debor008

  To make your children capable of honesty is the beginning of education . ~ John Ruskin In previous posts, we have been questioning the truth of aviation history as it's presented by the brothers Wright. Was Orville or Wilbur the first to fly? At the time of his death in 1912, Wilbur had been named the "first to fly," for the simple reason that the first three claimed flights of the Wright brothers December 17, 1903, weren't considered long enough to be called "sustained." Both brothers had said that Wilbur made the fourth flight, lasting 57-59 seconds. But soon after Wilbur's death, in a 1914 Boys' Life magazine, an article credited to Orville Wright was published where he claimed it was he who made the longest reported flight of 57 seconds instead of his brother, Wilbur. Why is this significant? For one reason, the brothers themselves didn't accept the first three shorter "flights"as true flights. (This will be addressed in a later ...

"What we need is not the will to believe but the will to find out." - Bertrand Russell                     "Only a fool of a scientist would dismiss the evidence and reports                      in front of him and substitute his own beliefs in their place."                                                  - Paul Kurtz     The cover of Boys' Life magazine Sept., 1914  Historians and the public, who want to believe the Wrights were first to fly, have many excuses for  inconsistencies in witness's descriptions of` what happened at Kill Devil Hills, N.C.,  Dec.14-17, 1903--and indeed...

  "The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd; indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widespread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible." - Bertrand Russell "All great truths begin as blasphemies." - George Bernard Shaw   A good many historians today base their version of early aviation history on the statements of the Wright Brothers. But a critical thinker has to establish that we can depend on the Wrights' honesty and consistency, especially since we have already established that their descriptions of the first claimed flights are not consistent with those of two of their five witnesses. The Wrights say they took off from level ground on December 17, 1903. Witnesses Daniels and Etheridge state that they placed the plane on the side of the hill for the claimed flights that day. What do later publications, documents and letters tell us about truth in the Wrigh...

..."Was the first Wright flight of December 17, 1903 (120 feet) sustained? Probably not...." -- Tom Crouch  Were the Wright brothers the first to fly as we've been taught in our  public schools? Orville Wright claimed that they made four actual flights on December 17, 1903, at Kill Devil Hills near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. On December 14 Wilbur failed in the first attempt to fly  He had won the coin toss for the first trial but he quickly lost control of the plane and it crashed. After repairing the plane, they decided to try again on the cold, windy day of December 17. Since Wilbur got the first shot on the 14th, it was Orville's turn to try first. These are the flights he claimed they made: 1. Orville-- estimated 120 feet (100 feet beyond the track)--12 seconds 2. Wilbur--estimated 175 feet--13 seconds 3. Orville--estimated 200 feet--15 seconds 4. Wilbur --measured 852 feet--59 seconds But did they really fly? Below is the opinion of Tom Crouch, Senior Curator o...

A close study of the iconic picture (third picture, below) of the 1903 Wright flyer reveals strange anomalies. If you observe the cast shadows, you can easily see that they are contradictory.  A bright, sunny day will produce dark crisp shadows like the cast shadows on the box in the foreground shown above. An overcast day like it was on Dec. 17, 1903, will produce fainter, softer shadows like that to the left of Wilbur. One could say a shaft of sunlight broke through the clouds hitting the box. But then there would be a cast shadow just as strong to the left of the box on the sand. Note that the cast shadow beneath the plane is dark as opposed to the one cast by Wilbur, which is faint and barely discernible. These shadows should be relatively consistent in the same cloudy conditions.  Adding to the inconsistent shadows, the perspective of the shadows is questionable   Position of the elevator is more than 5-6 degrees   The position of the elevator on the pla...

The picture that the Wrights claimed was taken just as their plane took off from the rail December 17, 1903, has been displayed as a record of the first flight ever made. Orville is piloting the plane, Wilbur has been running alongside, some say, to support the wing. Or to steady it. That's the generally accepted story. The date the famous picture was taken is another case where we have to rely on the word of the Wrights. They said that one of the five witnesses, John Daniels, took the picture but Daniels doesn't remember doing so. ( http://wyso.org/post/first-flight-and-photograph ) In fact it's well documented that in 1908 the Wright brothers returned to Kitty Hawk. The picture could easily have been taken in 1908.* December 1903 or May 1908?* Here is some of the story: After their last claimed flight of four in 1903, the Wrights packed their bags and went home to Dayton, Ohio. They continued their experiments there in new planes, flyers 2 and 3. Flyer 1 had crashed, then...

We are taught in our history books that the Wright Brothers were the first to fly on December 17, 1903. The narrations about that day usually begin dramatically, something like this: "On a cold, windy day near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, the Wright brothers lifted off the sand in their small plane and became the first in the history of mankind to fly." Obviously there were manned flights before that in balloons, kites, and gliders. Man even made powered flights. So the definition of what the Wrights claimed that day was changed to be more precise: the Wrights were "the first to make a manned, powered, controlled, sustained flight in a heavier than air machine." But we're looking for truth in aviation history. How do we know the Wrights actually flew that day? Well, there were witnesses who were there, five of them. They were three life guards, John Daniels, Adam Etheridge, and Willie Dough, W.C.Brinkley, a farmer who was said to be beach combing, and Johnny Moor...