Professor Sir Bennett Melvill Jones (1887-1975)

Francis Mond Professorship of Aeronautical Engineering 1919-52

Professor Bennett Melvill Jones gained his place in engineering history by demonstrating the importance of streamlining on the design of aircraft.

The idea that a moving body passing through air or another fluid encounters resistance i.e. aerodynamic drag, had been known since the time of Aristotle (384-322 BC), but it took Melvill Jones to demonstrate the importance of this to the performance of aircraft.