WW1 Goggles I don't Know what they are

[Ryan B]

These are my Great Grandfathers from WW1.
Here is the link to the video on my Youtube channel.

YouTube - World War 1 Motercycle or Aviator Goggles

[Ryan B]

Can You Guys Help Me Please!

[Eddie]

sorry man, I'm not really sure, I'm curious now and would like to know myself!

[Ryan B]

They were given to me by my grandfather and he said that they were either motercycle or Aircraft goggles from WW1.

[Nordland/Danmark]

They look's like early aviator googles, but I no expert in this fild ad all, I'm sure I have seeing this on ww1 pilots in books and so.

[wingandprop]

The video is nice, but can you provide a couple photos, front and back? And a bit of a description would help. It's hard to tell: is the front leather? Is it rubber? Can you remove the lenses? Are there any marks? From looking at the video, I don't think, even with a couple good photos, that we are probably going to be able to narrow it down any more than your grandfather did. Goggles were often private purchase items. Especially early in the war, there was no such thing as "aviator's goggles". There were motoring goggles. The same goggles might be used by automobile and truck drivers (often no windshields so goggles were valuable), motorcylists, or aviators. Even late in the war the same types of goggles might be used by a variety of folks. As an example, I have a set of goggles that were known to be used by aviators and motorcyclists during the war, but which were then remarked for use by skiers after the war when they were being resold as surplus. Your goggles have a bit of an early war look to them, but that is about as far as I can go. There were so many small companies making goggles that its impossible, unless they were marked by the manufacturer, or unless they were a really major manufacturer, to say much more. Photos might help though, so feel free to send some. Good luck.

[Ryan B]

I Know they are leather and i will put up pics later i just need for my brother to get off the computer that has the camera

[Ryan B]

/Users/hihart/Desktop/Photo on 2011-04-25 at 20.01.jpg/Users/hihart/Desktop/Photo on 2011-04-25 at 20.00 #2.jpg/Users/hihart/Desktop/Photo on 2011-04-25 at 20.00.jpg

[wingandprop]

They were not designed for aviation use, but they could easily have been used by aircrews very early in the war. As the war progressed most aviators would not have wanted to use those goggles as the lense is a fairly small radius and is too far from the eye. My guess would be motorcycle riders or car or truck drivers were the original users, but that doesn't preclude aviation use. If aviators did use them, however, it would probably have been early in the war. The smaller the lense, and the farther it is from the eye, the greater the tunnel vision effect. Pilots and observers early in the war were not really involved in air to air combat so goggles like these would have been acceptable. Once they had to worry about air attack, however, a pilot or observer would want to maximize their effective visual range in order to maximize their own chances of survival. These lenses would have cut off way too much peripheral vision, in all directions, to be a desirable option for a combat aviator.

[Ryan B]

Thanks sooooo much for your help I really apprechiate (sorry for the bad spelling) it its been over a year so thanks for your help.
Ryan