To Conquer the Air

by James Tobin

  “I see that Langley”: WW to OC, 10/16/1903, Papers, vol. 1, 364.

  After the Englishman learned: Alexander’s missed opportunity, Gollin, No Longer an Island, 36–40.

  Dan Tate had left: Dan Tate’s work dispute, OW to KW, 11/1/1903, FC, WBP, LC.

  “so cold that we could scarcely work”: OW, “How We Made the First Flight,” Flying, December 1913, reprinted in Jakab, Publishing Writings, 44.

  Will began to take: OW to MW and KW, 11/19/1903, FC, WBP, LC.

  “The new machine will be ready”: OW to KW, 11/1/1903, FC, WBP, LC.

  The next day they began: Details of 1903 flyer’s assembly, OW to MW, 10/15/1903, FC, LC; OW’s diary, 10/9–11/6/1903, Papers, vol. 1, 362–76.

  The propeller shafts tore: OW diary, 11/5/1903, Papers, vol. 1, 376–77; OW, “How We Made the First Flight,” Flying, December 1913, reprinted in Jakab, Publishing Writings, 42–44; OW to MW and KW, 11/15/1903, FC, WBP, LC.

  “apprehensions of disaster”: OC to Spratt, 12/19/1903, Chanute papers, LC.

  “I do not believe their machine”: Spratt to OC, 12/[10?]/1903,

  Engineers usually allowed: Worries about margin of safety in engine design, OW to Charles Taylor, 11/23/1903, Papers, vol. 1, 385–87.

  “We are now quite in doubt”: OW to MW and KW, 11/15/1903, FC, WBP, LC.

  “just the reverse opinion”: OW to MW and KW, 11/15/1903, Papers, vol. 1, 380–81.

  They estimated their odds: OW to MW and KW, 11/19/1903, FC, WBP, LC.

  “he nevertheless had more hope”: OW to MW and KW, 11/15/1903, Papers, vol. 1, 380–381.

  “too heavy in front”: Manly to SPL, 10/7/1903, box 45, RU 31, SIA.

  “Dismal if not altogether unexpected failure”: “Langley Airship Fails,” New York Daily Tribune, 10/8/1903.

  “a crushing blow to his theory”: “Buzzard a Wreck,” Washington Post, 10/8/1903.

  “any stout boy”: “Prof. Langley’s Bird,” Washington Post, 10/8/1903.

  “Notwithstanding the outcome”: “The Flying Machine Wreck,” Chicago Tribune, 10/9/1903.

  “the front portion of the machine”: SPL, “Experiments With the Langley Aerodrome,” Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution, 1904 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1905), 122–23.

  “is in no way affected”: “Langley Explains Fiasco,” Washington Post, 10/9/1903.

  a major storm wrecked: Costs of tugboat and watercraft wrecked in storm, SPL, “Experiments With the Langley Aerodrome,” Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution, 1904 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1905), 121–23; Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, pt. 2 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1911), 269.

  Yet there had to be: Decision to make a second test of the great aerodrome, Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, pt. 2 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1911), 270.

  removed one small lug: Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, pt. 2 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1911), 270.

  “Day closes in deep gloom”: OW diary, 11/20/1903, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 383–84.

  “fix anything”: OW to Charles Taylor, 11/23, 1903, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1,385–87.

  “We heated the shafts”: “How We Made the First Flight,” Flying, December 1913, reprinted in Jakab and Young, eds., Publishing Writings, 44.

  On the evening of December 6: Weather on December 6–7, “Cold Day for Airship,” Washington Post, 12/8/1903.

  Langley participated in the annual meeting: Minutes of the Smithsonian Institution Regents, 12/8/1903, RU 1, SIA.

  “it seemed almost disastrous”: Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, pt. 2, 271.

  “black bottle without a label”: “Flying Machine Tried and Failed,” Chicago Tribune, 12/9/1903.

  Manly felt “an extreme”: Manly’s report of aerodrome’s failure on 12/8/1903, including reports of Reed, McDonald, and other witnesses, Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, pt. 2, 271–75. SPL’s handwritten account appears in his wastebook entry of 12/8/1903, 376–78, NASM archive, Smithsonian Institution. The exact cause of the aerodrome’s collapse has remained a matter of debate ever since. The aeronautical historian Tom D. Crouch offers an authoritative view: “[I]n addition to structural shortcomings and leapfrogged problems, the Langley aerodrome seems to have harbored unrecognized aerodynamic defects. Raymond Bisplinghoff, a leading aeronautical engineer, has singled out the craft as a classic case of aeroelastic or wing-torsional divergence. That is, the flexible wings of the aerodrome were given a corkscrew twist as the center of lifting pressure moved rapidly toward the trailing edge at the moment of launch. The flexibility and enormous wing area of the machine magnified this twisting action until the inadequate wing supports failed. Those who have argued that the great aerodrome could have flown if only Langley had abandoned the catapult are wrong. The machine was structurally and aerodynamically unsound.” A Dream of Wings: Americans and the Airplane, 1875–1905 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1981), 290–91.

