Being ProSemitic: Jewish Inventor

Maybe he had a maple tree and was motivated by the seeds that fall and spin like helicopters. But whatever inspired the idea, Mikhail Leontyevich Mil (1909-1970), a Soviet aerospace engineer and scientist, developed the blades that led to the production of helicopters for both civil and military purposes. Born to a Russian Jewish family in Irkutsk, one of the largest cities in Siberia, he won first prize in a model glider competition at the age of 12. His father worked for the Trans-Siberian Railway and his mother was a dentist.

Mil began his career designing  autogyros, a class of rotorcraft more like gliders than helicopters in that the blades are not motor-driven but air dependent. At the start of World War II, Mil was drafted into the Red Army and fought on the Eastern Front in 1941 near  Yelnya . In 1943, he was called back to continue research and development in improving the stability and control of combat aircraft. He completed his dissertation and got his PhD in 1945, and in 1947 headed a helicopter lab later known as the Moscow Helicopter Plant.

Mil’s creations won many awards and set 69 world records. Most notably, the Mil Mi-4 won a gold medal in the Brussels International Exposition in 1958. In 1971, after his death, his Mil Mi-12 (the production name for the V-12 prototype) won the Sikorsky Prize as the world’s most powerful helicopter.