Viggo Widerøe

Viggo Widerøe (13 August 1904 – 8 January 2002) was a Norwegian aviator and entrepreneur. He founded Widerøe's Flyveselskap, Norway's third largest airline, in 1934. The airline is still in operation today.

Personal life Viggo Widerøe was born in Kristiania (now Oslo), the son of the mercantile agent Theodor Widerøe (1868–1947) and Carla Johanne Launer (1875–1971). He was a brother of the engineer and accelerator physicist Rolf Widerøe, and grew up at Vinderen. In 1935 he married Solveig Agnes Schrøder (1914–1989); they had a daughter Turi Widerøe. Through her, Viggo Widerøe was the father-in-law of Karl Erik Harr between 1972 and 1975.

Career Reportedly, Viggo Widerøe had decided to become an aviator already in 1910. In 1924, Widerøe joined the Royal Norwegian Navy Air Service and received a pilot's licence the following year. He became a conscript pilot for the RNNAS until 1 January 1928, when he was appointed an officer. Widerøe took his civilian pilot's licence on 13 June 1930 with Norske Luftruter and worked for the company until the end of summer of 1930. Two years later, Viggo Widerøe bought John Strandrud's shares in Rundflyvning, that was based in Drammen, and started as a pilot. In 1933, Viggo Widerøe established the company Widerøe & Bjørneby along with Halvor Bjørneby and bought a Simmonds Spartan. In all these companies, activity was concentrated at aerial photography, advertisement flying, air shows, demonstrations and charter passenger flights. Widerøe lay much emphasis on increasing the public interest in aviation throughout South Norway, and arranged flight shows in 1933 and 1934 through the Norsk Aero Klubb. He was sentenced to death, but this was converted to ten years of prison after he held his speech of defence in German. until he was liberated in March 1945. For the rest of the war, he worked as a secretary and interpreter for the American General George Patton. Widerøe never made much money from starting his company. He was in debt until the 1980s, and by the 1990s, he only had shares worth NOK 3,000. After retirement, Widerøe remained in Oslo during the summer, but spent his winters in L'Alfàs del Pi in Spain. He died in January 2002 in Oslo.