Zee Yee Lee (; 1891–1944) was a Chinese aviation pioneer. After becoming the first Chinese pilot to earn a

Royal Aero Club The Royal Aero Club (RAeC) is the national co-ordinating body for air sport in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1901 as the Aero Club of Great Britain, being granted the title of the "Royal Aero Club" in 1910. History The Aero Club was foun ...

certificate in October 1911, he brought two

Etrich Taube The Etrich ''Taube'', also known by the names of the various later manufacturers who built versions of the type, such as the Rumpler ''Taube'', was a pre-World War I monoplane aircraft. It was the first military aeroplane to be mass-produced in ...

monoplanes to China and flew on over

Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...

in April 1912. He was by some accounts China's first aviator, and was also one of the first Chinese aircraft designers. He served as the chief instructor and head of the Nanyuan Aviation School in

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

for 15 years, and later taught at the predecessor of the

Republic of China Air Force Academy The Republic of China Air Force Academy (CAFA; ) is the service academy for the air force of the Republic of China (Taiwan), and is located in Gangshan District, Kaohsiung, Taiwan. History Mainland China The Republic of China Air Force Acade ...

Biography

Lee was born in 1891 in

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

China, in his

ancestral home An ancestral home is the place of origin of one's extended family, particularly the home owned and preserved by the same family for several generations. The term can refer to an individual house or estate, or to a broader geographic area such as a ...

Dinghai Dinghai () is a district of Zhoushan City made of 128 islands in Zhejiang province, China. The total area is 1,444 square kilometres. The land area is 568.8 square kilometres, the sea area is 875.2 square kilometres, and the coastline is more th ...

Zhejiang ) , translit_lang1_type2 = , translit_lang1_info2 = ( Hangzhounese) ( Ningbonese) (Wenzhounese) , image_skyline = 玉甑峰全貌 - panoramio.jpg , image_caption = View of the Yandang Mountains , image_map = Zhejiang i ...

. His

courtesy name A courtesy name ( zh, s=字, p=zì, l=character), also known as a style name, is an additional name bestowed upon individuals at adulthood, complementing their given name. This tradition is prevalent in the East Asian cultural sphere, particula ...

was Yizhi (翼之). He studied in London, England, where he graduated from an industrial school in 1909. A year later, he entered the school of the newly established

Bristol Aeroplane Company The Bristol Aeroplane Company, originally the British and Colonial Aeroplane Company, was both one of the first and one of the most important British aviation companies, designing and manufacturing both airframes and aircraft engines. Notable ...

to study aviation and aircraft design.

Howard Pixton Cecil Howard Pixton (14 December 1885 – 7 February 1972) was a British aeronautical engineer, test pilot and air racing pilot who was most famous for winning the 1914 Schneider Trophy seaplane race. Early life Howard Pixton was the youngest ...

was one of his flight instructors. On 17 October 1911, Lee flew a

Bristol Boxkite The Boxkite (officially the Bristol Biplane) was the first aircraft produced by the British and Colonial Aeroplane Company (later known as the Bristol Aeroplane Company). A pusher biplane based on the successful Farman III, it was one of the ...

Salisbury Plain Salisbury Plain is a chalk plateau in southern England covering . It is part of a system of chalk downlands throughout eastern and southern England formed by the rocks of the Chalk Group and largely lies within the county of Wiltshire, but st ...

and passed the test to become the first Chinese aviator to earn a

certificate (No. 148). Rumpler Taube monoplane

Meanwhile, the

Xinhai Revolution The 1911 Revolution, also known as the Xinhai Revolution or Hsinhai Revolution, ended China's last imperial dynasty, the Qing dynasty, and led to the establishment of the Republic of China (ROC). The revolution was the culmination of a decade ...

broke out in China and toppled the Qing dynasty. At the request of the provisional

Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

government, Lee purchased two

monoplanes from Austria at the end of 1911 and brought them back to China. He was appointed the chief pilot of the

Military Government. On 13 and 14 April 1912, Lee flew a Taube over the Jiangwan Racecourse in Shanghai to celebrate the success of the Xinhai Revolution. According to

Frank Dikötter Frank Dikötter (; , born 1961) is a Dutch historian who specialises in modern China. Dikötter is the author of ''The People's Trilogy'', which consists of ''Mao's Great Famine'' (2010), ''The Tragedy of Liberation'' (2013), and ''The Cultural ...

and others, Lee was the first Chinese aviator, although

Feng Ru Feng Ru (; 1883–1912), also known as Fung Joe Guey (), was a pioneering Chinese aviator and aircraft designer. Life and career Born in Enping, Guangdong, Feng moved to the United States at the age of twelve, living and working in various part ...

