Pre-WW1 Aviation

Please see section “Background to Ernest’s flying” on the page “Ernest Archer, aviator and automotive importer” for some information on pre-WW1 aviation.

Ernie was very much a contemporary, in Holland, but quite some years older, of the Dutch aviation pioneer A.H.G. Fokker, whose aviation work in Germany during WW1 made him internationally famous, not least for the design of the Eindecker monoplane used by Manfred von Richthofen.

But it needs to be said that, contrary to impressions I had some years ago, and before I heard from Klaas Jan Sijsling, a man who has done much work on early Dutch aviation, and who seeks to dispel misapprehensions on that subject, Ernest Archer was not an aviation designer. Not in any way, as far as I can see. What he did do, was to put himself forward at a very early date for pilot-training at the Blériot schools in France, and he qualified for his pilot’s licence accordingly, and went on to do some flying for the Dutch aviation authority, in its then present form. More follows on this most interesting subject.


qaa© Philip B Archer 2014