  Orville Wright, carrying: OW tells WW of Langley’s 12/8/1903 failure, Kelly, The Wright Brothers, 94.

  “The power is ample”: WW to MW, 12/14/1903, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 392–93.

  “Repairs took a day”: Repairs after 12/17/1903 trial and flights of 12/17/1903. OW’s diary entries, 12/15/1903, 12/16/1903, 12/17/1903, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 394–97; WW to OC, 12/28/1903, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 401–03; “Statement by the Wright Brothers to the Associated Press,” 1/5/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 409–11; OW to James Calvert Smith, 2/11/1933, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 2, 1161; OW, “How We Made the First Flight,” Flying, December 1913, in Jakab and Young, eds., Published Writings, 40–49; OW as told to Leslie Quirk, “How I Learned to Fly,”Boys’ Life, September 1914, in Jakab and Young, eds., Published Writings, 51–57.

  “a flight very modest compared with that of birds”: OW and WW, “The Wright Brothers’ Aeroplane,” Century Magazine, reprinted in Jakab and Young, Published Writings, 30.

  “it was nevertheless the first in the history of the world”: OW, “How We Made the First Flight,” Flying, December 1913, reprinted in Jakab and Young, Published Writings, 47.

  The Wrights figured up: Wrights’ total cost for experiments 1900–1903 less than one thousand dollars, Fred C. Kelly, The Wright Brothers (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1943), 112.

  Interlude

  “SUCCESS FOUR FLIGHTS”: OW to MW, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. I, 397. For a facsimile of the telegram, see Plate 71 in McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1.

  “FLYING MACHINE SOARS 3 MILES . . .”:Virginian-Pilot, 12/18/1903, scrapbooks, WBP, LC.

  At 5:30 that afternoon: Fred C. Kelly, ed., Miracle at Kitty Hawk: The Letters of Wilbur and Orville Wright (New York: Farrar, Straus and Young, 1951), 118. Kelly’s account of the telegram arriving at 7 Hawthorn is based on the “vivid” recollection of Carrie Kayler Grumbach in 1948. See also entry of 12/17/1903, Bishop Milton Wright, Diaries, 1857–1917 (Dayton: Wright State University Libraries, 1999), 599–600.

  “FIFTY-SEVEN SECONDS”: Frank Tunison’s rejection of 12/17/03 press release, Fred C. Kelly, ed., Miracle at Kitty Hawk (New York: Farrar, Straus and Young, 1951), 118; OW to Sam H. Acheson, 1/22/1937, in Kelly, ed., Miracle at Kitty Hawk, 429–31. In his letter to Acheson, Orville Wright recounted the story of the exchange between Lorin Wright and Tunison as he, Orville, had heard it, presumably from Lorin, and Orville used the figure “fifty-nine” seconds. In this narrative, I have used the figure fifty-seven, because that was the number that appeared by mistake in the Wrights’ telegram of 12/17/1903, and therefore was the number that Tunison would have read and repeated.

  “BOYS REPORT FOUR SUCCESSFUL FLIGHTS”: KW to OC, 12/17/1903, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 397.

  “a propeller working on a perpendicular shaft”: “Airship After Buyer,” New York Times, 12/26/1903.

  The phanton propeller: Errors in press accounts of 12/17/1903
flights, “The Latest Flying Machine,” Boston Transcript, 12/19/1903; “Flying Machine Soars,” Chicago Tribune, 12/19/1903; “Besieged,” undated, unidentified newspaper article; “Airship Is a Success,” undated, unidentified newspaper article; “New Air Ship Flies Against Heavy Wind,” undated, unidentified Chicago newspaper article.

  They tried to set matters: Wrights’ statement about flights of 12/17/1903 to Associated Press, 1/5/1904, McFarland, Papers, vol. 1, 409–11.

  a letter from Augustus Herring: Herring’s proposal to “join forces” with Wrights, copy, August Herring to WW and OW, 12/26/1903, GC, WBP, LC.

  “felt certain that he [Herring]”: WW to OC, 1/8/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 412–13.

  He took the interurban trolley: OW’s diary, 1/22/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 417.

  He invited his friend: SPL’s dinner with Cyrus Adler on 12/8/1903, Cyrus Adler, I Have Considered the Days, 257.

  “certain it is that . . . success”: Langley Memoir on Mechanical Flight, pt. 2, 184.

