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Aviation History
1909
1909 - 0139.PDF
MARCH 13, 1909. THE HUMAN SIDE OF FLYING. BEING AN ATTEMPT TO INTRODUCE THE READER TO MESSRS. ORVILLE AND WILBUR WRIGHT AT PAU. By H. MASSAC BUIST. x:-r/i " ••••••-'T'1 ••-"••"•;•"•" •-"-• Continued from page 129.) ,v IF we knew the men who first went on the surface of the waters in boats, who first toiled into the bowels of the earth, who first trained the beasts of the pasture-lands to carry or to haul them along, would not the names of those men be immortal, as we know the meaning of that word, enduring to the uttermost reach of history ? Yet men may walk on the dry lands, they may swim or float upon the waters, and they may even dive among them by the use of their own limbs. But the men who have enabled their fellows to invade the realm that Nature seemed to have set aside for birds and insects only, have done a far greater thing than those who first found the means of being borne on the face of the waters or of being drawn along the dry land without effort of their own. The Montgolfier Brothers and the Wrights have each given man the secret of riding the air. The Frenchmen learned how to float amid it, and the Americans have learned how to ride on it, while yet another genius, Marconi, has shown us how to think through it. When every King now reigning shall have been forgotten, the story of these amazing men will be a tale that will be part of the legends of the nations and that will be told to inspire children in their earliest years with the thought of noble deeds and grand achievements for the enlarge- ment of the power of our race. If for no other reason than this, even the crudest attempt to put on record what manner of men Orville and Wilbur Wright are would be justified at this period. Happily for our purpose, how- ever, there is such a fund of human interest that, apart altogether from their amazing achieve- ment, one delights to know them. t5- If he followed the actor's calling ., Mr. Wilbur Wright would scarcely need any make-up to impersonate the Doge Loredano as portrayed by the brush of Giovanni Bellini. Again, there are those characteristics in his face that fit the very ideal of a cardinal; but his rapid utterances and sudden movements would be quite out of keeping wiih the part. Yet again, I saw in Spain a few days since a handsome, clean-shaven peasant who had a not dissimilar type of countenance, but one sought in vain for the activity, mental and bodily, which is characteristic of Mr. Wilbur Wright to such an outstand- ing extent that, no matter how dis- tinguished the visitor to the Champ d'Aviation at Pont Long, the little man with the lean, weather-tanned face stands out for a master among his kind, and the figure in the whole field. By comparison, Mr. Orville Wright does not possess any pronouncedly distinctive personality. That is to say, your eye would not be drawn to him among a crowd of men in the fashion in which it would instinc- tively dwell on Mr. Wilbur. Perhaps " Flight " Copyright Photo.Characteristic.—The photographs usually published of Mr. Wilbur Wright do nottruthfully portray his attitude towards cameras and the users of them. Here"Orv" is revealed to you. An instant before this snap was taken Mr. Wilburwas facing the sun, and engaged in an animated conversation with Mr. Orvilleon the subject of starting with the wind behind the aeroplane. The instant hiseye caught the camera, however, he turned round. Note his bulging pockets filledwith balls of string and so forth. Mr. Orville, you will observe, is not socoy; maybe he learnt the hopelessness of it in America. this is because Mr. Orville's features, including the jaw, are all small, while his eyes are not deep-set like his brother's and have somewhat of a dreamy expression, so that if you were asked to define the mental tempera- ments of the two brothers in a phrase you would say that Mr. Wilbur learned things through his eyes, while Mr. Orville got his knowledge by intuition, with which he is undoubtedly dowered to a rare degree. But you have only to appreciate the severe nature of his injuries and the amazing rapidity of his recovery, owing, the doctors agree, to his sheer determination to get well, to realise that the pale-faced little genius has more than an ordinary man's share of energy. Indeed, were it not that one instinctively contrasts him with Mr. Wilbur, one would gather that Mr. Orville is a man of very great physical activity. He is seldom still for more than a few minutes until, towards sundown, the ache of his heel may compel him to lie on a rug or to sit on a chair, but even so he continues to follow every detail of the flights and preparations for them, shouting instruction or advice from time to time, and being immensely proud that already he is able to climb over the tension wires to get at the motor. Despite the tremendous shock caused to his nervous system by his accident, he has flown in France with his brother, went up in a balloon only a week ago, and often it is plainly as much as he can do to restrain himself from taking control of the aeroplane and making a flight. There never were men who took their work more enjoyably than these " oiseaux artificiels," merely because for them the joy of living lies in the pursuit of their fascinating ambition. " Oh, they have just had no end of fun learning to fly," says Miss Katherine Wright. " To hear them argue around and knock the bottom out cf each other's ideas, then at the end of three hours to find Orv where Wil started off, and Wil where Orv began, is just the killingest thing imaginable, and makes them both burst out laugh- ing—but it saved them no end of useless experiment." Anyone may gather as much who watches them at Pont Long, where never a flight is made but some fresh problem either is presented or is solved, so that you may see the story of their pioneer work being re-enacted morning after morning before the onlookers arrive from the town nine miles away. And you find the secret of their success in the manner in which the problems are faced, as I will illustrate at the moment by citing a single example. Thrice the machine failed to rise when started in a certain wind and faced towards the Pyrenees. Somebody suggested that some of the ground beyond the 75-foot starting rail was so rough and abounding with 141
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