Giovanni Battista Caproni

Giovanni Caproni (on the left) on board the second Caproni Ca.32 at Taliedo airport in July 1915. Giovanni Battista "Gianni" Caproni, 1st Count of Taliedo (July 3, 1886 – October 27, 1957) was an Italian aeronautical engineer, civil engineer, electrical engineer, and aircraft designer who founded the Caproni aircraft-manufacturing company.

Early life and education

Caproni was born on July 3, 1886, in Massone, which at the time was in Austria-Hungary but became a part of Italy in 1919. In 1907 he received a degree in civil engineering from the Technical University of Munich. A year later he received a doctoral degree in electrical engineering from the University of Liège.

Career

In 1907 and 1908, Caproni gained experience in the construction of aircraft engines; he also collaborated with the Romanian aircraft designer Henri Coandă, whom he had met at lIstituto Montefiori di Liegi, in the building of sailplanes. In 1908, he founded the Caproni factory in the Taliedo district of Milan, Italy, to manufacture biplanes. In 1921, he built the prototype of a giant transatlantic passenger seaplane, the Caproni Ca.60 Noviplano, with a capacity of 100 passengers, but it proved unstable and crashed on its second flight. He also designed gliders. Caproni was granted the title Conte di Taliedo (Count of Taliedo, or Earl of Taliedo) during the interwar period.

In the 2013 Japanese anime film The Wind Rises, a fictionalized version of him interacts with the protagonist, Jiro Horikoshi, in dream sequences.