Blériot plane

French aviator, inventor and engineer

Louis Charles Joseph Blériot (BLERR-ee-oh,^[3][4]alsoBLAY-ree-oh, -⁠OH, blair-YOH,^[5][6][7]French:[lwiʃaʁlʒozɛfbleʁjo]; 1 July 1872 – 1 August 1936) was a French aviator, inventor, and engineer.

He developed the first practical headlamp for cars and established a profitable business manufacturing them, using much of the money he made to finance his attempts to build a successful aircraft. Blériot was the first to use the combination of hand-operated joystick and foot-operated rudder control as used to the present day to operate the aircraft control surfaces.^[8] Blériot was also the first to make a working, powered, piloted monoplane.^[9] In 1909 he became world-famous for making the first aeroplane flight across the English Channel, winning the prize of £1,000 offered by the Daily Mail newspaper.^{[10][Note 1]} He was th