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3 A Brief History of Space Flight
“Aerial Torpedo” was successfully developed. And thus, the solid gunpowder rockets
returned to the stage of history once again.
The jet rocket is the first reaction propulsion device used in practice. Although
it is not an ideal space launch vehicle yet, its basic principle can completely be
used to develop space vehicles. By intensively studying the solid rockets, astronautic
pioneers realized that space flights are only able to depend on the type of rockets
based on the principle of reaction force. With technological innovations of the solid
gunpowder rockets, the liquid rockets came into being further. Through the pioneers’
studies and tests, it was shown that space flights could be achieved by the rockets
using liquid propellants. And thus, the close link between rockets and space flights
was established in the early twentieth century.
3.2.3 Wan Hu Flying to Sky
“Wan Hu Flying to Sky” is an old Chinese legend, which told a story of a Chinese
official in the middle Ming Dynasty, named Wan Hu or Wan Hoo, achieving his
aspiration of space flight. On the day of the flight, Wan Hu sat in the chair where 47
fire-arrow rockets were attached to produce the thrust, and his two hands also took
respectively one large kite to produce lift force. He commanded that 47 assistants,
each armed with torches, simultaneously rushed forward to light the rockets. As a
result, Wan Hu lost his life because of the rocket explosion. All versions of this legend
have been spread to China by translating the English documents. However, up to now,
the records about Wan Hu and his deeds have not yet been retrieved from the existing
Chinese historical documents, which is also a reason why it is difficult to determine in
Chinese whether his name is “万户” or “万虎” through the English transliterations.
The foreign documents about “Wan Hu Flying to Sky” largely originated from the
following versions:
(1) In October 1909, an article written by John Elfreth Watkins, which told a story
similar to Wan Hu Flying, was published in the issue of Scientific American,
but the protagonist of the story was Wang Tu instead of Wan Hu. The story
said: “Tradition asserts that the first to sacrifice himself to the problem of flying
was Wang Tu, a Chinese mandarin of about 2000 years B.C. who, having had
constructed a pair of large, parallel and horizontal kites, seated himself in
a chair fixed between them while forty-seven attendants each with a candle
ignited forty-seven rockets placed beneath the apparatus. But the rocket under
the chair exploded, burning the mandarin and so angered the Emperor that he
ordered a severe paddling for Wang”.
(2) A monograph written by Willy Otto Oskar Ley (1906−1969) who was a
German-American science writer and space advocate, Rockets–The Future of
Travel beyond the Stratosphere, was published in 1944. The name of “Wan Hu”
first appeared in the monograph. In 1958, Willy Ley also said, in his another
3 A Brief History of Space Flight
“Aerial Torpedo” was successfully developed. And thus, the solid gunpowder rockets
returned to the stage of history once again.
The jet rocket is the first reaction propulsion device used in practice. Although
it is not an ideal space launch vehicle yet, its basic principle can completely be
used to develop space vehicles. By intensively studying the solid rockets, astronautic
pioneers realized that space flights are only able to depend on the type of rockets
based on the principle of reaction force. With technological innovations of the solid
gunpowder rockets, the liquid rockets came into being further. Through the pioneers’
studies and tests, it was shown that space flights could be achieved by the rockets
using liquid propellants. And thus, the close link between rockets and space flights
was established in the early twentieth century.
3.2.3 Wan Hu Flying to Sky
“Wan Hu Flying to Sky” is an old Chinese legend, which told a story of a Chinese
official in the middle Ming Dynasty, named Wan Hu or Wan Hoo, achieving his
aspiration of space flight. On the day of the flight, Wan Hu sat in the chair where 47
fire-arrow rockets were attached to produce the thrust, and his two hands also took
respectively one large kite to produce lift force. He commanded that 47 assistants,
each armed with torches, simultaneously rushed forward to light the rockets. As a
result, Wan Hu lost his life because of the rocket explosion. All versions of this legend
have been spread to China by translating the English documents. However, up to now,
the records about Wan Hu and his deeds have not yet been retrieved from the existing
Chinese historical documents, which is also a reason why it is difficult to determine in
Chinese whether his name is “万户” or “万虎” through the English transliterations.
The foreign documents about “Wan Hu Flying to Sky” largely originated from the
following versions:
(1) In October 1909, an article written by John Elfreth Watkins, which told a story
similar to Wan Hu Flying, was published in the issue of Scientific American,
but the protagonist of the story was Wang Tu instead of Wan Hu. The story
said: “Tradition asserts that the first to sacrifice himself to the problem of flying
was Wang Tu, a Chinese mandarin of about 2000 years B.C. who, having had
constructed a pair of large, parallel and horizontal kites, seated himself in
a chair fixed between them while forty-seven attendants each with a candle
ignited forty-seven rockets placed beneath the apparatus. But the rocket under
the chair exploded, burning the mandarin and so angered the Emperor that he
ordered a severe paddling for Wang”.
(2) A monograph written by Willy Otto Oskar Ley (1906−1969) who was a
German-American science writer and space advocate, Rockets–The Future of
Travel beyond the Stratosphere, was published in 1944. The name of “Wan Hu”
first appeared in the monograph. In 1958, Willy Ley also said, in his another