Every-day Science: Volume 7. The Conquest of Time and Space

The spectacular flight from London to Manchester was matched soon after by Mr. Glenn H. Curtiss' flight from Albany to New York, which took place May 29, 1910. Mr. Curtiss had already achieved fame as an aviator, having won the chief speed contest in the International Aviation Meet held at Rheims in August, 1909. He used a bi-plane of his own construction, differing but little in design from the Wright machine, but of very small size, and propelled by an eight-cylinder motor, also made by Mr. Curtiss himself. The start from Albany was made at three minutes after seven o'clock and the aviator arrived at Governor's Island, New York Harbor, at twelve o'clock, having stopped twice on the way to rest and take on fuel. The first stop was made near Poughkeepsie, the second on the heights near the Hudson, within the bounds of New York City. The distance covered 142-1/2 miles; the actual time of flight, 2 hours and 54 minutes,—an average speed of about fifty miles an hour. Parts of the flight were made at a good deal better speed. The first part of the journey from Albany to Poughkeepsie, a distance of 74-1/4 miles, was covered in 1 hour 23 minutes, or at a rate of more than 53.68 miles an hour. The minimum speed at which Mr. Curtiss' bi-plane could be maintained in the air is about 40 miles an hour, the supporting surface of its main plane comprising only 236 square feet, and the weight of the machine complete, including aviator, fuel, and oil, being 950 pounds. The machine uses a single propeller, 7 feet in diameter, making 1,100 revolutions per minute, and giving a pull, when the machine is held stationary on the ground, of over 300 lbs. The engine used is an eight-cylinder motor of 50 horse-power.

A flight in some respects even more interesting than that of Mr. Curtiss was accomplished in France on the ninth of June, 1910, by Lieutenant Feguant and Captain Marconnet, officers of the French army, on a Farman bi-plane. "Starting from Chalons at 4:40 A. M.," says the Scientific American, "the officers flew 176 kilometers (109-1/4 miles) across country to the artillery park at Vincennes, which was reached at 7:10. This flight of two and one-half hours' duration was accomplished at a speed of 43-3/4 miles per hour. Captain Marconnet was able to take photographs and make sketches that would have been of great strategic interest in time of war. This is the first practical demonstration of the aeroplane for scouting purposes, in addition to its being a new world's record for cross-country flying with two men in the machine. Another French aviator, Labouchère, flew for ten minutes with two passengers at Mourmelon on the same day."

A record flight of yet another character was accomplished in America by Charles K. Hamilton, a disciple of Curtiss, who, flying under the auspices of the New York Times and the Philadelphia Public Ledger, attempted successfully a round-trip flight from New York to Philadelphia on June 14, 1910. The aviator left Governor's Island at 7:36 A. M. and landed at Philadelphia at 9:26 A. M., having covered the 86 miles at an average speed of 46.92 miles an hour. After delivering messages from the Governor of New York, and the Mayor of New York City, Mr. Hamilton took wing at 11:33 for the return voyage. A difficulty with his motor made it necessary for him to descend at South Amboy, after covering 68 miles in 1 hour and 21 minutes. An injury to the propeller necessitated a delay of several hours, but the aviator was enabled to re-ascend at 6:17 and to land at Governor's Island at 6:40, the return journey having been accomplished at an average hourly speed of 51.36 miles.

The machine used by Mr. Hamilton is a Curtiss bi-plane, which in most respects follows closely the model of the original Wright aeroplane, but in which the function of the warping wings is fulfilled by two small wings, or ailerons, adjusted at each side between the larger planes. These ailerons, being deflected in opposite directions simultaneously, meet any tendency of the machine to tip unduly. Whether or not this method of maintaining lateral stability is the same in principle as the Wright method of warping the large planes themselves, is a question at issue between the inventors. From the purely scientific standpoint it would seem that one method is merely a modification of the other, which, however ingenious in its application, introduces no new principle.

On the same day on which Mr. Hamilton's inter-urban flight took place, a new record for altitude was made at Indianapolis by Mr. W. H. Brookins, a pupil of the Wrights, who rose in the Wright bi-plane to a height of 4,384 feet. The height was calculated by President Lambert of the St. Louis Aero Club, with the aid of a sextant. Earlier in the same day Mr. Brookins had risen about 2,000 feet. It becomes increasingly difficult for an aeroplane to rise to great heights owing to rarefaction of the upper atmosphere, but the flights of Paulhan and Brookins, as well as various unmeasured altitudes attained in cross-country flights, show that the aeroplane as at present equipped may be depended upon to rise well toward the mile limit.

