I guess weƵve all seen North Carolina registered vehicles on the road with their iconic ƵFirst in FlightƵ license plates. This motto, of course, commemorates the Wright brothersƵ taking to the air over a distance of 120 feet on Dec. 17, 1903. The flight, at Kittyhawk on North CarolinaƵs Outer Banks, lasted just 12 seconds, but several people witnessed it and someone from the U.S. Life-Saving Service took a photograph to prove it. The brothers made three other flights that same day, and the occasion has gone down in history as manƵs first flight Ƶ but was it?
Not according to the people of Brazil, it wasnƵt. They prefer the claim of a man named Alberto Santos-Dumont.
AlbertoƵs family had made a fortune from coffee planting, and during the 1890s, he was living in Paris. While there, he used his money to experiment with hot air balloons and motorized dirigibles. There is a rumor that during that time he kept a private airship that he used to travel around the city, tethering it to a lamp standard when he dined at his favorite restaurant.
In 1901, Santos-Dumont won a prize for flying a dirigible around the Eiffel Tower, but up until that time all of his flights had been in lighter-than-air machines.
The Wright brothersƵ flight was reported, of course, but most of their experiments were done away from the public eye, they launched their machine off a rail and the flight was aided by the powerful off-shore winds. On Oct. 23, 1906, Santos Dumont demonstrated his own flying machine in front of a large crowd of Parisians. That flight reached a height of 15 feet and flew for 200 feet, but the difference was that the craft took off from the ground instead of a rail and landed safely. By mid-November, Alberto had set the first flying world record when he flew 726 feet.
According to AlbertoƵs followers, this was the first real powered flight because the requirements at the time were that the craft should take off by itself and without assistance, fly a set distance in front of members of the public and then land safely. They say that the Wright brothers did not fulfill these criteria and therefor their flight did not count.
So, who was first, the Wrights or Alberto? The question may be moot because there is yet another contender for the title. For this one, we have to look north to the town of Bridgeport in Connecticut. According to the Bridgeport Sunday Herald of Aug. 18, 1901, four days prior to its publication a man named Gustav Whitehead, who worked as a night watchman at a manufacturing plant, had flown half a mile at a height of 50 feet in a machine that heƵd built himself.
This was more than two years before the Wrights took to the air at Kittyhawk and five before AlbertoƵs flight, so why doesnƵt Whitehead hold the record? For one thing, there were no pictures in the newspaper, just a hand-drawn illustration of the man and his machine. Some five years later, a picture that showed a blurred image of what was reported to be WhiteheadƵs machine was mentioned in the Scientific American magazine, but the photographƵs whereabout are now not known. Whitehead later claimed that he flew 7 miles across Long Island Sound in 1902, but again, there appeared to be little proof.
It would appear that Gustave Whitehead really isnƵt a contender for the title, a theory that was supported in 1930 when an attempt was made to interview two supposed witnesses of that 1901 flight. One was never traced and the other said that the newspaper report was made up. That was how matters stood until more recently. In 1987, however, a replica of WhiteheadƵs design was built and actually flown, then, in 2013, an Australian aviation expert said he had a photograph that showed the picture mentioned in the Scientific American. Not everyone was convinced, but the Connecticut state legislature passed a resolution saying they should have the title ƵFirst in Flight,Ƶ a claim that is refuted by both Ohio and North Carolina.
Whichever of these claims is correct, if one wants to be pedantic then the title should surely be ƵFirst in Powered FlightƵ or ƵFirst in Heavier than Air Flight,Ƶ because none of these pioneers were the first to leave the ground.
The name of the person who was the first to look back at the earth from on high is not known, although once again there are various contenders. The use of hot air balloons was known in China nearly 2,000 years ago. At that time they were small devices used for military signaling and there is no evidence that any were used to carry a man aloft, although there is an obscure report that the Chinese were able to navigate hot air balloons.
The Mongols were known to have used balloons in the 13th century but again there is no evidence of any that carried a human. There is even a theory that Nazca priests may have made the first man-carrying balloons 2,000 years ago to enable them to oversee the construction of the Nazca lines. In an effort to support this contention, in 1975, a hot air balloon capable of carrying a man was constructed using materials available to ancient Peruvians.
The first documented flight by a man actually occurred in 1709 when a Jesuit Priest, Bartoleneu de Gusmao, demonstrated a device before King John V of Portugal and succeeded in rising more than a dozen feet into the air. Details are sparse, witnesses were few and little seems to have come of that demonstration, so it may not count.
The first clearly documented people to ascend were another pair of brothers, Joseph and Étienne Montgolfier. When these two Frenchmen began their experiments in 1782, they came to the attention of the French Royal Academy of Science, which asked them to repeat their demonstration in Paris.
The brothers made a balloon of canvas with paper glued to both sides. The paper was sky blue with the royal cipher on it and, on Sept. 19, 1783, in front of the royal family and a crowd of onlookers, they sent a sheep, a duck and a rooster into the air.
That first flight climbed to nearly 2,000 feet and drifted more than 2 miles before coming down to earth with the animals alive and well. With that initial success, the brothers adjusted the balloon and, on Nov. 21, 1783, a man named Pilâtre de Rozier became the first man to leave the earth and fly in front of witnesses.
So, given all these rival claimants, who do you think was the first in flight? I donƵt think it matters. Ƶ one who has flown the Atlantic numerous times, I am grateful to all of the people whose daring and experimentation made it possible for us to fly.
