I’ve uploaded a series of films on historic wind turbines in operation to the Internet Archive. To help me keep track of them, I’ve posted the links and a short summary here. I’ve included some films in this list that are on YouTube.com as the provenance isn’t clear. Of course videos of operating wind turbines are quite common now, so I am limiting this list to those of historic interest or those that are so odd they’ve struck my fancy.
Film of Rotor Ship Buckau Sailing into the Firth of Forth in 1925: Anton Flettner’s rotor ship Buckau sailed across the North Sea in 1925 using two Flettner Rotors for propulsion. The event was recorded by British Pathé in a black & white silent film 5.5 minutes long. The ship was renamed the Baden-Baden and sailed across the Atlantic in 1926.
Power in the Wind 1932 Balaklava Wind Turbine Film: In 1932 British Pathé filmed a newsreel of the Soviet Union’s recently installed wind turbine at Balaklava near Yalta on the Crimea Peninsula.[1] The black & white newsreel is 1 minute 23 seconds long, giving a rare glimpse of the unique wind turbine in operation.
Note: I’ve come across several more films of historic wind turbines. I will be adding them here as I can.
Smith Putnam Wind Turbine Operating 1940s (High Resolution): This video is a digitization by Gabriel Altman of a film in the archives of the York County History Center. The video shows different views of the wind turbine operating. For scale, you can see the 1940s-era cars in the lower part of the frame.
Low-Resolution Film of Smith-Putnam Turbine in Operation: This is another video that had been previously posted on the Smith-Putnam turbine by Kristian H. Nielsen, the director of the Centre for Science Studies at Aarhus Universitet in Denmark.
Construction of Orkney Wind Turbine, 16 mm bw, 1955: Scottish fabricator John Brown Engineering installed an experimental three-blade downwind turbine using a complex variable pitch rotor in the Orkney Islands in 1955.
Video of Gedser Mill in Operation: In 2010 Kristian Hvidfelt Nielsen posted a rare one-minute long video of the Gedser mill in operation on YouTube.com. Nielsen is the director of the Centre for Science Studies at Aarhus Universitet in Denmark. You can also find a link to the film from the web site at Revival of the Mother Mill with information on the project to restore the Gedser mill in English, German, and Danish.
Operation of Ulrich Hütter’s StGW-34 at a test site in the Schwabian Alps: This 5.5 minute film shows operation of Ulrich Hütter’s StGW-34 research turbine at a test site in the Schwabian Alps (identified as Stötten-Schnittlingen above Geislingen/Steige in the film) from 1957 to 1968. Sepp Armbrust conducted the field tests and made the film as noted in the German text.
Wind: An Energy Alternative–Video Blast from the Past: In 1980 the Department of Energy published a short film titled Wind: An Energy Alternative. The 12-minute film was produced by the Solar Energy Research Institute (SERI) probably in 1979.
Wincon Wind Turbine Runaway San Gorgonio Pass Mark Haller: This is a nearly 30-minute video of a Danish Wincon wind turbine running away in the San Gorgonio Pass some time in the late 1980s or early 1990s. It depicts the field crew’s various attempts at stopping the rotor to prevent the wind turbine from destroying itself.
Enertech E44 Wind Turbine Runaway SeaWest Altamont Pass: This is a 33-minute video of an Enertech E44 running in overspeed in the Altamont Pass in the late 1980s. I had this video digitized for its historical content from a video cassette provided by Mark Haller from his collection when he worked for SeaWest in California’s Altamont Pass.
1984 Films of Fayette Wind Turbines by Thomas Braise: In the fall of 1984 California photographer Thomas Braise filmed Fayette Manufacturing’s wind turbines in the Altamont Pass. Braise was a professional photographer hired by Fayette to photograph their machines. He produced stunning images of wind turbines in operation.
Fayette Manufacturing Investors Tape (YouTube.com): Uploaded by Michael Noriega who was a mechanical draftsman for Fayette Manufacturing Corporation from 1983 to 1985 in California’s Altamont Pass. Fayette in the early 1980s was a major play in the California wind industry. This video was shot in 1982 or 1983 and features John Eckland, Fayette CEO, Dr. Forrest “Woody” Stoddard, and landowner Joe Jess, Sr.
PG&E Boeing Mod-2 Wind Turbine Removal Mark Haller: I had this video digitized for its historical content from a video cassette provided by Mark Haller from his collection when he worked for SeaWest in California’s Altamont Pass. The provenance of the video is uncertain.
Abandoned Vertical Axis Windmill In The Magdalen Islands: The 4-minute video was filmed in mid 2016 and shows a DAF-Indal Darrieus turbine standing idle on Îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The video films some of the debris on the site and the interior of the ground-mounted drive train. Keen observers will note what looks like an old Carter 25 (10-meter diameter) downwind machine in the background later in the video. It too isn’t operating.
Video of NedWind Turbines Spinning in Palm Springs May 2024: This is a 23 second video of NedWind wind turbines operating on the Whitewater Wash near Palm Springs, California in May 2024. The video was recorded by Thomas Spiglanin of Palm Springs Windmill Tours.
More Videos—Not Necessarily Historic—Sometimes Just Odd
Heidelberg Motor’s VAWT Video: In research for his new book, Vaughn Nelson is turning up a number of fascinating videos. One he found is a video of Heidelberg Motor’s H-rotor operating in Germany. The VAWT was unusual in that the H-rotor drove the large ring generator, seen in the video, directly via a torque tube. Later versions installed at the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Koog test center placed the ring generator on the rotor hub atop a novel tripod tower. Heidelberg installed five turbines at the test site.
WindStor VAWT: Another Sad Saga of Time & Money Wasted: There was nothing more online about the WindStor VAWT until mid 2010 when WindStor installed a unit in Ishpeming on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. I don’t know whether this was a derivative of the Quebec prototype or not because the guyed three-blade rotor, unlike the prototype in Quebec, attached the lower blades to the torque tube in a traditional manner. They finally got the turbine spinning in the fall. There’s a series of six videos about the installation of the Ishpeming turbine on YouTube.com. See mtienergy.
Video footage of FloDesign-Ogin Antelope Valley Prototype DAWT: The first video is the most interesting: 100 KW Ogin wind turbine drone footage. Posted by Stan Tehee on Dec 30, 2016 it appears to show drone footage of then recently installed prototype of the second generation FloDesign-Ogin DAWT in the Antelope Valley near the southern border of the Tejon Ranch. This video of FloDesign Experimental Wind Turbine on Deer Island in Boston Harbor. This is a video of the original design before it was modified for installation of a prototype second generation version in California. By the spring of 2017 the city was going out to bid for removal of the turbine. The defunct company walked away from the turbine, leaving the taxpayers to dispose of the aerial junk.
Optiwind Demolition–The Fate of Many Revolutionary Wind Turbines: In the research for his new book, Vaughn Nelson has been dredging up some amazing videos. One he came across in Extreme Demolition: 200ft wind turbine tower toppled in Torrington CT, Connecticut Aerial Video that was posted Oct 15, 2013 on the demolition of Optiwind’s prototype. The “device” as I am hard pressed to call it a wind turbine was installed at Klug Hill Farm, Torrington, Connecticut. It was erected in 2009 shortly before the company went defunct. According to Vaughn, the device was rated at ~ 50 kW from two small turbines. The tower was 61 meters tall.
