Wilhelm Niemann (officer)
Wilhelm Niemann (born August 25, 1892 in Ellingstedt / Schleswig , † March 21, 1935 in Beeskow ) was a navigation officer on the airship Dornier Do X and the first German airship postmaster .
Life
Wilhelm Niemann was the first officer and navigational officer on the airship Dornier Do X from Dornier-Metallbauten GmbH and the Reich Ministry of Transport . He remained an employed ship officer of the Hamburg-America Line HAPAG and was "loaned" by the Hamburg shipping company. On the test and transfer flight of the Do X in the direction of the USA from November 5, 1930, in addition to his navigation tasks, he carried out the ship's correspondence.
After being sworn in as the first airship postmaster on October 29, 1930 in the Friedrichshafen post office on Lake Constance, he processed the mail delivered on board until June 1932. During the Atlantic-spanning promotional trip of the largest passenger aircraft at the time , letters and postcards were sent internationally. These receipts, provided with a wide variety of postage stamps and special postmarks, as well as flight confirmation stamps, result in the special area of aerophilately : the DO-X-Post .
After leaving as a crew member of the flight ship and as a captain at HAPAG in September 1932, he became head of the navigation department at the German Aviation Research Institute in Berlin-Adlershof. He initiated the introduction of the decimal 400-degree circle in navigation. Due to his flying death at Beeskow on March 21, 1935 , he was on a training flight for a planned world flight , the navigational advantages of the 400-degree circle have not been pursued further.
literature
- Jörg-Michael Hormann , Evelyn Zegenhagen: German aviation pioneers 1900–1950 , aviation pioneers . Delius Klasing, Bielefeld 2008, ISBN 978-3-7688-2484-2
- Jörg-Michael Hormann: Airship DO-X: the chronicle . Delius Klasing, Bielefeld 2006, ISBN 978-3-7688-1841-4
- Jörg-Michael Hormann: A ship flies into the world: 75 years of the Dornier flying ship Do X D-1929 . Deutsche Post AG, Bonn 2004, ISBN 978-3-00-014367-0
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Niemann, Wilhelm |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German navigation officer of the DO-X and first German airship postmaster |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 25, 1892 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ellingstedt , Schleswig-Holstein |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 21, 1935 |
| Place of death | Beeskow |