By author Michael Adams, whose books are available at the Helensburgh and District Historical Society's website

Lawrence Hargrave was a Stanwell Park resident for six years, along with his family, from 1893-1899. There were about 1000 people in and around Helensburgh, but only a handful of people at Stanwell Park. There were the Hargraves and two other families running boarding houses – the Fosters at ‘Stanwell House’ and the Swaines at ‘The Glen’.

It was at this remote, unlikely location that Hargrave produced inventions and aeronautical research of tremendous importance to future manned flight and the aeroplane.

Today, most people think of Lawrence Hargrave as an aeronautical inventor, particularly of box kites. But he was more recognised and famous in Australia in his lifetime as a geographical explorer, an engineer celebrated for discovering gold on an 1876 expedition to New Guinea.

On his return, Hargrave became a Royal Society member, then turned to exploring the secrets of human flight.

By 1892 Lawrence Hargrave was regarded in some circles as the foremost aeronautical experimenter in the world. His wonderful invention, the radial rotary engine, earned him high international praise.

Lawrence Hargrave brought his family to Stanwell Park in 1893. Already he was designing what he called cellular kites, 3D kites that could catch the wind more surely and sit in the air more securely. He had plenty of wind at Stanwell Park, and conducted most of his experiments on the beach, and not on Bald Hill as might be suggested by the memorial there.

The steep Illawarra escarpment helped channel the winds, creating something of a wing tunnel for Hargrave.

Life at Stanwell Park was simple, almost at subsistence level, Hargrave wanting the Hillcrest property to support the family. In that way he could husband his inherited money through the great depression of the 1890s, but maintain his aeronautical experimentation. At first his family was happy to live and frolic in nature’s paradise, but it was an increasingly lonely place.

The rest of the aeronautical world was experimenting with single surface gliders. Hargrave decided to try himself, built a glider in 1894, launched himself from the then very steep sand hill above the beach, and ended up on his back, lucky to be alive.

Hargrave determined that when next he took to the air, it should be by means of cellular or box kites. The cellular kites were refined into the box kite design and his wife and oldest daughter, Nellie, could see possibilities in this line of work, readily assisting and sewing. Eventually Hargrave had several large box kites, the largest nine feet long.

Hargrave had let half the Hillcrest property to the Swaine family who lived in the original houses built by Ralph on the northern end, above Hargrave Creek. Jim Swaine would assist Hargrave on occasion. On the morning of November 12, 1894 Hargrave reckoned the strong southerly blowing was right for his biggest experiment so far.

The Hargrave and Swaine families rallied to get the box kites to the beach. Hargrave somehow managed to tie four in tandem, with a seat below the lowest. The assembled kites then lifted him 16 feet into the air.

Hargrave became the first person to be scientifically lifted by a heavier-than-air machine. He calculated the wind speed, his weight, the surface area of the kites, and was able to demonstrate these kites, if arranged as the fuselage of an aircraft, could take a person aloft with the right power output from a suitable engine.

More importantly the box kites went straight up, and sat in the air in perfect stability, their three dimensions trapping the air sweetly and securely. The experiment was immediately hailed by the aeronautical community.

From friend and future Prime Minister of the Commonwealth, Edmund Barton, 1894:

“Hargrave stands alone as one who has developed simultaneously the best form of aeroplane and motor before attempting to combine them in a flying machine. The great advance made by Hargrave is in having constructed what has been experimentally found to be a perfectly stable aeroplane.”

Douglas Archibald, vice-president of the Royal Society in London, came especially to Stanwell Park to see Hargrave in 1896:

“The balancing of single planes is wasted labour… in whatever way the rate of flying may develop in the future, Mr Hargrave has removed one serious surviving obstacle to the safe and rapid development of aerial travel.”

Hargrave had the photographer Charles Bayliss come to Stanwell Park, and a mock-up of the experiment was arranged below the family house. The cabbage tree in the photo is still there. This famous picture has caused some confusion since the actual experiment was conducted on the beach.

Six years in Stanwell Park were hard on the family, but productive for aeronautics.

Hargrave sent one his box kites to the USA as his friends there wanted to enter it in a kite competition. It won first prize, but as Hargrave steadfastly refused to patent any of his work, the Blue Hills Weather Observatory patented the box kite in the USA, selling it to countless meteorological bureaus.

Box kites could take weather instruments to great heights, more reliably than by balloon.

Hargrave was only interested in human flight, and encouraging anyone who would take up his ideas and inventions. He would next design and develop the wing curvature and leading edge that would give the necessary lift to hold a powered airplane aloft.

For more information, visit the website of the Lawrence Hargrave Society and find local history books at the Helensburgh and District Historical Society website

This article is an extract from the South Coaster guide, published in December 2020, rrp $19.99, available online, at Collins Booksellers Thirroul, and the Southern Gateway Visitor Information Centre at Bulli Tops.