This is one of my all-time favorite photographs. I use it to illustrate the principle, “Just because something looks good on paper doesn’t mean it will fly.” It’s easy to laugh, but remember, when this contraption was built in 1902, nobody knew how to design an airplane; the Wright brothers’ first flight was in 1903. So give the man credit for trying, even though he was on the wrong track, and his idea came to a dead end. (It’s hard to visualize commercial possibilities for this design.) Here’s what Wikipedia says about its inventor:
“Edward Purkis Frost (1842 – 1922) was an English pioneer of aviation. He built ornithopters, and became president of the Aeronautical Society. … Frost began studying flight in 1868 and built a large steam-powered flying machine with both fixed and flapping wings from 1870 to 1877. Frost had intended to have a 20-25 hp steam engine but the actual engine with 5 hp was not powerful enough to lift the ornithopter from the ground. … In collaboration with several colleagues he started another large similar craft in 1902 with an internal combustion engine. It lifted from the ground in 1904. A wing from this craft is displayed in London’s Science Museum.”
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Actually the design did fly in 1904. The Wright Brothers design flew first, and the brothers did think in terms of commercial use in their design.