Why You Can't Fly - Paperback

by J. Baldwin (Author)

Why can't you step out of the second story window and fly anywhere you wish this minute? With today's lightweight powerful computers, modern materials and advanced methods of making things, people still can't fly around as freely as birds. It's not because suitable materials haven't been available or affordable. In the 1950s, a dozen or so ordinary people formed a group to develop a Dutch levitation invention from mere drawings to actually flying! Like birds, they had to learn to fly-not an easy task. And what was the best way to use the new skill?This was the sort of project that showed humans at their best and worst. As the dream of personal flight edges closer, the exuberant fliers inspire other investigators to share the amazing adventure. Here is how it happened, and why you can't fly home tonight.

Author Biography

Jay Baldwin was born in 1933, the worst year of the Great Depression. Brought up middle class in metropolitan New Jersey, he spent his first ten summers in Eldon, Iowa, the scene of Grant Woods' American Gothic painting. Both his parents had college degrees. Jay got a BS in Design from U Michigan and did graduate work at UC Berkeley. Took his first airplane ride in 1936 in a Ford Trimotor at the Iowa State Fair. Jay learned to read early. He read Winnie the Pooh, Treasure Island and Poe stories in kindergarten and is still a speed-reader. That carried into editing: he edited the Nomadics and Design sections of The Whole Earth Catalog for more than 20 years and was Editor-in-Chief of the 1985 Essential Whole Earth Catalog and the Whole Earth Ecolog. Jay has taught Sustainable Industrial Design at ten colleges and universities (and one high school). He is currently teaching Design at CCA in San Francisco. He also led a crew that dismantled Bucky Fuller's Wichita House now on display at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. Jay wrote BuckyWorks: Buckminster Fuller's Ideas for Today (Wiley 96). He works as a designer, too of course: Jay discovered why many geodesic domes leak. Fuller bought one-the Pillow Dome-for his Bear Island off the coast in Maine. Jay's latest design is the patented Quickupcamper(TM) an RV based on a Ford Pickup truck. It gets 20 mpg at 70 mph fully loaded-double the fuel mileage of most competitors. It is stable in heavy winds, is agile, and rides well. Take a look at quickupcamper.com. (It's not yet in production). Jay is also a professional white water raft and canoe guide, and can be found on Wikipedia.org.