The History of the Helicopter

A documentary tracing the development of the helicopter from the original Da Vinci drawings to the modern versions actually in service in 1951.

Beginning with some early artistic impressions - trying to copy bird and bugs, some of the early illustrations of human attempts at flight look precarious to say the least. Not being able to emulate these creatures, flying became the thing of the devil - evil and malevolent. Luckily, science was not to be held back for ever, and when scientists in Paris were shown the effects of two rotor blades being rotated - generating lift, then the concept of the "aerial carriage" was born. Along the way this entertaining documentary illustrates some of the dafter contraptions that were tried out with some fun actuality of everything from a glorified lawnmower, powered dirigibles and other feats of engineering which were so heavy as to render any serious attempt at flight impossible. By 1924, though, progress was definitely being made as the concept of rotor aviation starts to become proven (if unstable). How to hinge the blades and reduce instability is the next task, and to get centrifugal force to take much of the strain off the infrastructure? Well, quickly ideas came from early "auto gyro" technology and it isn't long before the 1930 Brussels exhibition sees an actual demonstration. From 1936, journeys were longer; altitudes higher and the principles of cyclic pitch control are implemented to enable what we have quickly progressed to now. The narrative here, along with a surprising volume of decent quality moving footage makes this an interesting piece of cinema that doesn't try to overwhelm us with the science or the aerodynamics, but presents quite a watchable twenty minutes on the development - from scratch - of something we take for granted nowadays.