All Aero

Ludovic Georges Louis Verdier was born on November 19, 1882 in Frenelles, Boisemont, Eure, France. Louis was discharged from military service in 1903. He took an interest in the emerging aviation and, in Roncherolles studies several prototypes. He began in 1903 to build his first helicopter but was stopped by a lack suitable engine, although he himself made an attempt by grouping two motorcycle engines together.

In 1904, Louis moved to Paris, he rented an office and workshop in rue Vercingétorix to build his first monoplane. He was authorized to use the Issy-les-Moulineaux training ground in the Hauts-de-Seine, provided it takes place on Sundays and public holidays.

In 1905, he resumed the study of a helicopter with a traction propeller and a lift propeller, then the study of a monoplane.

Faced with the futility of his efforts, Louis leaves his Parisian studio to get along with an industrialist at La Souterraine in the Creuse, Henri Guyot who has already filed a patent for a helicopter.

The Guyot-Verdier tandem is studying a propeller-driven tractor biplane, “Antoinette” type with adjustable pitch with 50 horsepower, quadrangular fuselage, aft fixed plane with angle variable and adjustable incidence. Front and rear stabilizers combined, rear rudder, wingspan of the aircraft 12 meters, length 10 meters, cell mounted on a landing gear metal, with shock absorbers and steerable wheels for landing and ground towing.

The tests of this “creusois” aircraft are carried out in Haute-Vienne, on the Dorat aerodrome, installed by Henri Guyot and Louis Verdier, on the racecourse made available to airmen by Mr. de La Guériviére.

The same pair built another propeller-driven biplane with a 60 horsepower engine. A biplane with the span of the upper planes 15 meters, span of the lower planes 12 meters, the cell front and rear stabilizer were joined by V-shaped ash beams and to reduce resistance to forward movement by flight in the atmosphere, the guying masts, the levers of controls were streamlined, the front cell mounted on landing pads and shock-absorbing wheels with skids braking on the ground under the fixed rear plane, the incidence of the rear plane being adjustable without touching the rear skids, the rudder steering being fixed at the rear of the rear stabilizer, the ailerons manually controlled by a joystick, the spacing of the pads landing area of 3.50 meters, 4 shock absorbers per skid mounted on dual wheels, constructed with drop-base rims for the fitting of balloon tires.

In 1913, Louis Verdier wrote:
“Despite all these facts and qualities as well as many steps taken by our gentlemen, Deputies and Senators of Creuse and Haute-Vienne, the La Souterraine aviation factory has never obtained any order of a military service from the French State, nor any financial aid, all this aviation equipment has been studied, built and developed to no avail, for it was not the few parties and exhibitions that were able to cover all these study and construction costs for these aircraft prototypes. I give up building and flying these planes, I leave the provinces and return to the Paris region”

Louis entered the Sanchez-Beza Establishments as a pilot, then as a test pilot and engine developer at the Salmson aviation factories in Billancourt and, with mechanics, replaces engines on seaplanes in Saint-Raphaël (Var), Bizerte (Tunisia), Marseille (Bouches-du-Rhône), Toulon (Var).

1914, the war breaks out, Louis helps Caudron to move his aviation factory and he returned to Farman as a pilot and instructor.

In 1940, the Farman and Louis factory moved to Angoulême in Charente. When they return to Billancourt, a month later,the enemy planes had done a sad job, the factory was bombed from all sides, everything had to be rebuilt. In March and September 1943, the home of Louis and his wife was partially destroyed by bombing.

In 1950, at the age of 68, Louis decided to give up aviation.

Louis Verdier, domiciled at 18 rue de Clamart in Boulogne-Billancourt, died at the age of 74, on January 29, 1957 at the hospital in Paris in the 15th arrondissement. He rests in the cemetery of the commune of Boulogne-Billancourt.