  Manly jotted a soothing note: Manly’s reassuring letter to SPL, quoting Chanute’s letter regarding the Wrights’ flights of 12/17/03, Charles Manly to SPL, 12/25/1903, box 45, RU 31, SIA.

  “demonstrated to the world”: AGB, address to the National Convention of the Navy League of the United States, 1916, reprinted as “Preparedness for Aerial Defense,” Air Power Historian, October 1955.

  “Langley’s aerodrome will do nearly everything except”: “Prof. Langley’s Ill-Luck,” Chicago Tribune, 12/10/1903.

  “You can tell Langley”: quoted in Tom D. Crouch, The Bishop’s Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright (New York: Norton, 1989), 293.

  But Langley refused: Adler, I Have Considered the Days, 259.

  “his patience and rare philosophy”: H. H. A. Beach to Cyrus Adler, box 22b, RU 7003, SIA.

  “Brashear, I’m ruined”: David Fairchild, The World Was My Garden (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1938), 332–33.

  a number of scientists undertook: Conversation with Daniel Coit Gilman, Adler, I have Considered the Days, 258.

  “Samuel,” she said: SPL’s conversation with his aunt, Julia Goodrich, Adler, I Have Considered the Days, 259.

  “immensely pleased at your success”: OC to WW, 12/18/1903, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 398.

  “As you surmise”: OC to SPL, 1/1/1904, copy in OC letter books, Chanute papers, L.C.

  “I think that this success”: OC to [Lawrence] Hargrave, 1/9/1904, Chanute papers, LC.

  “the uses will be limited”: OC to F. H. Wenham, 1/9/1904, quoted in Charles H. Gibbs-Smith, The Rebirth of European Aviation, 1902–1908: A Study of the Wright Brothers’ Influence (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1974), 99.

  “I was much distressed”: OC to SPL, 1/1/1904, copy in OC letter books, Chanute papers, LC.

  “From the beginning”: Wrights’ statement about flights of 12/17/1903 to Associated Press, 1/5/1904, McFarland, Papers, vol. 1, 409–11.

  “paid the freight”: WW to OC, 1/18/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, 415–16.

  “In the clipping which you sent me”: OC to WW, 1/14/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 414–15.

  “a somewhat general impression”: WW to OC, 1/18/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 415.

  “for it’s very possible”: quoted in Robert Wohl, A Passion for Wings: Aviation and the Western Imagination, 1908–1918 (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1994), 291, note 24. Wohl gives his source as Andrée Ferber & Robert Ferber, Les Débuts véritables de l’aviation française (Paris: Fayard, 1970), an “important collection from Ferber’s personal archive.”

  “The problem cannot be considered”: Quoted in Charles Gibbs-Smith, The Rebirth of European Aviation, 1902–1908: A Study of the Wright Brothers’ Influence (London: Her Majesty’s Statonery Office, 1974), 106–07.

  They planned a trial: Flights at Huffman Prairie in May 1904, WW and OW, “The Wright Brothers’ Aeroplane,” Century Magazine, September 1908, reprinted in Jakab and Young, Published Writings, 31; Fred C. Kelly, The Wright Brothers, 123–26; entries of 5/23/1904, 5/25/1904, 5/26/1904, Milton Wright, Diaries, 1857–1917, 608; WW to OC, 5/27/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 437–38. See 436, note 7, for differing reports about the details of these flights.

  Chapter Eight: “What Hath God Wrought?”

  Hour after hour, they waited: Wrights waiting for good wind at Huffman Prairie, Tom D. Crouch, The Bishop’s Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright (New York: Norton, 1989), 283.

  A return to Kitty Hawk: Reasons for experimenting elsewhere than Kitty Hawk, WW to George Spratt, 4/12/1905, in Fred C. Kelly, ed., Miracle at Kitty Hawk: The Letters of Wilbur and Orville Wright (New York: Farrar, Straus and Young, 1951), 139.

  “a prairie-dog town”: WW to OC, 6/21/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 441. This letter contains Wilbur’s most detailed description of Huffman Prairie.

  “we must learn to accommodate”: WW to OC, 6/21/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 441.

  thought the Wrights were “fools”: Crouch, Bishop’s Boys, 279.

  In size it was: Dimensions of 1904 flyer, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 2, Appendix V, “Aeroplanes and Motors,” 1189–90.

  Milton’s battles within: MW’s church activities in 1904, Daryl Melvin Elliot, “Bishop Milton Wright and the Quest for a Christian America” (Ph.D. dissertation, Drew University, 1992), 302–03.

  “like taffy under a hammer blow”: Fred C. Kelly, The Wright Brothers (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1943), 122.

  “We certainly have been ‘Jonahed’”: WW to OC, 6/14/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 440.

