20 Facts About Octave Chanute

Octave Chanute was a French-American civil engineer and aviation pioneer.

Octave Chanute advised and publicized many aviation enthusiasts, including the Wright brothers.

Octave Chanute added the "e" to his last name in his adult life.

Octave Chanute began his training as a civil engineer in 1848.

Octave Chanute was widely considered brilliant and innovative in the engineering profession.

Octave Chanute designed and built the Hannibal Bridge with Joseph Tomlinson and George S Morison.

Octave Chanute designed many other bridges during his railroad career, including the Illinois River rail bridge at Chillicothe, Illinois, the Genesee River Gorge rail bridge near Portageville, New York, the Sibley Railroad Bridge across the Missouri River at Sibley, Missouri, the Fort Madison Toll Bridge at Fort Madison, Iowa, and the Kinzua Bridge in Pennsylvania.

Octave Chanute established a procedure for pressure-treating wooden railroad ties with an antiseptic that increased the wood's lifespan in the tracks.

Octave Chanute retired from the Erie Railway in 1883 to become an independent engineering consultant.

Octave Chanute became interested in aviation after watching a balloon ascend in Peoria, Illinois, in 1856.

Octave Chanute published his findings in a series of articles in The Railroad and Engineering Journal from 1891 to 1893, which were then re-published in the influential book Progress in Flying Machines in 1894.

At the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, Octave Chanute collaborated with Albert Zahm to organize a highly successful International Conference on Aerial Navigation.

Octave Chanute introduced the "strut-wire" braced wing structure that was used in powered biplanes of the future, not seriously challenged until the pioneering efforts of Hugo Junkers to develop all-metal cantilever airframe technology without external bracing from 1915 onward.

Octave Chanute based his "interplane strut" concept on the Pratt truss, which was familiar to him from his bridge-building work.

Octave Chanute helped to publicize the Wright brothers' work and provided consistent encouragement, visiting their camp near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, in 1901,1902, and 1903.

The Wrights and Octave Chanute exchanged hundreds of letters between 1900 and 1910.

Octave Chanute freely shared his knowledge about aviation with anyone who was interested, and expected others to do the same.

Three small towns in southeast Kansas were vying for the railroad's land office and Octave Chanute suggested that they incorporate, to make the larger town more attractive to the railroad.

In 1963, Octave Chanute was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in Dayton, Ohio.

Octave Chanute is represented in the Frieze of American History, in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington DC.