Louis Bleriot's Flight Across the Channel

Aviator Louis Bleriot made history's first international flight across the English Channel from Calais to Dover July 25, 1909. It doesn't seem like much today, but it was a huge international sensation when it happened.

Louis Bleriot

Five years after the historic flight, the artist Robert Delaunay painted this Homage to Bleriot. The brilliantly colored biplanes and monoplanes with all the whirling disks of light look almost angelic.
It's a poetic (and poignant in hindsight) work about the optimism, excitement, and expectation that the first aviators inspired in so many people. That's something hard to imagine today, especially when dealing with airlines and airports.


Eighteen years later, Lindbergh would cross the Atlantic. Sixty years later, three men would walk on the moon.