But nobody had powered, controlled heavier-than-air flight before the Wrights.
Only if the "controls" can actually control the aircraft.
I don't. Who does?
Oh, it's true alright. The only question is are you ignorant or a liar?
What you are describing now has absolutely nothing to do with how or what they invented.
now you are discussing the patent process.
other STOLE their patent idea's without permission. how are they to STOP them ? the one died before the damned court case was finished.
I have come up with quite a few ideas in my time. only to see them for sale in the stores 5 6 or 7 years later.
why did I not bother with them ? because the idea of spending thousands if not 10's of thousands on an idea just to have some chinese or taiwanese based company rip it off and them me unable to pursue they for it.
Why bother.
still what you describe is a patent issue NOT a whether or what they invented issue.
you are trying to mix them as if they are one and the same.
Chris Taylor
Once again to the best of my knowledge YOU are the only one to claim they have "invented the airplane"
everyone else claims they invented the first successful powered and controlled airplane to carry a human being.
THAT is what they invented.
you are the only one making the general "statememt" of they invented the airplane.
Chris Taylor
This just gets funnier all the time.
No. I am saying that, when convenient or through ignorance, the post-'03 photos have been used by many to represent the first flights. The technical accomplishments of those first flights were exaggerated to support the patent and continues to be exaggerated and considered inclusive by many in the popular press and textbooks as representative of the significant precursors and the inventions that made powered flight possible.
Are you asking more of me than you require of the Wrights to support their claims? ;) I have a collection of period papers and have read several books (recent and not-so-recent) on the subject of the invention of the airplane.
Fair enough.
-John DeMar
And many others also added to the wealth of knowledge before and after the Wrights abused the system with their claims.
Out of context, but that's ok, your other response supports my opinion on the matter.
-John
You're just too chicken to see the bigger picture. ;)
-John
If you had continued past kindergarten, and learned how to read, you would have notice the 1000's of textbooks and popular publications that state this without further qualification. If you weren't so busy browsing the web for sales on blue dresses, you would have noticed the "invention" claim being made all week from the popular media outlets.
Of course, you did say "to the best of my knowledge", so I should have taken your word for it. ;)
-John
Not to mention a book, authored by one of the brothers, entitled "How We Invented The Airplane"...
-dave w
How so?
How did the Wrights abuse the system with their claims?
Spiders eat flies that spread disease and parasitze cute little bunnies who wouldn't hurt anyone.
The bounty stays at TWO CENTS!
Peter Alway
Every book I can recall reading on the wrights claimed they invented the first sustained powered flight.
I even write a "report" on them in ??? 4th grade ?? or so that I still have somewhere.
I even still "again somewhere" still have the BOOK that I read that in.
NO BOOK that I have ever read claimed simply that they invented the airplane. it would be so obviously a FALSE fact as to be laughable.
HUNDREDS of failed "airplanes" were designed long before the wrights.
maybe you just had access to strange books or maybe I had access to different books etc..
but I have NEVER Seen it written that the wrights > >
I've not said much on this thread, simply because I'm no Wright scholar. Years ago, as a teenager, I did a lot of reading on the Wrights, and a lot of it escapes me., but as I've been eeking out a living from the history os science and technology, I'll add a couple thoughts.
At the time of the Wrights (yes that's vague--I'm rusty on this), there were multiple individuals and groups attacking the problem of the airplane. Samuel P Langley, Alberto Santos-Dumont, Otto Lillienthal, Alexandar Graham Bell, Glen Curtiss and Octave Chanute come to mind. I am rusty enough not to recall which were contenders for the first powered, controlled, sustained flight, which were on the sidelines, and which came in after 1903, but there were multiple contenders. Any one of them might have gotten their act together and gotten a sustained, controlled flight in.
This is quite a parallel to Goddard in 1926. Lots of people arpound the world were after a liquid-fueled rocket. Without any help from Goddard, Winkler, Riedel, and GIRD all got liquid fueled rockets off in 1931-1933. Goddard was secretive to the point of paranoia, and refused to contribute to the real advancement of rocketry.
Go to the chemical structure of DNA in the early 1950's (I'm working from readings, radio interviews and a documentary I'm rusty on, so I may getting some facts wrong). Again, there were at least two groups in England on the trail of the structure of DNA. Crick and Watson figured it out first, but not without skulldugery and a chance to steal some data that had accidentally been left out.
In all these cases, whether it's the Wrights, Goddard, or Crick and Watson, there were lots of others, some more pure of heart, who were on the same track, and who were smart enough and had the resources to make the particular step that made the history books. To some extent it was just dumb luck, or naked agression, or self promotion that made them the guys whose incremental step gets all the credit.
Why, is that while the Montgolfier brothers were the first to fly, in a hot air balloon, is that considered an obscure "pre-flight" flight compared to the Wright Brothers. Why is Frenchman Louis Bleriot's English Channel flight--one that showed an airplane could really go from here to there--an obscure bit of trivia, while Lindbergh's flight--not even the first trans-atlantic flight-- a big deal? Almost every invention, from the light bulb to the car to the spaceship is incremental, yet some step, and some character connected to the step is considered "history."
Every one of these innovators and inventors had a dark side. You can't pretend that they don't. But each has done a hell of a lot more than I have or ever will do.
Celebrating December 17, 2003 is simply an excuse to celebrate the fact that we can fly. It is not a day to deny the contributions of Otto Lillienthal, Octave Chanute, Alberto Santos-Dumont, Samuel Peirpont Langley, Glen Curtiss (heck, Curtis is my middle name, of course I admire his wonderful aircraft), Louis Bleriot, Deperdussen, Harriet Quimby, Anthony Fokker, Rheinhol Platz, and other aviation pioneers whose names I can't remember, let alone mis-spell.
Peter Alway
Saturn Press PO Box 3709 Ann Arbor, MI 48106-3709
VERY well said peter. Entire post left intact in the hopes that it will grind home.
What if it's at night, on a Tuesday, in a chicken suit, holding a royal phisbin?
Randy
Hmmm. I do agree but I have to wonder, if that's what the ATF is thinking about us.
Randy
Calvin: I think it terribly smart of the Wright brothers to invent the aircraft carrier before they invented the airplane. don't you? ; )
Randy
That whole cart/horse thing!
PULL!
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