While the aviation community celebrated the first flight on Dec. 17, History.com posted a story that questioned whether the Dayton brothers were really the first in flight.
Many people believe the honor belongs to two other pioneering aviators: Alberto Santos-Dumont of Brazil and Gustave Whitehead of Connecticut.
They invite you to read about the case for each — as well as the Wright brothers — and decide for yourself.
Check it out here, then let us know who you believe was the true “first in flight.”
The History (dot) com article referenced above has some gross errors regarding Gustave Whitehead. The Bridgeport Sunday Herald weekly newspaper did NOT report a mile and a half flight over Bridgeport and Fairfield, but a half-mile flight on Aug. 14, 1901 (still a huge success) in the area of Fairfield, CT. Whitehead also made numerous other powered heavier-than-air flights in the period before Dec. 17, 1903, many documented in the local newspapers, 5 Scientific American articles, and by 18 witnesses to these various flights. For accurate information on Gustave Whitehead, the first true inventor of the airplane, visit http://www.gustavewhitehead.info and read “Gustave Whitehead: First in Flight” (Brinchman, 2015) available on Amazon as an eBook and in print.
The contributions of the Wright brothers are widely misunderstood. Their 1906 patent covered a specific combination of aerodynamic controls — pitch, roll, and yaw. Theirs was the first 3-axis control system. A secondary provision of their patent covered the combined use of roll and yaw control surfaces in a turn. Both Alberto Santos Dumont and Glenn Curtiss used 3-axis aerodynamic control and effected turns in exactly the same way as described in the Wright patent, as do most fixed-wing aircraft flying today. This is why the Wright patent was adjudicated to be the pioneer patent of the aviation industry by a 3-judge panel in 1914.
The case for Gustav Whitehead is a different matter — there are no photos, drawings, technical notes, or other primary sources to prove the Whitehead had three-axis control or that he had discovered the right combination of control surfaces to effect a turn. In fact, there are no photos of him flying his “No. 21” in a straight line. The August 18, 1901 story in the Bridgeport Herald, which supposedly broke the news concerning Whitehead’s flight in the No. 21 contained some details that were patently impossible. For example, to prove that the airplane was capable of carrying a man, Whitehead first sent it up with 220 pounds of sand in the pilot’s seat. When that landed safely, Whitehead exchanged himself for the sand. (Was he also the inventor of the autopilot?) Furthermore, editor Richard Howell buried the story five pages back in the Herald in a space reserved for unusual, paranormal, and tongue-in-cheek stories. Howell was a member of a drinking society of journalists and it was rumored that your initiation into this society required you to publish a made-up story in a respected newspaper or magazine. Many of the stories that appeared on Page 5 may have been unverifiable for just that reason.
If you stop arguing about who was first and concentrate on who got us off the ground, it’s hard to pretend that the contributions of Santos Dumont, Curtiss, and Whitehead were more important than 3-axis aerodynamic controls. Curtis came close with the aileron. (Which was not his sole invention, by the way. It had been developed by the Aerial Experiment Association in 1907, of which he was a member.) But it was only a part of the solution to how to control an aircraft, not the whole ball of wax.
None of the above.
Glen Curtiss was the first. He introduced ailerons. Heretofore the Wrights had used wing warp for banking the plane. In a patent case on
ailerons vs wing warp, a mis-directed, unfair, prejudiced and wrong federal judge awarded the aileron patent to the Wrights.
I liken the question who was first to to fly to who was first to discover the New World. The Wrights, Santos-Dumont, Whitehead? Columbus, the Vikings, the Chinese. I look at it this way. Even if they were first what came of the Viking’s or the Chinese’ discovery? Nothing. The same for Santos-Dumont and Whitehead.
Since the Wright Brothers were observed visiting Gustave Whitehead’s shop by several witnesses AND Whitehead shared his knowledge with the world, I beg to differ. He was first and helped teach the world to fly.