Anton Flettner (1 November 1885 – 29 December 1961) was a German aviation engineer and inventor. Born in Eddersheim (today a district of Hattersheim am Main), Flettner made important contributions to airplane, helicopter, vessel, and automobile designs.
Having served Germany in both World Wars, Flettner emigrated to the United States after World War II as a consultant to the office of Naval Research at the United States Navy.
Flettner attended the Fulda State Teachers College in Fulda, Germany. He was the village teacher in Pfaffenwiesbach from 1906 to 1909.
World War I
From 1914 to 1918 Anton Flettner worked at the German Ministry for War in the development of remote controls for air, water, and land vehicles. While employed under the aegis of Graf Zeppelin, Flettner also developed pilotless aircraft projects. The servo tab evolved into the "trim tab" which is still in use on all airplanes and many large vessels. The patent was later acquired by Flettner's firm Flettner Ventilator Limited, which still manufactures modern versions of the device in Britain. It has been widely used on buses, vans, boats, railroad cars, campervans, and trucks to assist cooling in warm weather.
Other post-World-War-I work
Following World War I, Flettner was named managing director of the Institute for Aero and Hydro Dynamics in Amsterdam. The Buckau was a schooner refitted with two rotating 50-foot cylinders and was the first vessel built with a propulsion system based on the Magnus effect. A commercial rotor ship, the Barbara, was also built, and sailed to the United States. Flettner followed this accomplishment by building the Flettner Fl 185 in 1936, an experimental German gyrodyne, which could fly as both a helicopter and as a gyroplane.
In 1938 Flettner, together with Kurt Hohenemser, built the Flettner Fl 265. he held a personal relationship with the head of gestapo, Heinrich Himmler. Himmler had Flettner's wife and family escorted safely to Sweden for the duration of the war. They were the Flettner Fl 285, another reconnaissance helicopter with a two-hour flight limit and capacity to carry two small bombs, and the Flettner Fl 339, a large transport helicopter project designed for approximately 20 passengers. After 1945, Flettner, along with many other aviation pioneers, was brought to the United States as part of Operation Paperclip. Flettner and his partner, Kurt Hohenemser, were among the first German emigrants into the United States after World War II.
Flettner started Flettner Aircraft Corporation, which developed helicopters for the U.S. military.
Flettner's company in the U.S. was not commercially successful, but his work was shared with the US Army Air Forces. There are two ships utilizing the concept of the Flettner rotor in a modified form, the turbosail Acyone developed by Jacques-Yves Cousteau in 1985 and the E-Ship 1, a cargo ship that made its first voyage in 2010. Albert Einstein praised the Flettner Rotor ship as having great practical importance.
Anton Flettner died at age 76 in New York City on December 29, 1961. Among his many distinctions, Anton Flettner was an honorary member of the American Helicopter Society and the Convertible Aircraft Pioneers.
- Flettner Fl 185