 |
|
|
|
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
 |
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
 |
We are proud to be an Authorized Distributor for Weems & Plath |
||||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||||
| In May of 1919, eight years before Lindberg's famous solo flight, three small planes set out from Newfoundland headed for London in an attempt to make the first trans-Atlantic flight. Only one of them made it.Twenty-five hundred feet below on board a station tracking ship, a young navigator, Lt. Cdr. Philip Van Horn Weems, U.S. Navy, gazed up and thought there must be a safer and simpler way than using a small armada of ships as beacons for the flight. |  |
||||||||||||||||
| For centuries, man
had relied on the heavens, on the circling planets and the constant
horizon, to guide him in his travels. A compass, a sextant, and charts
were the necessary tools for plotting a course, but these required
time for computations and a place to spread out and study the charts.
The timeworn system of celestial navigation was ill suited to the
cockpit, but the airplane was here to stay. Lt. Cdr. Weems, a brilliant,
inventive, and determined young man knew as he tracked that first
flight that navigation was his destiny and he went on to revolutionize
the field with his ideas, writings, and inventions. He went on to
establish his own school in Annapolis to teach The Weems System of
Navigation. Charles Lindberg studied with Weems before attempting
his trans-Atlantic flight. And Admiral Byrd, a classmate of Weems
at the Naval Academy, came to Weems for instruction before setting
out for the North Pole. A century earlier, Carl Plath's company in Hamburg, Germany - C. Plath, had been manufacturing the finest commercial sextants and magnetic compasses available . C-Plath developed the first gyrocompass installed on a commercial vessel in 1913. |
|||||||||||||||||
 |
Weems school for navigation had become the purveyor of Weems' instruments. It was a natural development for Weems' company to become the North American source for C. Plath's fine instruments also. Hence the alliance of two distinguished names - Weems and Plath.Today Weems & Plath is still located in the Chesapeake Bay town of Annapolis where it began so many years ago. It is committed to supplying the world with the finest nautical products available while maintaining the high standards of service that have distinguished Weems & Plath from its inception. | ||||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||||