  But then came a reason: Vandal’s attack on Santos-Dumont’s airship, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 444, note 3.

  “a rather strange affair”: WW to OC, 7/1/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 444–45.

  “the prospect of a race”: WW to OC, 7/17/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 445.

  His California Arrow dirigible: Crouch, The Bishop’s Boys, 290.

  On August 6, both: Flights of 8/6/1904, WW’s Diary E, 1904–05, 8/6/1904, in McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 448.

  “It is a pity,” he said: And speeds needed for flight, WW to OC, 8/8/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 448–49.

  “sore all over”: And OW’s crash of 8/24/1904, WW’s Diary E, 1904–05, 8/24/1904, in McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 452; OW escapes worse injury, Crouch, Bishop’s Boys, 283.

  French aero enthusiasts read: Chanute’s article, “Aviation in America,” and its impact in France, Charles H. Gibbs-Smith, The Rebirth of European Aviation, 1902–1908: A Study of the Wright Brothers’ Influence (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1974), 76–81. Gibbs-Smith thoroughly treats both what is included and what is omitted in Chanute’s article, and the resulting confusion among French aero enthusiasts.

  The early misreporting: First accounts in France of Wrights’ first powered flights, Gibbs-Smith, Rebirth of European Aviation, 91–93, 97–99.

  Men unwilling to risk: Responses to Wright flights of Archdeacon, Tatin, and Deutsch de la Meurthe, Gibbs-Smith, Rebirth of European Aviation, 105–16.

  Ferdinand Ferber, the Army officer: Ferber’s response to 1903 flyer, Gibbs-Smith, Rebirth of European Aviation, 100–101.

  Ferber gave a lecture: Voisin’s entry into aviation, Gibbs-Smith, Rebirth of European Aviation, 126–27.

  The children of Dayton: Description of 1904 catapult launching device, Crouch, Bishop’s Boys, 284.

  the brothers tried the catapult: First catapult attempts and half-circle flight of 9/7/1904, WW’s Diary E, 1904–05, 8/24/1904, in McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 454–55.

  “It is difficult nowadays”: James M. Cox, Journey Through My Years (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1946), 83.

  “I guess the truth”: Kumler quoted in Fred C. Kelly, The Wright Brothers (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1943), 135.

  “Frankly,” Cox said: Copy,
James M. Cox to Fred C. Kelly, 1/30/1940, GC, WBP, LC.

  “I used to chat with them”: Kelly, Wright Brothers, 139–40.

  “remarkable not in one way”: “Amos I. Root,” Medina (Ohio) Gazette, 5/1/1923.

  Possibly they saw him: That the Wrights considered Root as a possible investor at least later on, in 1908, is evident in a letter, WW to OC, 1/17/1908, McFarland, Papers, vol. 2, 854–55.

  “The answer involves a strange point”: Root’s chief account of his experience with the Wrights at Huffman Prairie is A. I. Root, “Our Homes: What Hath God Wrought?” Gleanings in Bee Culture, 1/1/1905.

  “We went out to celebrate Roosevelt’s election”: WW to OC, 11/15/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 464.

  His father was watching: MW and railroad men present at 11/9/1904 flight, MW’s diary, 11/9/1904, McFarland, ed., Papers, vol. 1, 464; Arthur G. Renstrom, Wilbur & Orville Wright: A Chronology (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1975), 145.

  Just before Christmas: WW notifies Root of approval to publish account of Huffman Prairie flights, “My Flying-Machine Story,” Gleanings in Bee Culture, 1/1/1905.

  He did so in his issue: Root’s accounts of the Wrights’ 1904 flights appeared in his “Our Homes” column in Gleanings in Bee Culture, 1/1/1905, and a follow-up article, “The Wright Brothers’ Flying Machine,” in the issue of 1/15/1905. Root kept in touch with the Wrights and wrote several more short articles about their efforts in the form of updates based on press accounts. Most dealt with the Wrights’ world-renowned flights in the fall of 1908. Among these are articles in the Gleanings issues of 4/1/1905, 11/1/1908, 11/15/1908, 12/1/1908, 12/15/1908, 1/1/1909, and 4/15/1909. Collections of Gleanings in Bee Culture are held in several university libraries. I am grateful to John Root, Kim Flottum, and Jim Thompson, of the A. I. Root Company, for making available to me the Root Company’s complete run of Gleanings in Bee Culture.

  This one they rejected: Scientific American’s rejection of Root article, Kelly, The Wright Brothers, 143.

  Chapter Nine: “The Clean Air of the Heavens”

  “[Will] and I could hardly wait”: Ivonette Wright Miller, “Character Study,” in Miller, comp., Wright Reminiscences (Air Force Museum Foundation, 1978); 60.