| Image Comments |
| LASTWOODSMAN | 27-Jul-17 13:59 |
| "VUIA 2" - by Trajan Vuia March 18, 1906 (six months before Santos Dumont) - The Romanians consider Vuia to be the first one who took off using the airplnae's own energy source ( ie, landing gear and motor, and not catapulted down a rail by sandbags falling from a tower and using no landing gear like the Wrights did). |
| rgood | 27-Jul-17 15:02 |
| Hard to believe that this actually flew! (under control!) |
| rgood | 27-Jul-17 15:04 |
| I do wonder why so many feel anti-Wright Brothers? They did IT! |
| LASTWOODSMAN | 27-Jul-17 16:58 |
| This plane sort of looks like todays' Ultralights, Yes there is a lot of controversy concerning who was the "first" to "fly" - new books and new evidence. Check out Cecil A. Steeves Oct 10, 1936 affidavit here http://www.deepsky.com/~firstflight/Pages/steeves.html and the Smithsonian "Contract" with the Wright Brothers here http://www.wright-brothers.org/History_Wing/History_of_the_Airplane/Who_Was_First/Smithsonian_Contract/Smithsonian_Contract.htm "Neither the Smithsonian Institution or its successors ... shall publish or permit to be displayed ...any aircraft model or design of earlier date than the Wright Aeroplane of 1903, claiming in effect that such aircraft was capable of carrying a man under its own power in controlled flight." This contract in 1942 was to bring back the "Wright Flyer", which had been sent to England in 1903, back to the US. |
| rgood | 27-Jul-17 21:50 |
| Where is the hard evidence of all these "would be" first to fly, a fully controlled aircraft, bod's? Photo's - trust worthy witness's etc! |
| LASTWOODSMAN | 27-Jul-17 23:15 |
| Jane's All the World Aircraft will credit Bridgeport's Gustave Whitehead as the first man to build an operational heavier-than-air aircraft http://www.ctpost.com/local/article/Aviation-bible-Whitehead-first-to-fly-4348050.php |
| jgood | 28-Jul-17 13:01 |
| The Fédération Aéronautique Internationale recognizes the Wrights to have "the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight". A number of people built and even launched machines capable of uncontrolled flight before the Wrights... But that's not very useful, is it? |
| LASTWOODSMAN | 28-Jul-17 17:07 |
| It has become quite the fiery and very provocative and captivating debate, from what I have read - the history, the legal battles for patents, the lack of pictures and public flights and lack of eye witnesses, and the arguments over the very definition of "first to fly" ... I just read what the Aviation historians have to say - it is all a very FASCINATING story ... !! Enter Glen Curtiss, the "Forgotten Eagle" ... |
| rgood | 30-Jul-17 11:33 |
| Ah! Glenn... he who highly modified the Langley machine in an effort to claim "it" as the first to fly!!!! He was of course WRONG! Not that he was a bad type - every body wanted to pull Wilbure & Orville down from that position. (and still do it appears) |
| LASTWOODSMAN | 30-Jul-17 20:16 |
| The stories go on and on - one says that Curtiss broke into the Wrights hangar to see how their wing warping worked, then created ailerons, got sued by the brothers who won their lawsuit, then Curtiss put separate ailerons between the wings of his biplane and still got sued ... I think Bleriot also tried to sue anyone who used his patented wheeled landing gear ... |
