Richard Pearse is remembered by a Doper who uses his name as a username. The linked AOPA article suggests that Gustave Whitehead may have flown a poered aircraft on 14 August, 1901, predating both the Wrights and Pearse.
The aircraft has never been found. A purported photograph was supposed to have existed, but was destroyed in a fire at Whitehead’s workshop. An eyewitness account is hardly concrete evidence. Still, a replica of the Condor has been built, and it actually flew about 20 times. Its longest flight was 330 feet.
Of course, I grew up knowing that the first controlled, powered flight was made by Orville Wright on 17 December, 1903. Richard Pearse (the historical figure, not the Doper) wrote:
Some say his statements were taken out of context, or else he was just being polite since the Wrights had already been acknowledged. Claims and counter-claims notwithstanding, if Gustave Whitehead flew, he did it before Pearse. And there are other contenders.
Perhaps one day there will be incontrovertible proof that someone flew a powered aircraft in controlled flight before the Wrights. If that happens I will adjust my opinion, which today is the conventional view. And then we can argue what ‘controlled’ means.
There is no credible evidence that Gustave Whitehead constructed a device which ever left the ground. His machine couldn’t fly. An attempt at reconstruction using modern engines and lightweight materials produced something that could leave the ground, but even still could not have flown in the manner Whitehead described. There really is no doubt that the Wright Bros. were the first to fly a powered aircraft in controlled flight. The part about ‘control’ is the key.
They used the same materials: Spruce, bamboo, silk. Building from the blueprints, I would say that the replica was approximately the same weight as the original.
The modern engine does bring in a variable; but if the engine had the same horsepower as the original, and extra weight was added to the engine area so that the engine/weight system weighed the same as the original engine, I don’t see a problem with that. As the article states, ‘The main idea was to prove the airframe.’
Note that I’m not supporting the idea that Whitehead (or Pearse, or Maxim, or any of the others) achieved the first controlled powered flight. As I said, I’m in the Wright camp. Also as I said, no actual evidence exists that Whitehead did it.
Indeed it is; which is why I mentioned it three times.
My recollections are that some replica used carbon fiber and kevlar in it’s construction. Maybe there has been more than one replica. But the one I read about and saw in a video used a Rotax engine which would have had a much better power density than anything available in Whitehead’s day. An all up engine that produces around 50HP at around 100 lbs. would have been impossible in those times. Further, I haven’t seen anything indicating replica flights were in any way ‘controlled’.
Actually, John Stringfellow beat them all by over half a century in producing an steam-powered, propellor-driven heavier-than-air monoplane:
http://www.teemings.net/series_1/issue15/calmeacham.html
The original movie The Flight of the Phoenix incorrectly states that Stringfellow built it with Henson, and that it was powered by a rubber band. He didn’t (Henson and Stringfelloew, having collaborated on the idea of a flying machine company, had already broken apart) and it wasn’t (Stringfellow built his own lightweight aluminum steam engine, which must’ve cost a fortune back then. It still exists). Stringfellow’s test flights were observed and reported on. Don’t ask for photrographs – it was too early for the taking of photos of rapidly-moving objects.
Stringfellow’s airplane was a miniature, however, and therefore not manned. It also wasn’t controlled. In fact, he had to fly it in buildings or tents because it had no mlateral stability, and he needed to avoid winds. I am utterly amazed that he didn’t think of the idea of a tail for stabilizing – youi’d think it would be suggested by the analogy of the rudder on a boat.
Of course Stringfellow’s craft was not an ‘airplane’, in that it was incapable of carrying an occupant/pilot. I’d call it a ‘model airplane’. There were powered, heavier-than-air aircraft that were not capable of carrying humans before that. George Cayley made a helicopter powered by a whale-bone bow in 1792, influenced by ‘helicopter tops’ that were popular toys in China c. 400 BCE.
…as mentioned at the end of my article. In fact,as I also say, two Frenchmen built a spring-powered helicopter eight years before Cayley. But Stringfellows device was very different from those helicopters – it encompassed many of the features we today associate with an airplane, and looked like one. And it flew, successfully. That may not sound impressive, but I don’t know of anyone else (aside from his son) who built a non-primitive* working heavier-than-air craft until shortly before the full-size flight of the Wright brothers. I know that Langley did.
*like those stick helicopters. There’s a world of difference between those spring-powered helicopters and Stringfellow’s airplane.
