The Fokker Scourge by Stan Stokes.
Anthony Herman Gerard Fokker was born in the Dutch East Indies in 1890. When his father retired the Fokker family returned to Holland, where Anthony attended school. He dropped out of college, and being deemed unfit for military service, worked at a number of odd jobs. Fokkers father persuaded his son to attend an automobile mechanics school in Germany, but Anthony was disappointed and convinced his father to enroll him in a school near Mainz which offered courses in aircraft construction and flying. This endeavor was not particularly successful, and Anthony decided to build his own flying machine. He found a partner in Oberlieutenant Von Daum, a fifty-year-old officer in the German military. The aircraft was completed in 1910, and Fokker flew it successfully on a number of flights. Von Daum, unfortunately, destroyed the machine on his first attempt at flying it. The two partners then teamed with a boat-builder to construct a second aircraft. In early 1912 Anthony had organized Fokker Aviatik GmbH with money advanced from his father. Fokker won his first contract for military aircraft in July 1913. Fokker became interested in the design of the Moraine-Saulnier, which exhibited flying characteristics far superior to the early Fokker designs. The Fokker M.5 (Eindecker I) emerged from the reengineering of a damaged Moraine-Sualnier. With the outbreak of WW I, the German military ordered large numbers of this aircraft for use as a scout. These Fokker scouts were good machines and well-liked by the pilots that flew them. Early in 1915 the French equipped their scouts with forward firing machine guns, and German losses in aerial combat increased sharply. The French system was simplistic and utilized shields on the propeller to deflect soft copper shells. Anthony Fokkers company was the first to introduce a workable machine gun synchronizer which would allow steel bullets to be used. The German military ordered the new Fokker fighter in large numbers, and by late 1915 the tide had shifted dramatically in favor of the Germans. The British press coined the term Fokker Scourge to describe this new menace which was increasing casualties to unprecedented numbers. Oswald Boelcke, and Max Immelmann were two German pilot aces who became very popular. Immelmann is depicted in Stan Stokes painting executing the aerial maneuver which took his name. Immelman received the Blue Max (Pour le Merite) to add to his Iron Cross following his eighth victory on January 12, 1916. He would officially be credited with fifteen victories prior to his death in June of 1916. The Germans maintained that a defective gun synchronizer caused Immelmann to shoot off his own propeller.
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