On September 21, 1909, Feng Ru, the earliest aircraft designer and pilot in China, flew an aircraft of his own design and manufacture and flew on a flat open space near Mount Mount Monte in Oakland, USA, achieving a flight altitude of 4.6 meters and a flight distance of about 805 meters. This is the first time Chinese have flown a homemade aircraft into the blue sky.
On September 23, the Observer newspaper in San Francisco, USA, reported on the front page that "the genius Chinese Feng Ru built the aircraft himself and installed a homemade engine for test flight" under the title of "Wright of the East flying and homemade biplane", and made an evaluation of the test flight that "in the field of aviation, Chinese left white people behind" and published photos of Feng Ru and the plane he made. On the same day, the American People's Newspaper in California published an article entitled "Chinese people's aviation technology surpasses that of the West", which also reported on Feng Ru's success.
Feng Ru, whose original name was Feng Jiuru, was born on January 12, 1884 in Enping, Guangdong. At the age of 12, he went to the United States with relatives and worked in San Francisco and Then in New York. After 10 years of half-work and half-study, he studied mechanical technology assiduously, and he mastered the knowledge of machinery and electricity.
After the success of the Wright brothers' aircraft flight in December 1903, Feng Ru was deeply affected. He said: "I have heard of military weapons, Mo Feiruo, vowed to be the initiative, into a masterpiece to return to the motherland, no success, rather than death." "Airplanes are indispensable to the military,...... If thousands of aircraft are divided into Chinese ports, weite is enough to strengthen our own circle and strong enough to intimidate our neighbors. Feng Ru was determined to study and build and fly an airplane to the death to serve the motherland.
In May 1908, Feng Ru, Huang Qi, Zhang Nan, Tan Yaoneng and four other people jointly raised 1,000 US dollars to lease a factory at No. 359 East Ninth Street in Oakland, east of San Francisco, to jointly develop aircraft. Subsequently, zhu Zhuquan, Zhu Zhaohuai, Situ Biru, and other young overseas Chinese attended. Due to insufficient funds, it is impossible to purchase the necessary machinery and equipment, and many aircraft parts can only be made with simple tools and manual operations, which brings great difficulties to the development work. During the trial production of the aircraft, many test flights failed, and the factory was burned down. In the case of successive setbacks, Feng Ru was not discouraged, and after more than 10 revisions, he finally succeeded.
In January 1911, Feng Ru made a biplane with a liquid-cooled engine and performed successfully in Auckland. In February 1911, Feng Ru and his assistants Zhu Zhuquan, Zhu Zhaohuai, Situ Biru and others returned to China with 2 aircraft and prepared to produce and manufacture aircraft in China. Due to the negative attitude of the Qing government, Feng Ru's desire to build aircraft in his own country was not realized.
After the outbreak of the Xinhai Revolution, on November 9, 1911, the Guangdong Military Government was established, followed by a fleet of aircraft to prepare to fight north with the Guangdong Northern Expeditionary Army. Feng Ru was appointed captain of the Guangdong military government aircraft fleet.
On August 25, 1912, Feng Ru flew an aircraft of his own construction over Chinese territory in Yantang, Guangzhou. Due to the failure of the control system, the plane stalled and fell when it flew to more than 100 meters, and Feng Ru was seriously injured and unfortunately died after being rescued, becoming the first pilot in China to die in a crash. Before his death, Feng Ru struggled to tell his assistants the reason for the crash and encouraged them to "not hinder their enterprising spirit because of my death, you must know that this is a necessary stage." At the same time, he was instructed to bury his body in Huanghuagang and accompany the heroic spirits of the seventy-two martyrs.
After Feng Ru's death, the Army Department of the Guangdong Military Government submitted a report to the Provisional President for approval, allocating 1,000 yuan to his family according to the death of the major general of the army, and announcing the facts to the National History Museum. Feng Ru's body was buried in the Huanghuagang Martyrs Cemetery in Guangzhou, and a monument was erected to commemorate it, honoring him as "China's Founding Flying Master".
The blood of this air force martyr has made the first page of the "History of Chinese Aviation" more brilliant, and his contribution is that he has a great guiding and encouraging effect on the aviation construction of the Chinese people in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Ming Dynasty.
At that time, the development of China's aviation was completely an input of Western science and technology culture, and the Chinese people's understanding of aviation was some indirect reading of books and periodicals, and some directly observed the test flight of the aircraft; and the overseas Chinese and students living in Europe and the United States must be the earliest contact, participants, and the earliest medium to be introduced to the Chinese people.
Although french and Russian pilots showed the flight of the aircraft in front of the Chinese people a little earlier than Feng Ru, its impact on China's aviation construction was really not as good as Feng Ru's. The Chinese people may have an unpredictable sense of profundity in the test flight of foreigners, and Feng Ru proved that Chinese can also make their own aircraft, or they can fly the aircraft, shortening the distance between Chinese and aviation, and cultivating the interest and confidence of compatriots at home and abroad in aviation. It is a pity that Feng Ru's sacrifice was premature, which was a great loss for China Airlines.
Feng Ru is typical of China's aviation pioneers, but not an isolated exception.
At that time, there were many Chinese people, especially overseas Chinese and overseas students, who practiced aviation, and some of them gave up halfway, but there was no shortage of people who persevered and achieved outstanding success: Tan Gen and Lin Fuyuan, overseas Chinese in the United States, Li Ruyan, students studying in Britain, Yao Xijiu and Zhao Shizhong, who studied in France, were all famous aviation experts at that time, and later they also contributed to China Airlines and were the sowers of China Airlines.