How the Wrights' Tall Tales Came to Light. "Falsity is so easy, truth so difficult." --George Eliot in "Adam Bede" Headlines of the Virginian Pilot article printed on December 18, 1903. The story was "scooped" by 19 year old reporter Harry Moore Reporter Harry Moore in his later years and a photo of him as young man. This blog is dedicated to finding the truth about what really happened in aviation history, as far as is possible. Rather than relying on the words of the Wright brothers, we have taken a new approach by exploring other documents and witness statements. We feel that it's important that all the great aviation explorers receive their proper places in history and that we expose false claims of biased individuals, or those who would benefit from publishing misinformation. The previous post establishes how documents we are posting came into the hands of Steve Fritts, an aviation enthusiast and collector of historical newspapers. This p...
This is the final article in the series discussing the 1984 Smithsonian publication The Wright Flyer: An Engineering Perspective. This article addresses the fourth and fifth sections of the "Perspective" compilation concerning propulsion and structural design * (The full text of the Smithsonian"Perspective" compilation pictured below can be found here .) Publication by the Smithsonian critiqued in this and in three previous articles by Joe Bullmer .* The W Right Perspective--Article Four by Joe Bullmer As stated previously, the purpose of these articles is to address differences between information presented in the " Perspective " compilation and that in this author's book The WRight Story . Chapters III and IV of that book contain detailed discussions of the development and testing of the Wrights’ early aircraft based exclusively on an experienced aeronau...
Unmasking Root In 1942, the Smithsonian Institution endorsed the Wrights as first to fly--and the first even capable of flying. Thirty four years later, Freedom of Information Laws revealed that a secret contract in 1948 had become part of the deal. In it, the Wright family dictated the wording of pertinent museum labels and forbade the Smithsonian from ever investigating the issue, however compelling the evidence might be to the contrary.. The bombshells kept coming. In 1978, highly respected Caltech (California Institute of Technology) in Pasadena analyzed the Wrights’ 1903 airplane, casting scientific doubts on many of the brothers’ claim...
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