The boy who never went to school

Michel Wibault, born in Douai in 1897, was disabled by polio at four, never went to school and taught himself engineering; his disability also kept him out of the First World War. In 1919 he founded the Société des Avions Michel Wibault at Billancourt and built military parasol monoplanes in duralumin, using metal construction methods he patented. From 1922 he was a consulting engineer to Vickers in Britain, which adopted his methods.

Metal parasols for three air forces

His best-known aircraft was the Wibault 7 fighter of 1924. It came only third in the French fighter competition but still won orders, and across its variants it went to the French air force and navy, Poland, Paraguay and, as the Vickers Wibault Scout, Chile. The carrier-capable Wib.74 had a strengthened fuselage and arrester hook. From 1930 the firm turned to airliners, and Air France bought twelve of its 280-series trimotors.

The idea that outlived the firm

In 1931 Wibault merged with the Penhoët shipyard at Saint-Nazaire, and in 1934 Breguet took over the combined company. Wibault’s most famous idea came twenty years later. In 1954 he designed a vertical take-off concept using swivelling compressor nozzles, worked on it with Bristol Engines, and shared a 1957 patent with Gordon Lewis. It led directly to the Bristol Siddeley Pegasus and the Harrier. He died in Paris in 1963.

Fábricas

• Billancourt works · Billancourt, near Paris

Pessoas

• Michel Wibault · founder and designer — 1897–1963; Chevalier of the Légion d’honneur 1931; co-inventor of vectored thrust
• Gordon Lewis · Bristol engine designer — Joint 1957 patent with Wibault