Remembering: Frank Whittle and The Jet Engine

Born June 1, 1907 Frank Whittle was quick to pick up mechanical skills, thanks to his father being a mechanic. At the age of sixteen he joined the Royal Air Force as an aircraft apprentice.

In 1926, at nineteen he passed the medical exam and began training as a pilot at the RAF College. His senior thesis, discussed rocket propulsion as a way to power airplanes, and was entitled Future Developments in Aircraft Design.

He was posted to a fighter squadron and in his free time worked on creating his own jet engine. One of the instructors was impressed by his work, and put the word up the chain that his designs should be looked at. But they were rejected by both the Air Ministry and a private turbine firm.

Whittle did not let that stop him though. In 1930 he patented his design, and in 1936 formed his own company, Power Jets Ltd. By 1937 he had tested his engine on the ground, but still could not get the funding required to go further.

On August 27, 1939 Hans Joachim Pabst von Ohain's design Heinkel He 178 was successfully flown in Germany, marking the first jet flight in history. A week later WWII began. Suddenly the Air Ministry was more than interested. They immediately commissioned Gloster Aircraft Company to build an experimental aircraft around a Power Jets Ltd. jet engine.

May 15, 1941 the Gloster-Whittle E 28/39 successfully flew up to 370 miles per hour at 25,000 feet. It beat a prototype that had been designed by the same company which had rejected Whittle's designs in 1929. By 1944 Gloster Meteor jet aircraft were taking to the skies over the battlefields of Europe.

Mr. Whittle would retire from the RAF in 1948 as an air commodore. The year also saw him become Sir Whittle, and he was awarded 100,000 pounds. He published a book in 1953, Jet: The Story of a Pioneer. In 1977 he moved to Columbia, Maryland and took up a job as a research professor at the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis. Sir Frank Whittle died in Maryland in 1996.

Sir Whittle was a pioneer in science and mechanics. He was also a hero. Not just a British hero, or an American one; he was a hero to all people who fought on the side of freedom. He is someone who history tends to forget, but a man who we should always remember.