. As a professional showman he adopted
the extravagant form of dress for which he was to become so
famous from his compatriot, namesake and friend. Colonel
William Fredrick Cody, alias 'Buffalo Bill' whose hugely
successful Wild West show he had seen and admired greatly.
Apparently, with the help of the coincidence of their names,
close physical resemblance, and Cody's affectation of
shoulder-length hair, beard, moustache, stetson, fringed
buckskins and cowboy boots, Samuel Cody quite deliberately
nurtured confusion in the minds of the public, some of them
genuinely believing that they were watching
'Buffalo Bill' himself, or at least the son or brother of the
famous cowboy.In 1898 the family's latest production, a gory melodrama called 'The Klondyke Nugget' became wildly successful. Cody's son Leon was a keen kite flyer, and father and son competed with ever larger kites, capable of ever increasing heights. By 1900 Cody's enthusiasm for the pastime was eclipsing his other interests, while The Klondyke Nugget continued to play to packed houses, financing his exhaustive experiments with a series of kite configurations. He finally settled for a winged variation of Hargrave's double-cell box kite, which he patented in 1901. With this kite he devised his remarkable system of man-lifting, and gave a demonstration of the apparatus to the War Office in December of that year, with a view to its military application. Cody's man-lifting system involved first flying a small
steadying pilot kite, then a team of lifter kites, the number
used depending on the condition of the wind. These lifter kites
were attached to the main flying cable by two towing rings,
Despite his flamboyant exterior, and the fact that he was said
to be illiterate, Cody was a man of great intelligence, with an
extremely practical outlook which was supported by apparently
unlimited reserves of courage, strength and perseverance.
In an attempt to publicize the traction potential of his system
Cody successfully crossed the English Channel in November
1903 in a collapsible boat, drawn by kites. The
triumph pleased Cody, and the resulting publicity, which
included a number of public demonstrations of his invention
seems to have had the required effect.
Despite the War Office's earlier reluctance to adopt Cody's
invention, extensive trials
were carried out in 1904-5 on both land and water, the
Admiralty having put some warships at Cody's disposal.
During these trials Sapper Moreton reached
. Cody's courage and enthusiasm led him on to experiment with powered flight, and in October 1908 he became the first man to build and fly an aeroplane in Britain. The slang term ' kite' for aeroplane is said to have been derived from this period when aeroplanes were virtually power-driven kites. On 7 August 1913 Cody and his passenger were killed when his last creation, the Waterplane, broke up in the air over Laffan's Plain, Aldershot. . |
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one at the head of the kite, the other at the towing point of a
four-legged bridle. Upon being released the kite would be
blown up the flying cable, which was provided with a number
of conical stops at predetermined mooring points along the
length of the cable. Finally the carrier
kite was attached to a trolley, the wheels of which ran against
the top of the cable. From this trolley was suspended the
basket-work car in which the passenger travelled. The carrier
and its load were released up the cable towards the lower lifter
kite. The passenger was able to control the ascent and descent
by working a complex system of lines and brakes.
In a military situation it was proposed that the passenger
should be equipped with a telescope, telephone, camera and
firearm. If a telephone system was impractical a system of
messengers was used. Communications were blown up the
cable by the wind, and returned in a weighted bag which was
allowed to simply slide down the cable.
the possibly record height of 792-6 m (2,600 ft) on the end of a cable
1219m (4,000 ft) long
The War Office finally adopted the
system in 1906 for Army observation, and Cody was given
Officer status with the post of Chief Kite Instructor at
Farnborough. For this he received a salary of
£1,000 per annum, together with free fodder for his white
stallion, his favourite and famous means of transport.
Cody's War Kites, as he called them, were to remain a part of
military equipment for some years.