, who had flown earlier in the United States, is also commonly credited as the first Chinese aviator. Zee Yee Lee on The Eastern Miscellany

Lee enlisted in the newly established flying battalion of the

Republic of China Army The Republic of China Army ( Chinese, 中華民國陸軍) also known as the ROC Army (ROCA); colloquially the Taiwanese Army ( Chinese, 台湾陆军) by western or mainland Chinese media, or commonly referred as the National Military Army ( Chi ...

Nanjing Nanjing or Nanking is the capital of Jiangsu, a province in East China. The city, which is located in the southwestern corner of the province, has 11 districts, an administrative area of , and a population of 9,423,400. Situated in the Yang ...

. In March 1913, President

Yuan Shikai Yuan Shikai (; 16 September 18596 June 1916) was a Chinese general and statesman who served as the second provisional president and the first official president of the Republic of China, head of the Beiyang government from 1912 to 1916 and ...

moved the battalion to Nanyuan Airport in

, and Lee was appointed chief flight instructor as well as head of maintenance. In September 1913, he became the chief instructor of the Nanyuan Aviation School; he was promoted to head of the school five years later. On 10 and 11 March 1914, Lee and two other pilots flew between Beijing and

Baoding Baoding is a prefecture-level city in central Hebei province, approximately southwest of Beijing. As of the 2020 census, Baoding City had 11,544,036 inhabitants, of which 2,549,787 lived in the metropolitan area made of 4 out of 5 urban distri ...

, establishing China's first airline route. He was also instrumental in establishing the first aerial mail passenger service between Beijing and

Tianjin Tianjin is a direct-administered municipality in North China, northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the National Central City, nine national central cities, with a total population of 13,866,009 inhabitants at the time of the ...

, which was inaugurated on 7 May 1920. Because of sabotage by the troops of the

Fengtian clique The Fengtian clique () was the faction that supported warlord Zhang Zuolin during Republic of China (1912–1949), China's Warlord Era. It took its name from Fengtian Province, which served as its original base of support. However, the clique quic ...

when they retreated from Beijing, the Nanyuan Aviation School was closed in 1928. Lee moved south to serve the

Kuomintang The Kuomintang (KMT) is a major political party in the Republic of China (Taiwan). It was the one party state, sole ruling party of the country Republic of China (1912-1949), during its rule from 1927 to 1949 in Mainland China until Retreat ...

government, and was appointed deputy director of the Aviation Corps of the

Central Military Academy The Republic of China Military Academy ( zh, t=中華民國陸軍軍官學校, p=Zhōnghúa Mīngúo Lùjūn Jūnguān Xúexiào, poj=Tiong-hôa Bîn-kok Lio̍k-kun Kun-koaⁿ Ha̍k-hāu), also known as the Chinese Military Academy (CMA), is ...

, which later became the

in Jianqiao,

Hangzhou Hangzhou, , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ; formerly romanized as Hangchow is a sub-provincial city in East China and the capital of Zhejiang province. With a population of 13 million, the municipality comprises ten districts, two counti ...

. He also designed a

floatplane A floatplane is a type of seaplane with one or more slender floats mounted under the fuselage to provide buoyancy. By contrast, a flying boat uses its fuselage for buoyancy. Either type of seaplane may also have landing gear suitable for land, ...

and became one of China's first aircraft designers. He published at least two books on aviation. Lee left the aviation industry after the 1930s. He died in 1944.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lee, Zee Yee 1891 births 1944 deaths Chinese aviators Aviation pioneers Chinese expatriates in England Engineers from Shanghai Republic of China Air Force personnel Chinese aircraft designers

Biography

See also

References