Vsevolod Abramovich

Vsevolod Abramovich was a pioneering aviator who came from a rather Jewy family: his grandfather, Mendele Mocher Sforim, is considered the founder of modern Yiddish literature. Vsevolod himself was at the forefront of aviation innovation. Working as a test pilot in the Wright brothers' German operations, he made numerous improvements to their designs and set a bunch of flying records in the process.

All of this came quite rapidly: he earned his pilot license in 1911, designed his own aircraft, the Abramovich Flyer, in 1912, and then... Oh-oh. You see that lifespan above the profile? These pioneer pilot stories rarely end well.

Abramovich fell in love with a countess. Eugenie Shakovskaya was not your ordinary noble: she was also obsessed with flying. She even flew for the Russians during World War I... but that was after she got her lover killed. The two used to fly together, until a fateful day in 1913 when the countess crashed into the ground and walked away with broken bones. Abramovich wasn't so lucky.

The countess' story is rather fascinating as well; she later became a spy and a bolshevik intelligence agent, all while addicted to cocaine and morphine. She died in 1920 in a drunken bar fight. Talk about a femme fatale... Watch out for those, young Jewish men!