2-636-895 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The flying ship, c1709 (1919). On 17 April 1709 Friar Bartolomeu de Gusmao, a Portuguese Jesuit priest and naturalist, petitioned King John V of Portugal, claiming to have invented a flying machine. The King granted Gusmao the sole right to build the device and if it succeeded, great academic acclaim. However The Church in Rome strongly requested him to desist from such acts of heresy. From The Wonder Book of Aircraft for Boys and Girls, edited by Harry Golding. [Ward. Lock & Co. Limited, London, Melbourne and Toronto, 1919]