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Article: Leonardo springs to life // Working models give breath to the designs of Italian genius
- Article from:
- Chicago Sun-Times
- Article date:
- March 5, 1987
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright (null) Chicago Sun-Times. (Hide copyright information)
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probably wouldn't work.
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Four centuries before the first airplane was built, Leonardo da
Vinci already was thinking about parachutes.
"If a man has a tent made of linen of which the apertures have
all been stopped up," Leonardo wrote, "he will be able to throw
himself down from any great height without suffering any injury."
Leonardo's parachute probably would have worked. So too would
many of the futuristic inventions he sketched in his thick notebooks,
including a machinegun, helicopter, transmission, military tank, life
preserver, paddle-wheel ship, gyroscope, drill press and all sorts of
pumps, gears and clocks.
But most of ...