A Scientist of Flight Wins an Honor Intended to Keep Him in Place

By KATHERINE MANGAN

As a boy, Hermann F. Fasel used to spend hours on the weekends gazing out his window, watching gliders soar through the skies near his hometown, Schwäbisch Gmünd, Germany.

His father feared that his fascination with flight and obsession with model airplanes would catch the attention of military recruiters looking to rebuild Germany's air force more than a decade after World War II. Not wanting to upset his father, Mr. Fasel, a tinkerer who took apart "anything that moved or