Kremer Prize
In 1959, industrialist Henry Kremer offered the first Kremer prizes, of £5,000 for the first human-powered aircraft that could achieve record breaking feats. Managed by the Royal Aeronautical Society's "Human Powered Aircraft Group" formed by idealistic members of the College of Aeronautics at Cranfield. At first, only British citizens were eligible.
Take a moment to notice that the Kremer Prize was largely the project of the British Aeronautics industry. Yet, they did not create a challenge for "fuel efficient airplanes." Instead, the challenge was to create an aircraft that could run a small obstacle course with only "human power" -- resulting in a panoply of designs that would allow planes to take off and glide in a manner essentially like pedaling a bicycle.
To cast a wider net, in 1973 Kremer opened the prize to anyone and increased the prize to £50,000.
Dr. Paul MacCready was later contracted by General Motors to compete in the World Solar Challenge and the team was the first to win with the Sunraycyr.
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Footnotes
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- Grosser, Morton. Gossamer Odyssey: The Triumph of Human-Powered Flight.
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