Wolfgang Langewiesche

Who was Wolfgang Langewiesche?

Wolfgang Langewiesche aviator, author and journalist, is one of the most quoted authors in aviation writing. His book, Stick and Rudder, is still in print, and is considered a primary reference on the art of flying fixed-wing aircraft.

Born in Düsseldorf, Germany in 1907, he migrated to America in 1929. He was a graduate of the London School of Economics and earned his master's degree from Columbia University. He was in a doctoral program in the University of Chicago when he decided to learn to fly and pursue a career in aviation.

Mr. Langewiesche wrote for Air Facts magazine, an aviation safety-related publication edited by Leighton Collins, and his articles were the basis for most of Stick and Rudder. The basic facts about flying that he emphasized in 1944 have withstood much criticism since then. Over 200,000 copies of the book had been printed as of 1990.

He taught "Theory of Flight" to US Army aviation cadets in the ground school at The Hawthorne School of Aeronautics in Orangeburg SC during World War II, and test flew F4U Corsairs for the Vought Corporation. He later worked for Cessna as a test pilot. In the 1950s he became Reader's Digest's roving editor, retiring in 1986.