National flight donation

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National pride and aviation in the German Empire (photo from 1910)

The national flight donation was a national fund-raising campaign set up by the government before the First World War to promote the development of the German aircraft industry .

history

At the suggestion of August Euler , Prince Heinrich of Prussia created the “national flight donation” in the German Reich in 1912, based on the model of the zeppelin donation by the German people , in order to - as it was officially called - “to work inexorably on the perfecting of the flying machines, on the training the aviator, so that dangers are reduced and performance increased ”. The fundraising campaign began with the prince's appeal for donations during his opening speech on the occasion of the General Aviation Exhibition in Berlin from April 3-14, 1912 . At the end of 1912 the donation total was 7.5 million marks . Some of the money collected was given to industrial companies to promote aircraft development, and some not inconsiderable amounts were offered as rewards for the numerous flight days that took place at the time. On the initiative of the Reich Colonial Office and the German-South West African Aviation Association , 100,000 marks were used to build up aviation in the German protected areas .

See also

literature

  • The general importance of aviation for our time. According to information from the National Air Donation Committee . Göhmann, Hanover 1911.
  • Rudolph Penzing: The national flight donation . In: Ethical Culture . No. 20 , 1912, pp. 73-74 .
  • Sperling (Ed.): On the 70th birthday of the Minister of State d. Dr. Count Posadowsky-Wehner, the president of the curator of the national flight donation . Klasing, Berlin 1915.
  • Brigitte Kazenwadel-Drews: Zeppelins are conquering the world . Delius-Klasing, Bielefeld 2006.
  • Karl-Dieter Seifert: With collective dime to German air power . The national flight donation 1912–1914. Nora, Berlin 2014, ISBN 3-86557-351-7 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Karl-Dieter Seifert: German aviators over the colonies . Zweibrücken: VDM Heinz Nickel, 2007. ISBN 978-3-86619-019-1 .