From the early years of aviation, curious minds attached floats to aircraft and more or less succeeded in taking off and landing on the water. The press reported these exploits and some manufacturers fitted floats to toy aircraft in their range.
While French engineers were at the forefront of these tests, their compatriots, the toy manufacturers, were conspicuous by their absence!
Several German firms offered these toys in painted sheet metal with a clockwork mechanism, the propeller driving the seaplane through the water.
Günthermann
From 1908, 18 x 20.5 cm
Heinrich Fischer
1910 ,12 x 18 cm
Plank
The most prolific; for this one he imagined Bériot’s aeroplane with floats!
Around 1910, the pilot’s arm waves the flag, 21 x 30 cm
A seaplane inspired by the Antoinette that equipped the nascent German air force
1911 – 1912, 25 x 29 cm
A seaplane with its tank in the air.
Circa 1914, 17.5 x 24 cm
A toy seaplane reduced to its simplest form
Before 1914, 17 x 24 cm
In Spain, Manuel de Jesús García produced a curious and highly amusing machine in painted sheet metal with a clockwork mechanism. The propeller propels the seaplane through the water.
Before 1914, 32.5 x 23 cm
Finally the Japanese, Yamada, with this pretty little seaplane decorated in the colours of the Rising Sun, again in painted sheet metal with a propeller driven by a clockwork mechanism; the whole propels the toy over the water.
Before 1914, 11.5 x 16 cm