Engineer, inventor and British Royal Air Force officer born in Earlsdon, Coventry District, Warwickshire, West Midlands, who designed and built the first turbojet engine (1937), whose first patent he registered (1930) and had another model later patented (1937). Elder son of mechanic Moses Whittle and Sara Alice, who bought the Leamington Valve and Piston Ring Company at Leamington Spa (1916). He entered Leamington College (1918), where he acquired a taste for astronomy and aviation engineering.
He entered (1922) for the Royal Air Force, the famous RAF, to study piloting at the RAF College in Cranwell. Graduated as a squadron pilot (1928), defending the thesis Future Developments in Aircraft Design, and received the Andy Fellowes Memorial Prize for Aeronautical Sciences. He served as a test pilot (1931-1932). The following summer (1932) he entered the engineering course at RAF Henlow as a member of Peterhouse College, Cambridge, where he received a First in Mechanical Sciences Tripos (1936).
While still in Cambridge, he began designing mechanical equipment for aircraft and decided to dedicate himself to aircraft projects within the RAF itself. The first British jet was built (1941), and during the war he was in Boston to assist General Electric (1942). He withdrew from the RAF (1948), was named Knight (1976), became research professor at the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland (1977), was awarded the Order of Merit (1986) and died (1996) in Columbia, Maryland, U.S. He was married (1930-1976) to Dorothy Mary Lee, with whom he had two children and divorced to remarry (1976) this time to Hazel Hall.
Source: http://www.dec.ufcg.edu.br/biografias/
Order F - Biography - Brazil School
Source: Brazil School - https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/biografia/frank-alice-whittle.htm
