Reginald Kirshaw "Rex" Pierson CBE (9 February 1891 – 10 January 1948) was an English aircraft designer and chief designer at Vickers Limited later

Vickers-Armstrongs Vickers-Armstrongs Limited was a British engineering conglomerate formed by the merger of the assets of Vickers Limited and Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company in 1927. The majority of the company was nationalised in the 1960s and 1970s, w ...

Aircraft Ltd. He was responsible for the Vickers Vimy, a heavy bomber designed during World War I and the first aircraft to cross the Atlantic non-stop. He was the chief designer of the

Vickers Wellington The Vickers Wellington (nicknamed the Wimpy) is a British twin-engined, long-range medium bomber. It was designed during the mid-1930s at Brooklands in Weybridge, Surrey. Led by Vickers-Armstrongs' chief designer Rex Pierson, a key feature of t ...

bomber of World War II.

Early life

Pierson was born on 9 February 1891 at Little Fransham, Norfolk, the son of the rector the Reverend Kirshaw T. Pierson and his wife Helen Mary. He was educated at the Felsted School in Essex.

Career

Vickers

Although his father wanted him to work in a bank, young Rex started an apprenticeship in 1908 with Vickers at Erith. As soon as the company started an aircraft section in 1911 he joined that part of the company and learned to fly. He gained Royal Aero Club Aviator's certificate number 660 on 14 October 1913 at Brooklands. By 1917 he was the chief aircraft designer at Vickers based in its Knightsbridge offices in London. In 1917 he designed the twin-engined Vickers Vimy biplane

heavy bomber Heavy bombers are bomber Fixed-wing aircraft, aircraft capable of delivering the largest payload of air-to-ground weaponry (usually Aerial bomb, bombs) and longest range (aeronautics), range (takeoff to landing) of their era. Archetypal heavy ...

which entered service with the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

in 1919. A Vimy flown by John Alcock and Arthur Brown made the first non-stop crossing of the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

in June 1919. Among his many other designs were the Vickers Vespa which held the world altitude record in 1932 and the Vickers Wellesley which held the world long distance record in 1938.

Vickers Wellington

He was also chief designer of the

twin-engined bomber, of which nearly 11,500 were built between 1936 and 1945. The Wellington, ''K4049'', first flew on 15 June 1936 from Brooklands with Joseph Summers.

Post war

Postwar designs included the

Viking Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

, Valetta and

Viscount A viscount ( , for male) or viscountess (, for female) is a title used in certain European countries for a noble of varying status. The status and any domain held by a viscount is a viscounty. In the case of French viscounts, the title is ...

. Pierson was promoted to chief engineer in 1946. His successor as chief designer was the engineer and industrial leader Sir George Edwards.

Personal life

After a long illness Pierson died at his home in Cranleigh, Surrey on 10 January 1948 aged 56. His name and achievements are commemorated by an annual ''R K Pierson Lecture'' held by the Royal Aeronautical Society (Weybridge Branch) at Brooklands Museum, usually in November. The museum also displays a unique collection of aircraft produced by the Vickers design team led by Pierson and Edwards from 1917-60.

References

* * Lynch, Brendan. ''Yesterday We Were in America - Alcock and Brown - First to fly the Atlantic non-stop''. Yeovil, England: Haynes Publishing, 2009 {{DEFAULTSORT:Pierson, Rex Commanders of the Order of the British Empire English aerospace engineers English aviators People educated at Felsted School People from Breckland District Vickers people 1891 births 1948 deaths