33 Facts About Richard Pearse

Richard William Pearse was a New Zealand farmer and inventor who performed pioneering aviation experiments.

Witnesses interviewed many years afterwards describe observing Pearse flying and landing a powered heavier-than-air machine on 31 March 1903, nine months before the Wright brothers flew.

Ambiguous statements made by Richard Pearse himself make it difficult to date the aviation experiments with certainty.

Richard Pearse largely ended his early flying experiments about 1911 but pioneered novel aircraft and aero-engine invention from 1933 with the development of his "private plane for the million", a foldable single-engined tiltrotor convertiplane.

Richard Pearse played the cello, which he always kept close to hand.

Richard Pearse attended the Waitohi Flat School from 1883 and Upper Waitohi School from 1891 to 1893, where, deep in thought at times and as a keen reader, he pursued an interest in technology.

Richard Pearse informed the Minister of Defence in May 1945, he'd started to work on this engine from about February 1904, a few months after Samuel Langley's aeroplane failed to fly.

In 1902, at Waitohi, Richard Pearse invented a novel bell-crank pedal lever type bicycle with self-inflating tyres.

Coincidentally, on the day the Patent Office issued Letters Patent, Richard Pearse's bicycle drew public attention when he rode it in to Temuka on Sale Day, Tuesday, 19 May 1903, and Timaru on Wednesday, 20 May 1903.

Some witness accounts suggest Richard Pearse flew in 1902; others indicate a series of flights in 1903, ending in winter that year.

Richard Pearse was taken to hospital to see if he had broken his collar bone, but it was not, and he returned home the next day.

Richard Pearse recollected to interviewer George Bolt that the take off occurred long before she moved away from Waitohi in May 1904.

Gibson recalled that Richard Pearse had transported his flying machine with a dray and couple of horses from his shed to a terrace field above the Opihi River.

Arthur Tozer, who was about 17 years old at the time, recalled an event similar enough to be the same; that whilst driving a horse-drawn carriage through the Opihi riverbed he saw Richard Pearse fly overhead but thought he had flown on to land on the terrace.

Richard Pearse recalled that he was about 16 and a half years old when he saw one of Pearse's flights.

Richard Pearse had pushed his bamboo plane out of his shed and after altering the steering, started the engine and taxied for about 50 yards.

Daisy Moore Crawford, born 1892, recalled that she saw Richard Pearse's flying machine in the air.

Richard Pearse was with her father, William, who was a close friend of Pearse, on the hillside at the back of Pearse's farm.

Richard Pearse recalled his teacher at Fairview, Mrs Christian Ritchie, telling the children that Pearse had flown.

Sisters, Annie Fraser and Margaret Fraser, recalled that they were on a hill filling sacks of potatoes dug by David Stumbles, when they heard Richard Pearse's flying machine in the distance.

Richard Pearse continued to develop the ability to achieve fully controlled flight.

Diagrams and eyewitness recollections agree that Richard Pearse placed controls for pitch and yaw at the trailing edge of the low-aspect-ratio kite-type permanently stalled wing.

Richard Pearse's work was not clearly reported at the time; no contemporary newspaper accounts appear to exist of his earliest efforts.

Richard Pearse moved to Milton in Otago in about 1911 and discontinued his flying experiments due to the hillier country there.

Richard Pearse subsequently moved to Christchurch in the 1920s, where he built three houses and lived off the rentals.

Richard Pearse intended the vehicle for driving on the road as well for flying.

The Public Trustee administered Richard Pearse's estate following his death in 1953.

The trust officer was instructed to place the properties and saleable articles up for auction and dump Richard Pearse's patented convertiplane invention.

Sometime later, during a stopover at Christchurch Airport, Captain John Malcolm, NAC, caught sight of Richard Pearse's dismantled convertiplane in the hangar, and reported the find to aviation pioneer George Bolt in Auckland.

In mid-1958 Researcher George Bolt had tentatively concluded that all of his evidence showed that Richard Pearse had conducted a public flight experiment on 31 March 1903 when two newspaper clippings had been found in the Richard Pearse family album.

Richard Pearse's monoplane had a steerable pneumatic tyred tricycle undercarriage to "solve the problem of starting" flight.

The collection includes the flying machine created for the 1975 television docudrama Richard Pearse, based on Pearse's patent, witness descriptions and early 1900s technology.

The Richard Pearse Memorial stands at Waitohi, South Canterbury, where Pearse made attempts at powered flight.