These are but a few of the interesting flights made within a brief period after the Wright brothers' first successful demonstrations. The number of the aviators who so quickly entered the field, and the prominence given by the press to such feats as those of Blériot, Paulhan, and Curtiss, have tended to distract attention from the original inventors, and to produce some confusion in the popular mind as to the exact share the various aviators have taken in the conquest of the air. The facts, however, are quite clear and unequivocal. At the time when the Wright brothers made their first successful flights, comparatively few people in the world believed that anyone would ever be able to propel himself through the air with safety or certainty in a heavier-than-air apparatus.

The Wright brothers solved the problem after years of patient effort, and solved it effectively and conclusively. They profited of course by the efforts of predecessors, but they were the inventors of the airship in a far fuller sense than, for example, Fulton was the inventor of the steamboat, or Stephenson of the locomotive, or Morse of the telegraph. To their success, and to that alone, must be ascribed the fact that many scores of men in various parts of the world are now able to fly in aeroplanes. Slight modifications of type mark various of these aeroplanes, but no radical departure in principle.

In time, no doubt, flying-machines of quite different types will be invented. Quite possibly the machines of the Wright model will become altogether obsolete. But this can have no possible effect upon the position that the Wright brothers themselves must always hold in the history of scientific progress. The men who fly from New York to San Francisco, or from New York to London, will be carrying out the work of the Dayton pioneers; and no future accomplishment of the heavier-than-air machine can possibly rank in historical importance with that first flight in the presence of witnesses made December 17, 1903. Then and there it was successfully demonstrated that the last difficulty, so far as joining theory and practice was concerned, had been mastered. Potentially, from that moment, the conquest of the air was complete; and the names of the conquerors as all the world knows, and as throughout the future all must remember, are Wilbur and Orville Wright.

APPENDIX
REFERENCE LIST AND NOTES

CHAPTER II
THE HIGHWAY OF THE WATERS

(pp. 77-79). The Great Eastern. The quotation is from Ancient and Modern Ships, by Sir George C. V. Holmes, K.C.V.O., London, 1906.

CHAPTER III
SUBMARINE VESSELS

(pp. 95, 98). The first submarine. As stated in the text the quotation is from a letter written to Thomas Jefferson by David Bushnell, and published in the Transactions of the American Philosophical Society in 1789.

(pp. 104-105). A successful diving boat. The quotation is from The Naval History of the Civil War, by Admiral Porter.

CHAPTER IV
THE STEAM LOCOMOTIVE

(pp. 127, 128). George Stephenson's locomotive of 1825. The quotation is from The History of the First Locomotive in America, by William H. Brown, New York 1874.

CHAPTER VI
THE DEVELOPMENT OF ELECTRIC RAILWAYS

(pp. 179–181). Early experimental railways. The quotation is from the article on "Street and Electric Railways," by Thomas Commerford Martin, in the Special Report of the U. S. Census Office on Street and Electric Railways, Washington, 1905.

CHAPTER IX
NAVIGATING THE AIR

(p. 247). Henson's studies of the flying-machine. The quotation is from Travels in Space, by E. Seton Valentine and F. L. Tomlinson, New York, 1902.

CHAPTER X
THE TRIUMPH OF THE AEROPLANE

(p. 275). How the air supports a heavier-than-air mechanism. The quotation is from an article on "The Flying Machine," by Professor S. P. Langley, in McClure's Magazine for June, 1897.

(p. 284). Langley's aerodrome. The description is from Professor Langley's own account in McClure's Magazine, above cited.

(pp. 289, 290). Experiments of the Wright brothers. The quotation is from an article on "The Wright Brothers' Aeroplane," by Orville and Wilbur Wright, in The Century Magazine for September, 1908.

(p. 298). Cross-country Bight by French officers. The quotation is from the Scientific American of June 18, 1910. This periodical has shown great interest in the new science of aeronautics, and was the first to offer a trophy for long-distance flying—a trophy that was won for the years 1908 and 1909 by Mr. Glenn H. Curtiss. The Wright brothers have declined to compete for prizes; otherwise "records" for cross-country flying and the like would doubtless have advanced even more rapidly than has been the case.