Premier Naufrage D'Un Hydravion and J'ai vu naître l'aviation Henri Fabre Manuscripts

Henri Fabre was an engineer trained at l'Ecole Supérieure d'Electricité who made the first seaplane flight in 1910 in an aircraft he designed and built. This collection consists of two manuscript,including entitled Premier Naufrage D'Un Hydravion, by Henri Fabre that contains Fabre's account of flights he made in his seaplanes between 1906 and 1910 as well as information about other seaplanes and flights made in them by other pilots through 1911.

Henri Fabre was an engineer trained at l'Ecole Supérieure d'Electricité who made the first seaplane flight in 1910 in an aircraft he designed and built. Henri Fabre began experimenting with seaplane design in 1906 and patented a system of hollow, wooden floats. After several failed attempts, Fabre succeeded on March 28, 1910 with the 1910 Goeland (Gull) (Canard Seaplane), powered by a Gnome 50 h.p. engine and using the flotation devices he had patented earlier, and made four successful flights and landings from the water on the Étang de Berre. This aircraft was later piloted by Louis Paulhan. Glenn Hammond Curtiss and Gabriél Voisin both used Fabre's floats in their own aircraft. The 1910 seaplane was wrecked in May of that year with Fabre, who was unhurt in the crash, at the controls. Fabre introduced a new version of the Goeland (Gull) (Canard Seaplane) in Monaco in 1911 but it was wrecked there during a series of aquatic races. Fabre subsequently set up a company that supplied his floats to various aircraft manufacturers and also manufactured seaplanes during World War I.