Post 5: A Major Character: The Glider

     I wanted the glider that the kids build to be a very simple design, and also wanted a picture of one for the blog. While doing research for that title  image, I found a wonderful "model" for it in a German design from 1926 called the "Zogling Primary Glider". It was designed to be launched from a hillside with a bungee cord and had a 33 ft wingspan, and was originally completely made of wood, fabric and cables. No wheels, just a skid. Just what I needed!

   Copies of the Zogling were built in Great Britain as the Dagling and the Slingsby T3, in France as the Avia, in Italy as the LT30, and in the US as the Detroit G1 Gull and the Waco Primary Glider. 
   It is a very basic machine, and blueprints were available in the 30's:

       Digging a little deeper, I found that the Aeronautics Club of the University of Paris, the C.A.U.(Club Aeronautique Universitaire) had started fling an AVIA glider at a small airfield in Beynes, about 27 miles east of Paris in 1931. The family of my hero could well have spent summer vacations there, and the child have seen and learned about gliders in 1936-39.

   They often crashed or were damaged, and he could have seen one being rebuilt. We could even imagine that somebody built one there one summer in those years, and that the kid helped. The father could well have been interested too, and might even be the builder...