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This back-to-the-basics education, and an admiration of German avant-aircraft designer Alexander Lippisch, led the Hortens away from the dominant design trends of the 1920s and '30s, and toward experimenting with alternative airframes -- building models and then filling their parents' house with full-sized wooden sailplanes. The first Horten glider flew in 1933, when both brothers were still in their teens.

The Hortens' glider designs were extremely simple and aerodynamic, generally consisting of a huge, tailless albatross-wing with a tiny coccoon of a fuselage, in which the pilot lay prone. They were also beautiful -- simple to the last line, and iconic like an image of flight itself. But the great advantage of the Horten designs was the extremely low parasitic drag of their airframes. They were 'slick' and scalable to high speeds.

By 1939, with Hitler in power and the Treaty of Versailles no longer in effect, Walter and Reimer had entered the Luftwaffe as pilots. (A third brother, Wolfram, was killed flying a bomber over Dunkirk.) They were also called upon as design consultants, although they suffered a disadvantage in that their reputation was very much grass-roots, among Germany's aeronautical community, rather than through official connections.

The Hortens had made the natural leap to powered flight in 1937, with a twin-engined pusher-prop airplane (an earlier glider had a mule engine). The Luftwaffe, however, paid mostly lip service to their designs until 1942, when grudging (and partly under-the-table) support was given to a twin- turbojet-powered fighter design, designated under wartime protocols as the HO-IX.

Working turbojets were scarce in wartime Germany, and other projects carried higher priority. Although the turbojet-equipped HO-9 reached almost 500 mph in trials, the project was soon given over to the theretofore low-tech aircraft company, Gothaer WaggonfabrikGothaer Waggonfabrik Gotha GWF) was a German manufacturer of rolling stock established in the late nineteenth century at Warnemunde. During the two world wars, the company expanded into aircraft building. In World War I, Gotha manufacturer a highly succes, as the Gotha Go 229The Gotha Go 229 was a late- World War II flying wing fighter aircraft, designed by the Horten brothers and built by Gothaer Waggonfabrik. It was a personal favourite of Hermann Goring, and was the only plane to be able to meet his infamous performance re.

The Go-229 was a fighter with great potential, but arrived too late to see service. Among other advanced Horten designs of the 1940s was the supersonic delta-wing HO-X, designed as a hybrid turbojet/rocket fighter with a top speed of Mach 1.4, but tested only in glider form (as the HO-XIII), and later with a piston engine.

As the war ended, the Horten brothers emigrated to ArgentinaArgentina is a Spanish-speaking country in southern South America, situated between the Andes in the west and the southern Atlantic Ocean in the east. It is bordered by Paraguay and Bolivia in the north, Brazil and Uruguay in the northeast and Chile in th, where they continued designing and building airplanes. Reimar died in 19941994 is a common year starting on Saturday, and was designated the International year of the Family''. Events January events January 1 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) goes into effect January 6 Nancy Kerrigan is clubbed on the right leg by an, while Walter died in 19981998 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar), and was designated the International Year of the Ocean''. Events January January 1998 A massive ice storm, caused by El Nino, strikes New England, southern Ontario and Quebec, resulting.