Louis Blériot traverse la Manche!



Crossing the Cliffs of Dover.  The actual weather was reported to be 'turbulent'.

Postcards of the first crossing of the English Channel/La Manche by aeroplane (a trip which took 37 minutes), piloted by French aviator Louis Charles Joseph Blériot (1 July 1872 – 2 August 1936) on 25 July 1909 for which he won a prize of £1,000 offered by the Daily Mail newspaper.  As well as an aviator, he was an inventor and engineer, and he developed the first practical headlamp for cars and established a profitable business manufacturing and making them, using much of the money he made to finance his attempts to build successful aircraft.