Why the Wrights?

[Roundel]

That's the question people have wondered for a century. Two brothers, with only a local if sterling reputation, solved a problem that had stumped many others, including America's top scientist, Samuel P. Langley, and Britain's foremost inventor, Sir Hiram Maxim.

If you're in or near Washington, D.C., you can find the answer in an excellent exhibit at the National Air & Space Museum. If you can't make it to D.C., try this website:

http://www.nasm.si.edu/wrightbrothers/

[Barrett]

An interesting perspective is Walt Boyne's WB novel, Dawn Over Kitty Hawk. Worth a read.

[jumpinjan]

For the couch potatoes, this is the best of the best in DVD documentaries.
http://www.davidgarrigus.com/
A 2-disk set also has rare movie clips of actual flights. Some, that I have never seen before.

[Wind In The Wires]

Thanks Jan. I just bought the DVD.

[JohnReid]

Often new advances in any field is brought about by people who have a new way of looking at things because their mind has not been narrowed by conventional wisdom(Universities,professional societies and such)They have no massive reputations(or egos) to worry about so they just press on with their original ideas.Cheers! John.

["Junior"]

Originally Posted by Roundel

That's the question people have wondered for a century. Two brothers, with only a local if sterling reputation, solved a problem that had stumped many others, including America's top scientist, Samuel P. Langley, and Britain's foremost inventor, Sir Hiram Maxim.

If you're in or near Washington, D.C., you can find the answer in an excellent exhibit at the National Air & Space Museum. If you can't make it to D.C., try this website:

http://www.nasm.si.edu/wrightbrothers/

That's only if you're one the ones who believe that the Wrights were first

Two words, Richard Pearse...

Junior.

[EricGoedkoop]

Gustav Whitehead?

Heck of a difference it makes to have a photographer present . . . .

["Junior"]

Actually there's a lot of documentary evidence to support Pearse's first flights.

Back home it's pretty much a done deal in terms of who we believe flew first, even taught at school level. And even in Oz, Pearse's claim is taken fairly seriously even at academic levels.

But like most Kiwis, we don't like to make a big song and dance and blow our own trumpets too much. You believe what you want and we'll keep on doing the same

Junior.

[JohnReid]

The Wrights may have been first but Glenn Curtiss is the father of aviation, in my opinion.Cheers! John.

[EricGoedkoop]

I think Pearse most likely DID do it, I think Whitehead did it and I think there were probably a good handful we've never even heard of that did it, too. The Wrights were certainly not the first, just the first for whom incontrovertible proof has survived. That's an important distinction that got lost a long time ago - somewhere between the personality cult of modern society and the Wrights' own ridiculous notion that they somehow owned the principles of aerodynamic control.

Fact of the matter is, technology and theory had advanced just far enough to allow powered flight right around the turn of the century, and if the Wrights hadn't pulled it off with a photographer standing by, someone else would have. Like anything else in science (or art or law or philosophy or religion), flight is an endeavor and an accomplishment of the species, not the man. The Wrights made a tremendous contribution and I don't mean to belittle that, but if they had never set foot out of the bicycle shop the history of aviation and of the world would not be very much different. It all would have happened and progressed just about the same.

Well, maybe with a little less litigation . . . . .