6MHZ5pmPK

NICK COOK 19
Electrogravitics Systems had not been prepared by the Air Force, it
turned out, but by an outfit called the Gravity Research Group, Special
Weapons Study Unit, a subdivision of Aviation Studies (International)
Limited, a British organization.
I did some checking. Aviation Studies had been a think tank run by
Richard "Dicky" Worcester and John Longhurst, two talented young
aerospace analysts who in the mid-1950s produced a cyclo-styled
newsletter that had a reputation for close-to-the-knuckle, behind-thescenes
reporting on the aerospace and defense industry.
From the start, the Electrogravitics Systems report adopted a lofty tone:
"Aircraft design is still fundamentally as the Wrights adumbrated it, with
wings, body, tails, moving or flapping controls, landing gear and so forth.
The Wright biplane was a powered glider, and all subsequent aircraft,
including supersonic jets of the 1950s are also powered gliders."
The writers went on to say that insufficient attention had been paid to
gravity research and that the "rewards of success are too far-reaching to
be overlooked."
But while it quickly became clear that the report was not authored by
the USAF, or apparently even commissioned by it, it did appear to be
remarkably well informed about the progress of gravity—and antigravity—
research in the United States and elsewhere; something that LaViolette and
Valone felt might have accounted for its burial for so long in the Wright-
Patterson technical library.
The word "antigravity" was not used in the report, presumably
because this pop-scientific term was felt to be too lurid for the report's
paying subscribers. To those less fussed, however, the term "electrogravitics"
seemed pretty much synonymous with antigravity, even by
Aviation Studies' own definition:
"Electrogravitics might be described as a synthesis of electrostatic
energy used for propulsion—either vertical propulsion or horizontal or
both—and gravitics, or dynamic counterbary, in which energy is also
used to set up a local gravitational force independent ofthat of the earth."
Counterbary is subsequently defined as "the action of lévitation
where gravity's force is more than overcome by electrostatic or other
propulsion."
Antigravity, then.
The report echoed what had already been made clear in the Gladych
and Interavia articles: that antigravity was of real interest to just about
every U.S. aerospace company of the day.
"Douglas has now stated that it has counterbary on its work agenda,
but does not expect results yet awhile. Hiller has referred to new forms