In the future, everybody is going to be flying around in their cars….it sounded great back in the 1950s but the future may actually be just around the corner!
The history of flying cars goes way, way back…
Back in 1843, William Samuel Henson and John Stringfellow filed a British patent for a flying machine. More “airplane” than “automobile”, it was a passenger-carrying, heavier-than-air vehicle that was steam powered. It never went beyond and idea.
In 1919, Glenn Curtis, considered the father of flying cars, patented his “Autoplane”. There has been many inventions and patents since then, like this patent from 1963, the “Flying Car” from Einar Einarsson.
Today, there are numerous companies designing and building flying cars, with some actually planning to start selling production models in the next one to two years. So you may actually be zipping around like George Jetson* in the near future.
Sources: Wikipedia and the USPTO. Jetson is a registered trademark of Hanna-Barbera Productions
Patents shown: US1294413 Glenn Curtis 1919 / US3090581 Einar Einarsson 1963